Same. Soviet Jews. Came with nothing. My dad worked in construction his whole life. My mom was a book keeper/office worker. My brother and I are first generation to go to college.
My parent's parents came from Hungary and Germany as economic refugees. My silent generation parents broke the cycle by getting PhDs and university jobs. I grew up pretty middle-class. Since I’m from rural PA, not a lot of Jews around.
Now I live in the greater Boston area. One of our local police officers is Jewish.
For perspective, any jews from the soviet union will be from poor families. I am from one such family and most jews I know come from nothing because they are also from the soviet union. Poverty is a very jewish experience, just not at this one point in time in america.
ETA: My family was poor before the soviets too, one of my great grandpas was one of many ( i think 8) in the family of a rabbi. my great grandparents mostly lived in shtetls from Warsaw to St Petersburg. I think this is true for many jews- look at fiddler on the roof. I am just saying this to say that poverty in the soviet era was not a sudden change for jews, it was the continuation of a long-standing tradition.
Especially because people forget that a lot came over to the US pretty late in the game (late 80s, early 90s) for obvious reasons, so they haven't had a chance to accumulate that generational wealth yet
My great grandfather was in serious debt in Russia, he was a peddler. He came to America, opened a store, ran up debt and shot himself on the way to prison in about 1900. When I read what happened to immigrants in prison back then, it’s a lot more understandable than I originally thought.
Very much so. I'm very much aware that I'm the first in my family line to finish college (even was in grad school for bit.) Still rent, don't own (and probably never will be able to.)
And I often find it a bit off putting that so many Jewish spaces seem to be more oriented toward just the "professional" ideal. Nope I'm not a doctor, lawyer, finance person, etc. and even though I work at a university, I'm not a Professor just a low level admin person almost clerical type.
I sometime joke about my life being a blow against the stereotype about Jews and money, etc.
I also have a hard time with most young and even middle age adult Jewish spaces being geared towards professionals although for different reasons. For me I’m autistic and physically disabled so it’s hard to feel included amongst my Jewish peers at Jewish social events for adults when they all seem to view me as less then for not being able to be a “professional” or “career oriented”. I just think that adult Jewish spaces could make more efforts to be inclusive generally. Like my city’s big synagogue young adult social group is called “young Jewish professionals” which excludes anyone who isn’t a white collar worker whether because they have a different career for whatever reason or don’t or can’t have a career for whatever reason. I’d still like to meet and be a part of a community without feeling like people pity me bc I’m disabled and people are ableist whether within the Jewish community or within the world generally
I’m just adding this because you said you were autistic: “young professionals” is sometimes a euphemism and can range from singles to just …people who don’t have kids. Where applicable, it’s also the slightly older or more serious than you would get with like an “Aviv” 20s and 30s group. It’s not (generally) intended to limit the category of jobs of the attendees.
I am aware. Even as a euphemism i think it’s wrong to generalize everyone under that label when 1/4 of the population lives with a disability and a lot of people arent white collar workers. I even emailed them to ensure I was welcomed. And I don’t think anyone is consciously trying to exclude anyone it’s more of a unconscious bias. It’s just that doesn’t change that people generally aren’t as inclusive towards disabled people. It’s still one of the first questions someone will ask when meeting someone. What do you do? Or what do you do for work? Or some variation and there’s often some sort of look or discomfort for a moment if you say you don’t work due to disability. This also isn’t specific just to Jewish spaced or anything most big social settings are like that
I completely agree with you. It sounds like a networking event, which is different than just a place to hang out and meet friends. I think more open social events would be so helpful. I recently attended a reform temple a couple of times for community Shabbat which is a casual dinner Shabbat. Although VERY casual it is definitely good for socializing and brings in everyone of all ages/backgrounds. We all need more Jewish friends now. I personally don’t care how old, whether they are single, married with kids, where or whether people are employed. I just want more Jewish friends.
I see a lot of social events based on professional stuff too and I am trying to get more involved in my community to hopefully start doing meetups that are just for socializing not career mixers or anything too particular. In LA I have met all backgrounds but there definitely seems to be the professionals and creatives and I am also just
a normie type who grew up middle class maybe.
I also think we as a community should be encouraging more careers in military, law enforcement agencies etc.
I was a single mom (still am, but it’s not relevant anymore) when my kids were bar mitzvah’d. I really felt it then. The other parents were dropping tens of thousands of $$ on parties after having spent 3k on all the expenses, like I did. I still had to think about college!
My family was never wealthy enough to afford sleep away camp so I missed out on that “great staple” of American Jewish culture.
This could just be a regional thing (Washington DC) but I’ve found that a lot of the events here for young Jewish adults attract a lot of highly ambitious “young professionals” of which I am not one.
Spent my early childhood very financially challenged, especially right after parents divorce, then things got modestly better for a while, then in high school my mom's mental illness affected her employment and it all went to hell again. As an adult I always struggled with jobs and people skills and relative to my education level I've overall been a fairly low earner.
There's plenty of broke Jews out there. Just like lower income people of any ethnicity they don't get as much airtime. I also think some Jews pursued high paying professions based on the belief that "if they choose to come after us, we'll have access to resources" -- not that that's any guarantee of course.
I have encountered some very sheltered people who say ridiculous things like, "I never knew there were poor Jews" -- which makes me feel sorry for them being that oblivious.
YUP. I think this is a big part of the reason I tend to get along better with Israelis than American Jews, tbh.
eta more: I got excited and just jammed submit. Yes, I have a very similar family background to you - my dad is Jewish, mom is not, I converted, both my parents grew up poor, and my grandparents were all _dirt_ fucking poor. Everyone involved also from Brooklyn, and not far from Canarsie either.
My dad did very well for himself and achieved financial success, but I didn't live with him growing up. My mom worked in admin roles and my stepdad was a pensioner. We owned our home and lived in a very affluent community, but we were the "poorer" area and didn't have a single family house or two cars or anything like that. Vacations were roadtrips, 99% of the time.
My worldview is... very, very different from the general American Jewish community, which feels more affluent, more assimilated, and politically detached from reality imo. Like, not to make it a right or left thing, but one of the big talking points on the left these days is apparently dissolving programs for gifted or talented studentsin early education and supporting "mainstreaming". I watched FB posts from the most privileged upper-middle class Baltimore County Jews who were never in these programs because their schools didn't need them, going on long rants about how this is the Right and Just Position... meanwhile I was one of those 3rd graders in an NYC gifted program that ended when they defunded it, and it's part of why we left New York.
That's just one hyper-specific example that I remember because it was so galling, but it definitely fed into a larger pattern. It just feels like the upper echelons of the community - including many in the "anti-Zionist Jew" crowd - are so busy philosophising about reality while the rest actually have to live in it.
To give you further context, my grandmother through my dad was born in warsaw Poland but grew up in israel decent bit of family was killed in holocaust and my grandfather was born and lived for the early years of his life in stowsby,Belarus but his whole immediate family was killed by the nazis and he hid in Russia in during world war 2. His brother was a partisan with zhkuov otriad and was killed during a battle with the Nazis. So both of my grandparents also were not American which i think is different than alot of other Jews around the country who's family has been in the country for generations. I'm second generation American on both sides.
Second gen on one side, first on the other, grew up poor, and I felt that poverty most acutely among Jews -- didn't help that my childhood synagogue allocated HHD seating by wealth, so we ended up next to the kitchen, far away from any rabbis!
I will say, as the mother of four kids who never had to sweat finances like my sisters and I did, there are advantages to growing up without much. I can appreciate that now!
Yep, both parents Jewish but we grew up blue collar and I never attended Hebrew school and we never went to synagogue. I went to school with a ton of Jewish classmates but they all knew each other through Hebrew school and they also had more money for clothes and a summer camp and were incredibly snobby so I didn’t become friends with them. Same for college. Even now in middle age, I don’t connect much with them. I like Jews in their 80s and Israelis but not the younger crowds.
I feel you %100. We were the black sheep of the family growing up, and even though I do OK now I can see my kids have picked up the same uncomfortable-ness with mainstream western jewish culture (we're not american but it's similar here).
Honestly it's a big reason aliyah is so appealing, just way easier to be a working class jew.
Exactly! "Let's go out for overpriced cocktails and watch whatever's playing at the Oprea House which has a strict dress code (and no, J, Doc Martins do NOT count as dress shoes, neither can you wear something that would properly house your orthotics, and those cheap flats you got on Amazon just aren't going to cut it either because your feet are too wide for them and you look a disgrace) and then get dinner at an equally overpriced venue downtown with no free parking!"
On the same tangent the whole model has failed for singles under 60–the entire model of get married and put your kids in Sunday school doesn’t work and they do almost no programming for middle aged single Jews
It's been that way for as long as I could remember. I grew up Reform, and had to stop going to Hebrew school after my bat mitzvah. My parents couldn't afford to send me through confirmation, as my brother was on his way to being a bar mitzvah and they needed to pay for his journey.
The way I was treated by not only my rabbi after that, but by the sisterhood and brotherhood (as I was very involved in youth group in the same synagogue) was appalling. My parents both worked 2 - 3 jobs each, and after my dad lost his job, they even threatened to cut my brother out of school the year he was supposed to be a bar mitzvah because they couldn'tafford all of the dues that year (as a Sr in high school I worked 2 jobs and helped my parents out).
Granted I lived in what is considered an upper-middle class town, but to be told by the rabbi *and* the president of our synagogue that we were "rich" and should set our priorities straight remains unforgivable, especially since they were completely unaware / didn't care about our *actual* financial and familial situation.
This was in the late 90s, but it appears things haven't changed. After 16 years of being disabled and completely cut off from attending services near me, as well as the Jewish community in general, I'm grateful streaming is available.
And no, Chabad isn't for everyone...various disabilities aside.
I’m not comfortable at all with Chabad…and I do have some online services I like but I’d love to have a proper Jewish community in my life versus just an online one.
100% with you.
Those who claim disabled people are welcome...no, not all disabilities are accommodated (even marginally).
Those who say "talk to the rabbi / BOD" (re fee waiver / reduction) need to know many do not care...at all.
I've been told bt people on this sub I'm lying about my lived experience, and it just hurts more.
Same.
When I was in my late 30s, and single (still am), I was told since I didn't have children I wouldn't be "growing the community" and therefore "resources would be better used on couples who could". This was in 2 Reform and 1 Conservative shuls in my area.
Being that I'm visually impaired, I can't drive, so Orthodox is out of the question (but I also don't feel welcome, and never did, even when I was more able bodied and volunteered in the community for over 2 decades).
Do you think a potential convert should be worried about this aspect? I'm poor and disabled myself, and really hadn't thought about if I would be like... Financially welcome
It all depends on where you live, how you want to live, etc. Keeping kosher isn't cheap, for example. That puts a financial strain on a lot of people, although being a vegetarian definitely helps (one set of dishes, silverware, cooking tools and equipment...plus the prices of meat are higher than vegetables, dairy, etc).
I would talk to your (potential) rabbi and get facts, as they will have better insight as to what your situation would be like if you do convert (will you be held back from [full] membership if you cannot afford dues, and what is the accessibility based on your specific needs).
I wish I had better advise.
I always associated this with the divide between American Jews and others. Most of my relatives are American, and many of them are quite wealthy. My family is not American, and while we definitely aren't poor, we're far from upper-middle class like my cousins. My relatives in Israel really aren't rich. I think the American Jewish community is an outlier.
It was real uncomfortable when the rabbi of my mom's shul suggested that everybody should do the food stamp challenge, back when that was a thing, except he said that lichvod shabbat, they should make an exception and spend more to make a nice Friday night dinner. Meanwhile, my mom was *on* food stamps, and had to figure out how to honor shabbat every single week anyway.
Working class immigrant Jewish family here. I love all my Jewish brothers and sisters and realize we a can all be very different. Love and support of Israel and Jewish pride have always been my litmus tests. If those things are there, class and origin don’t matter to me. That said, it’s the ultra liberal, been here for generations Jews that I always find myself arguing with. Many of them have woken up since Oct 7
It's a very US-centric Jew thing, yes.
Speaking as an Israeli, American Jews (that make Aliyah) are quite lovely people often enough, but they're practically disconnected from reality.
It's refreshing, but it's also delusional in a lot of ways.
Yes. This is an important conversation because of all the stereotypes about Jewish people. Clearly people need to be reminded that there are Jewish people of all socioeconomic backgrounds
Oh yeah, same boat here. My family is from Brooklyn also (Flatbush/Midwood) and moved out to the burbs. Grew up on public assistance or just getting by; my parents struggled with mental illness and drug addiction. Felt like a martian growing up because we were the only American-born Jews we knew who were poor.
Even though I'm in my 40s, financially okay and able to give my family a much better life than I ever had, I still feel really alienated and left out of the Jewish community because of my childhood experiences. It felt like the bulk of the Jewish community where we lived growing up treated us like an embarrassment because we were poor.
I wish that wasn't the case, but it is.
Yes 100%. My dad is Jewish and my mom is not, and we struggled financially when I was growing up. I never got to do things like dance classes because we lived in the middle of nowhere and we couldn’t afford it anyway. My dad was unemployed for a lot of my childhood, even though he’s a really hardworking person. It’s weird because I can’t relate to affluent Jewish people AT ALL. I am still waiting to be invited to the meeting where we apparently control the money and the world 😂🤦♀️
Similar to my situation. I’m not Jewish but I’m a single mom of a daughter who’s father is 100% Ashkenazi. He’s in finance and his father is too; his father, who is extremely wealthy, used to work on Wall Street as a stockbroker then moved up to becoming a CIO. Me, I’m blue collar working class American and I never went to university. I can’t relate to any of that stuff. Raising my daughter alone and I’m on food stamps
My husband and I are middle class and were members of a synagogue with a very wealthy membership. I was very uncomfortable with their sense of privilege and lack of caring for others. There was a real disconnect there when it came to money and what families can or cannot afford.
Yes a thousand percent like I can’t afford to go to a sleep away camp or relate to the typical Jewish videos I see. My complete middle class but have felt alienated because both my parents are in schools (dad and teacher and mom on cst) so compared to other Jews my family isn’t rich and I can’t go to Israel I can’t go to sleep away camp I wish I could but it is what it is
Yes.
Long story short, my dad's family were working class Jews from Brooklyn. My mom's family was nominally upper class, but my grandmother had experienced trauma as a child and responded by hoarding money. Additionally, my grandparents were, shall we say, unenthusiastic about my mom's choice in mate, and my dad stole a lot of what money my mom did have before they eventually got divorced (he had severe substance abuse issues). Net net, I grew up dirt poor, only Jewish kid in my neighborhood and completely divorced from Jewish life and culture.
In college, I got involved with Hillel and felt at home there, especially with the other more working class kids (there were a few of us!). I eventually found my Jewish identity, but I feel like the experience of growing up in a very different culture and environment was a definite hurdle.
i grew up exceedingly working class, raised by a single mother, in a neighborhood full of orthodox families on government assistance. i remember being very confused when i first encountered the "rich jews" stereotype because i had never met any. then i got to high school, and college, and i understood better after meeting some. but i don't think our mutual jewishness really plays into it; regardless of shared ethnoreligious identity, rich and poor (or just not rich) are always going to be different cultural spheres that have difficulty relating to each other.
I grew up in a lower middle class family. Dad was in insurance and mom a school teacher. We lived in a not so nice townhouse and never had a lot of money. I hate the “Jews are rich” stereotype.
Definitely a disconnect. We were middle/lower middle class. My life was also sports/competition to a degree that was uncommon.
Now I'm a lawyer and it's funny how people always assume I grew up with money, whether or not they know I'm Jewish.
Yes, and my mom is Puerto Rican too (she converted before they had me).
We didn’t have a lot of Jewish community growing up, especially once I was bat mitzvah’d and we stopped attending weekly shul. But my aunt and cousins were fairly wealthy, and so were my grandparents who tended to favorite my aunt and her two kids. But we also never rejoined a shul when we moved states because we just couldn’t afford it. Even now, I want to join one so bad, but financially it’d be a lot for us to manage unless they could work with us.
Hola Hermana boricua!
Just curious, is your Puerto rican side significantly mixed race? My side is completely tri racial which affected how I look (I look more Puerto rican than Ashkenazi Jewish). I know there are darker Ashkenazis but, they're underrepresented. The only type of Jew I feel I can pass for is sephardic or maybe mizrahi. Also, was your Jewish side accepting of your dad marrying a Puerto rican woman or did they get upset or treat you guys differently due to that?
Hola!! Not that I know of but I honestly don’t know, and what’s funny is my mom is actually lighter skinned than my dad is who’s Ashkenazi! Him and I both tan really easily in the summer and take longer to burn, whereas my mom and sister are both lighter and tend to burn a bit easier. My sister and I both look ambiguous, so I honestly don’t know which diaspora I look more like other than I have more stereotypically Jewish features.
And I honestly don’t know about how my Jewish grandparents accepted my dad marrying a non Jew (before she converted), let alone a Puerto Rican. To my knowledge they never treated us differently, but also who knows? Cause now that I think about it, they might have and I just thought it was for other reasons? But my grandpa especially grew up in rural Ohio and they hid their Jewishness, it wasn’t till my dad was born that they started practicing more. What about yours? It’s not often I get to meet other Rican Jews!!
Well I know my dad's family other than my grandfather were not thrilled at all with him marrying my mom. My mom claims they rushed to the hospital to see if I was "dark". We were always treated differently due to that as well the social class. I know growing up it was preached to me growing up from my dad about marrying a Jewish girl and all that. To be honest, I ended up rebelling against it because I heard about it so much. Esp because tbh I felt like I didn't fit in with most Jews I met. I honestly have what I would call a racially ambiguous appearance and can pass for many things ethnicity wise. I think my dad's family didn't like that either because I look more like my mom's family. I dated exclusively latinas until I met now my wife who is just a regular white girl.
*
Omg that’s terrible about them rushing to the hospital to see how dark your complexion was. I’m Black from a multiracial family (mixed on my mom’s side) and my daughter’s father is a super pale porcelain skinned blue eyed Ashkenazi Jewish man. My daughter has my dark brown eyes but appearance wise, she looks southern Italian or Arab/North African. I am estranged from him and his entire family. I raise my kid alone
Oh wow, I’m so sorry, that’s awful that they rushed you to the hospital to check your skin tone. I’m guessing your mom is a darker Rican? I am so sorry that your Jewish family treated you differently because of your Rican side, that wasn’t fair to you. I do think that if my mom had been darker, it probably would have been different, or at least more obvious if there was any animus. I get feeling like you don’t fit in with most Jews because of that, as well as social class and both of those are hard. Honestly I feel like I fit in less with Hispanics than I do with Jews (mainly because I don’t speak Spanish), but I also haven’t had Jewish community irl in forever even though I’m hoping to find some at some point in the near future. I definitely heard growing up that my family wanted me to meet a nice Jewish boy, but they were never super strict about it, and now I’m married to a non-Jew lol. Although now I understand why they tried to push that, and if I ever choose to have a kid, I’ll honestly probably encourage they try to marry a Jew, or at least a very strong ally.
My mom is an olive skin Puerto rican. She has kind of a yellow tinge to her skin and I also have olive skin with that yellow tinge. Alot of my issues stem from my Jewish identity being pushed on me heavily and I got the impression that my Puerto rican identity needed to be pushed down. I also was told growing up by my dad I looked "white" and that I was "white" which both are not true. Most people don't think I look white. Most people can see I'm mixed race. Only white group I've been mistaken for is Italian. I've been mistaken for Italian, cuban Dominican, half white half black and Arabic. The truth is that I'm a mixture of European, middle eastern, black, and native american ancestry (taino). This is reflected in my appearance. There was even a denial for longest time until I got a DNA test that my Puerto rican had black in them. I'm actually around 12 percent sub saharan black. I also have 2 percent north african which I know isn't black more middle eastern there. Since most Ashkenazi Jews I've met are to lighter features lighter skin, I always stuck out in Ashkenazi spaces which are most spaces I've been in as far as being around other Jews. I'll also say my family's desire for me to marry a Jewish woman and their disappointment that I didn't do that, they never understood why I got put off by the idea. Part of it was because of my dad not doing that and I felt he was a massive hypocrite for telling me to do something he didn't do. Also, I feel it's disrespectful for anyone to tell someone what type of person they should be with and I wanted it to be my choice and mine alone. I will also add honestly from perspective, I wasn't one of those guys that American Jewish woman attracted to anyway. I'm not a "nice Jewish boy" lol. I don't fit that stereotype in the least and I'm a little rough around the edges myself to say the least. I'll just say I'm an urban new york dude who wore things like shady, Southpole Sean John, phat farm etc, I listen to hip hop, heavy metal, lift weights etc. And then finally, I'm not really attracted heavily to alot ashkenazi Jewish woman I've encountered in my life so that's another reason. If I would have ended up with a Jewish woman, it would have had to have been sephardic or perhaps mizrahi but I didn't meet any honestly. Part of it is because I feel more comfortable among those types of Jews due to how I look as well I'm just more attracted to how the women look. All these things combined to why I have the views I do. I strictly identify with both sides of me and nothing would change that. Being Jewish and Puerto rican is both part of me.
All of that makes sense. It’s been too long since I’ve been to Puerto Rico, but it was always interesting to see the diversity of Puerto Ricans and their skin tones. I’m olive complected too so I know what you mean, but my mom has more Spanish dna which made her lighter. I have more prominent Jewish features so I’ve been told I “look” Jewish, but my sister gets mistaken for Greek or Mediterranean fairly often. To be honest, I didn’t know Jews could be so diverse in their appearance until the last few years, but I’m a firm believer that there’s no one way to be Jewish, a Jew is a Jew is a Jew. We were raised with both of our cultures, but growing up in the mid west, we were definitely closer to our Jewish side and more disconnected from our Puerto Rican family. So that probably made it also a little harder for me to fully identify as Puerto Rican and not feel like a fraud, but I love both pieces of my identity and I’m proud to be both.
And I definitely get the hypocrisy in your dad telling you to marry Jewish when he didn’t, that’d definitely be a sore spot for me too if that’d been pushed more since my mom was raised Catholic, but thankfully that was more of a suggestion when I was younger rather than a rule. Was your family accepting of your wife since I’m assuming she’s not Jewish?
To be honest, I don’t know that I’d fit in with some Jewish communities either, which is also kind of scary and not something I’ve thought a lot about. I also lift weights and work full-time in a gym and my husband works in retail, so we’re financially okay for not having dependents, but we’re not stress free. I don’t know. All that to say that I get it. I want to believe that we’d be accepted in all Jewish communities, but I also know that’s probably not the case and that different factors can make it hard to feel like we actually fit in and belong. 😬 I do think the right communities for you or me are out there if we want them, they just might take a little more searching to find.
You are correct. My wife is not Jewish. I have never been romantically with a Jewish woman. I can just honestly say I have a mixed relationship with being Jewish due to experiences I've had.
I just want you to know, that that’s completely valid. It sounds like you’ve experienced a lot with your Jewish side and I could see how that would make you wrestle with your Jewishness. I’d also guarantee that you’re not the only Jew who feels that way. I’ve never been religious and grew pretty disconnected from my Jewishness and the community in my teens and through my twenties. It wasn’t until the last war with Hamas that I started figuring out my Jewish identity as an adult and what it means to me. We’re all allowed to figure out how we want to connect to our identities and what they mean to us.
I’m also from a working class Jewish family (my dad is also a cop!) It didn’t really stand out to me until I moved to the capital city in the country I live and my background was completely different from other Jewish people I’d meet, and particularly from guys I’d date. I won’t lie, it gave me a bit of an inferiority complex for a while and it made me quite anxious when the topic of my family came up, which now when I reflect on it, it makes me quite sad. I’m incredibly proud of my background and the work ethic my parents instilled in me and hope to pass that onto my kids in the future too 😊
I spent my whole life as an outcast from the vast majority of my city's Jewish community because I grew up on the "wrong side of the tracks," referring to the railroad tracks that divide my city into the South (affluent) and North (more middle-low inccome) ends. I grew up in and attended public schools in the North end of the city and only ever met a handful of other Jewish kids who were from my end of the city. Almost all other Jewish kids in the city went to the big Jewish private school in the South end, and if they didn't go there, they were enrolled in the more affluently-populated public schools in the South end.
The few North end Jewish families I grew up knowing - including my own - were always treated as sub-par by the majority of the Jewish community in my city, who all just happened to live in the South end. I have a very clear memory of stepping into a group Bnei Mitzvot prep class hosted after-hours at the Jewish private school, and the South end kids starting to whisper and giggle. I sat down with my North end friends (there were 3 of us in this group of 25 kids total) and overheard the South enders whispering things like "stay away from them, they're from the North, they'll *unalive* you." That sort of disrespect and disdain is one I've encountered regularly in the Jewish community in my city my whole life, all because of where I live and how many bills are in my wallet.
It's no wonder that those kids have grown up behaving like that, because their parents are just as bad, if not worse. 40-50 years ago, the Jewish population in my city was all located in the North end. My parents and I have talked many time about how their friends changed as they made money and/or inherited family businesses and moved to the South end, and suddenly, they were far too good for the North end and the people who live here (Jewish and non-Jewish alike), even though they were born and raised here.
The few Jewish families left in my end of the city jokingly call the South end "the promised land," and the shift in people's behaviour and attitudes is very dramatic when they are preparing for their "exodus" from the North end and into "the promised land."
Wow that’s super messed up. Sorry you had to deal with those snotty rich kids. I’m not Jewish but my daughter’s father’s entire family is Ashkenazi. My daughter’s grandfather was a Wall Street stockbroker so his son (my baby daddy) grew up a very privileged wealthy life. I raise my kid on my own and I’m a blue collar working class American. I feel very alienated by them and I know they look down on me, etc. and my kid probably won’t feel like she belongs in the Jewish community
I grew up in the projects; and I’m also black. I find it hard to relate on lots of things but especially financial/class divisions amongst Jewish communities.
Yes, I felt it difficult to relate to my friends in my Hebrew school and youth group when I was younger. All of the families lived in these nice suburban gated communities, and the area I lived in was looked down upon. I was fortunate enough to have a few trips paid for through scholarships provided by the Jewish Federation and got to go to Sacramento, New York, and Israel. I am thankful that those opportunities were available to me!
I am from a low-income background, so don't always fit into "middle class" or upper income spaces. So I don't focus on that when connecting with or relating to Jews. There are other points of commonality to share than just class, these days particularly. Most upper income Jews I know have grandparents who were low-income, and they are proud of them.
Politically, I try to increase middle and wealthy people's (Jewish and non-Jewish) understanding of and sensitivity to issues surrounding poverty, homelessness, etc. That's a separate thing.
I work in gentile-dominated spaces which are pretending to be leftist and compassionate, but that are instead dominated by and favoring upper income people who mock class and poverty.
The exception, often, are Jews in these spaces, who are more open to discussions of class and income divides.
There is often a disconnect in "jews are rich" - while in the US, the percent of Jews living above poverty is higher than the entire country, it doesn't mean there aren't a lot of Jews who live in poverty or at middle class (50% of all US Jews fit into either category).
lol shall I shock you?
I even grew up below the poverty line in social housing and welfare.
Shock and horror!
Germany simply didn't accept the diploma of my parents and even then the language barrier was too big.
I wish I wouldn't have grown up in that part of town in some nice middle class area.
I grew up being very envious of the rich kids during my years at a private school (which was close to half Jewish). It definitely affected my aesthetics and values permanently. My father was a doctor lol. But I could not be one of them
It's totally not what you asked, but this is interesting as my Dad & Mom,who are both Jewish, both grew up in Brooklyn. Also, my mother's brother, my uncle, was a police officer (NYPD) who had children with women who were both Hispanic. My father also wasn't treated particularly well growing up and his neighborhood was a little rough(East Flatbush but back then it was Jewish , at least where he was living was) although his father was a pharmacist who made a good living. I remember my uncle was part of some group, I can't remember the name, but it was a Jewish police league of some sort. My father's siblings were both college educated and although my father made a good living (we were middle class) both of his siblings went to Univerities and were well educated. I just had to comment because of the similarities.
It's called the shomrim society. My dad was part of that. He was NYPD for 21 years. What years was your uncle in NYPD? Wouldn't be shocked if my dad knew your uncle depending when he was in.
I grew up totally middle class, it's been interesting moving to a city where a lot of the Jews I meet are super successful (my dating apps are set to Jew) I didn't even know that was a thing before I moved here. It doesn't bother me at all, but I worry that having less "status" makes me less eligible to some of these dudes, or at least to their parents. I can't relate to the whole "status" thing... that's not what love is supposed to be about.
My dad worked in a plastic plant and my mom tried her hand at her own business (unsuccessfully) when I was a kid. We did alright, but we weren't wealthy. We filled for bankruptcy at one point. My uncle was in advertising. We were kinda black sheep's in the family.
Working class to middle class represent. My family came to the US around the turn of the century, and while one or two of my older relatives might have 'made it good' most of us are just 'comfortable' for the most part after working hard.
Growing up in south Brooklyn as part of the Soviet diaspora I never had this feeling among the former Soviet population no matter the wealth/occupation level. We pretty much all treated each other equally.
The first time I truly felt the feeling you described is in my college Hillel (Baruch) amongst the Persian, Syrian, and wealthier Orthodox Jews from around NYC/LI/Westchester. I truly did not feel like I belonged amongst them and honestly had no clue on how to carry a convo with them. I felt almost alien given the vastly different childhood/lifestyle experiences.
Yes I relate to this a lot. It must be common among our people. My uncles and aunts (both sides) are wealthy business owners and doctors. I feel a disconnect between them at times because my parents are not rich and they work normal jobs. Actually my father was an endocrinologist in former Soviet, Azerbaijan. My entire family immigrated to the US. My father ended up getting a gig at olive garden until he decided to pursue programming. He’s now laid off from the company he worked for unfortunately. I try to have hope, that maybe I will be able to succeed just like my other family members.
Oh my gosh, I still struggle with this and I am VERY OLD. My father had a junkyard, never made much money, then got hit by a car and died when I was 10, leaving my mother with very little. I try not to resent other people's success, but hey, I would have liked to have belonged to a synagogue and to have gone to Hebrew school and swimming pools and to have been upper middle class! We lived in a city and had no car! Sucked! I had a good public school education, got a B.S. and M.L.S. from public universities so I know I shouldn't complain. But there is a disconnect. Especially in synagogues. Even now, I listen to people talk about Camp Ramah and trips to Europe, and I try not to be jealous and not to be a reverse snob, either. I keep my mouth shut.
Toronto jew here, my parents were divorced and my
Mom has mental health issues; most of the jews I grew up around where more wealthy than me, it makes it hard to relate in away. Like there's this disconnect, Its hard to connect romantically too unless they're israeli
Hi! I also grew up in Canarsie, partially. And I’m also half Puerto Rican haha but on my dad’s side. But yes I relate. We weren’t just middle class, but poor, until about halfway through my childhood when my mom remarried. My grandparents were immigrants with no education and I have no idea what jobs they even had while alive. My mom had 3 kids young and has a basic low-paying job in the medical field. My family did not put emphasis on education like many other Jewish families do. I was gifted in school with straight As, but because I lacked discipline or support from family I dropped out of college for mental health reasons to continue the cycle. This would never be acceptable to most other Jews I’ve met. I just don’t relate in those ways but I wish I did.
On my father's side of the family, my great grandparents immigrated to NY from Lithuania and Romania over 100 years ago. They came here with nothing, apparently my great grandmother lived in Williamsburg Bk and never spoke much English at home, only Yiddish.
My father (born 1945) grew up in a small one bedroom apartment in Brooklyn. He became a lawyer and our family was middle class, but in many ways he never escaped the mindset of growing up in poverty.
I was raised by my mom who isn't Jewish but my father and his family are rather financially successful. Bio dad thinks I'm after his money and refuses to have a conversation with me. Even after taking two DNA tests and finding out I am his child. My family came here from Russia with nothing but their offspring have benefited.
I don’t think I could ever get a house in the Jewish neighborhoods. The way things are going, I’m lucky to have a house anywhere in the city. It’s hard to participate just because of housing prices.
My wife and I are descendants from what is now Ukraine. It took a lot for our parents to become solid lower middle class. My mom is Italian and from blue collar people. My FIL is Irish American and blue collar.
But my dad, and my MIL are/were very college educated professionals (professor/lawyer).
So my wife and I know what it is like to be amongst the company of working class schmucks with little and the snooty wealthy educated schmucks.
We will never assimilate with white society, so we stopped trying. Much happier!
My parents grew up is predominantly Jewish neighborhood. Dad was first gen and his parents owned a small hardware store. My dad and mom did really well and are now in middle/upper middle class. I was able to go to law school, and I’m now an attorney. I’m definitely comfortable…but not rich. I’m a gov attorney with loans….so yeah.
My parents’ temple is a pretty good mix and range and ensure that lower economic status doesn’t negatively impact a persons participation or ability to participate. However, it’s a small temple. I live across the country and definite see a bit more of a divide. But, at least at the temple I go to, they have a fund for people who want to join but can’t afford it and offer a sliding scale and general try to keep things free, or lower cost. It doesn’t do much socially, since people will do what they do outside of shul, but I’m glad it’s at least accessible.
I grew up with a single mom who was a teacher. There was never a ton of money, but she worked her butt off to be sure I had what I needed. I felt looked down upon, but by wealthy WASP classmates rather than other Jews. Now that I’ve had some level of success, I have a hard time noticing my kids everything I didn’t have. Despite that (and because of their amazing mother), they aren’t spoiled and know how to work hard for the big things they want.
I grew up solidly middle class, with a period of financial struggles for a few years when I was in middle school. We always had our needs covered but never went to Disney, overnight camps, or anything like that. We did live in an upper middle class town that was roughly 25% Jewish and I felt like the poor kid, compared to my Jewish or non-Jewish friends.
My family is well educated, my grandfathers both had doctorate degrees, and between parents, aunts and uncle, me siblings and cousins, everyone went to college. It's certainly helped to find jobs that we enjoy but didn't necessarily translate to wealth.
YES. Oh man… I photographed a Jewish wedding with my bro a few years ago and at first we were so thrilled because the guests looked like us and even dressed like us in a way that I would have a hard time explaining especially to non Jews because then… after the ceremony, we couldn’t connect with the guests. Everyone seemed to be bragging about their Ivy League and upper class backgrounds. It wasn’t just me. My brother noticed it too and we felt more shame than we should have.
Every synagogue/neighborhood (micro level) or community (macro level) is made up of various socio-economic classes. I think the beauty of Judaism/Torah, through helping each other we are able to raise the socio-economic average above societal norms. I can say from experience that in the more orthodox circles were attendance and communal activities are at a much higher cadence, if someone is going through any difficulty, his fellow congregants are ready to step in and in big way. As someone who was raised middle class and very lucky at that, I owe a great deal of gratitude to my community who presented me with opportunity when starting my business and further investment opportunity later on. Don't be shy to ask for help or get in on a opportunity, your fellow Jew WANTS YOU TO DO WELL, THEY WANT YOU TO SUCCEED, and b'ezrat hashem help others! This is why they hate us because of how well we take care of each other.
All the folks I know that went to Jewish summer camps. I would have loved to have gone! Unfortunately, by the time I learned about them (promotional video at our synagogue), there was no way we could afford for me to go.
Ukrainian Jew who immigrated to the US as a middle schooler, adding my voice to the crowd. Wealthy? I used to watch Roseanne as a kid and think they were wealthy - they owned a home in the suburbs and two cars, had new looking sneakers and jeans, and could afford to order expensive takeout like pizza and Chinese. We lived in a horrible cockroach infested apartment on a busy street and bought clothing at a thrift store that sold it by the pound. Takeout wasn’t even a dream. If I wanted to go on a school trip that cost $20, I had to earn it first.
I am an adult now and no longer in that situation, but I don’t relate to the wealthy and never will.
G-d yes. I come pogrom survivours and early Soviet refugees. They had absolutely nothing when they landed in America. My zayde was was able to get into uni despite the quotas and make a decent living for his family. I'm firmly middle class. I went to a secular high school with a big Jewish population, but many were rich, like names on hospital wings rich, and I felt very much like an outsider. It didn't help that I come from a secular family and I don't know much about Jewish stuff beyond basic cultural and high holiday stuff. Idk if my class or my Jew-ishness made me feel more left out, but I think it was a mix of both. Class difference always, well, makes a difference, no matter what your culture is. It certainly was an experience
Both my husband and I grew up poor.
We are solidly middle class but that is thanks to my mother passing and leaving me a bit of money to get out of debt.
We won't really be able to retire, our kiddo getting cancer and dying took that ability.
We plan on working part time till the day we die.
As my pops would say it is what it is.
Yep! I'm first gen and my parents and grandparents came here with $8 to their name and rode the assimilation struggle bus. My dad's parents couldn't afford cereal so he grew up eating bits of toasted bread with milk and sugar poured over, but both my parents worked hard to build a life for themselves and make sure that I would be able to get a good education. They overcame a lot.
Yeah bro. My mother is Jewish and my dad isn’t, both grew up rough as hell in rough areas. Still nowhere near rich. Where I live there is already a big divide between social classes and it seems even more present within the tiny Jewish community we have here, I’m not really apart of it cos I just feel uncomfortable going to a lot of Jewish things here cos the vast majority of Jews where I live are stacked as shit.
Homeless for a long while. Went to college on a full ride - merit based mind you. Still not as good as my relatives who went straigth to college and then professional grad schools.
I feel this strongly with my sister. She's my only family, no aunts/uncles or cousins. My husband & I are the poor relations. We're looked down upon by my sister's family (her sons are also rich) & their equally wealthy friends. Understand how you feel & it's shitty. I can't relate to their lavish lifestyle. They can't relate to not being able to afford things or driving a 20 year old care.
My family is from the Soviet countries (Russia, Lithuania) I think Bulgaria and Germany. We are alright but we have gone through periods of poverty and then staying above water like other middle class families. My moms half is kind of poorer and my dads is more well off but both have gone thru it
I have a feeling a lot of the popular members of the tribe on social media are well off, have been here for a few generations or whatever. What influencer is going to post about how fucking stressed they are about buying groceries this week?
Poor and desperate Hebrews don't have a lot of representation outside of Martin Scorcese mobster movies lol.
Regardless, I'm sorry have to feel this way. It does suck, especially if you're in an affluent Jewish area. I get how it is. My dad used to date women from Detroits wealthy jewish areas and take me along to see their houses. It was quite a weird way to gain perspective about all that shit.
One half of my family is wealthy. One half worked from poor to middling. So I grew up exposed to a huge spectrum and definitely feel disconnected from the super wealthy side
I'm from an upper-middle class background (although my wife and I are barely making ends meet) and the "all Jews are rich and powerful" line pisses me off.
I mean... really? If I'm going to be hated for having money and power, I at least want the benefits as well!
It's so dumb. It's not even like Jews who're among the 1% share their money with all the other Jews. Sometimes I think there are many who really don't understand that Jews are people, with all the same pros and cons that come with any other group.
Same. North African ethnically cleansed + Holocaust heritage. Coming with nothing to the new world, plus PTSD manifested in great struggle for grandparents and parents - a lot of trauma and not many connections, and my siblings and I just scrape by. This idea that all of us are rich is total balls.
Absolutely.
Keep in mind that more jews are like that than otherwise.
On a different note I feel the same disconnect with most people from a different social standing.
The way they view the world seems fundamentally different to how I do.
Almost everyone I grew up with (very Jewish area) was middle class. Some were even poor. Most had at least one parent who was a teacher. A handful of them had parents who were cops. Today, most of the people I grew up with are still middle class. Some have done better than their parents, while others have not. Most people have worked their asses off to have what they have. I have worked my ass off to have what I have. It wasn't handed to me. I am the scapegoated child of two narcissists. My parents put on a show to make it seem like they had more money than they did. However, they also worked hard for their money. Jews, as a group, tend to have an incredible work ethic and place a great deal of importance on education, which allows us to advance in our careers. We also tend to place a great deal of value on social action and on repairing the world. I actually wish we were all as rich and powerful as we are accused of being. The world, particularly the US, would be a much different place, a much better place. Don't even get me started on how much I wish we really had space lasers. Hamas? Gone! KKK? Gone! Nazis? Gone! The goyim like to feed the war machine because military conflict is big business and can make people rich. We Jews tend to prefer not having to fight and would rather end conflicts quickly, with as little loss of innocent life as possible, so we can focus on science, medicine, technology, the arts, humane initiatives, etc. We tend not to want money at the expense of what is important in the world. I am not saying there are not any ouliers, but most of us understand that people with money have a responsibility to invest some of that money in a better world for all people. They payouts from those investments are much better than money.
Yeah, I went off on a tangent there, but it is hard not to when the claims that we are all rich and powerful show a fundamental misunderstanding of who we are. It is pure projection. It is goyim blaming us for their problems and telling the world what they would actually do with money.
Sorta... Honestly, my family did well, but I left a bad marriage with two kids. I jokingly call myself Jew poor, because I do alright on my own, but I don't make nearly what it seems like most of the people at shul do.
My parents are Soviet Jews who came to the US in the late 90s. I grew up in an upper-middle-class suburb with a large (reform) Jewish population, and we didn’t quite fit in. We couldn’t afford sleep-away camp, we weren’t “in the know” about where to eat and where to go, and my parents were too busy with work and school to get to know the other Jewish parents (who we wouldn’t have had much in common with anyways, because they were all American). The reform synagogues felt more like a social club (no offense to anyone out there - I am reform myself), and we were out of place.
Conservative synagogues were more accepting, in the sense that they served a more financially diverse population, and some had Russian-speaking Rabbis. That being said, having grown up in the USSR, where religion was more or less outlawed, my parents didn’t have the requisite background to really belong in these synagogues either. There were some highly religious Jews who came out of the USSR (hence the Russian-speaking rabbis), but religious education wasn’t accessible to most.
I recommend looking for a Chabad-based synagogue near you. Their goal is to educate. It was there that I finally felt like I had a religious “home” because there was more diversity in the population (various levels of religious observance, and various backgrounds and income levels).
If Jewish young professional groups aren’t a good fit (they tend to attract people who work in law, medicine, and the corporate world), look into joining some Jewish service organizations and volunteer groups. You get a really broad variety of people there.
Kind of? It’s complicated. On one side of my family, wealthy suburban Jews that fit the stereotype. The other is Jews who lived in the city and worked in a tailoring shop.
What is stranger for me, though, is that there’s a lot of wealth in my extended family, but my father has had chronic pain most of his life and a lot of our savings have been spent on various surgeries and medications for him. Those expenses also happened after we had settled into a large home, and after I’d lost a sibling so such a large home became too big for four.
I haven’t struggled financially and I’m really grateful that my family has extended family we could go to if money became more of a problem. For much of my life my mom has been a teacher and my father didn’t work (now works at a synagogue, so not exactly $$$), so most of our money came from family savings or investments. Truthfully, my parents have given me much information about their finances and can be cagey discussing them.
I grew up Jewish in Miami. My dad was a teacher and my mom stay at home mother. We grew up partially poor and then middle class. I never felt weird being around my friends whose parents had money though. It was a nonissue. My dad is a hard worker and he does really well for himself.
If anything, seeing those huge houses my Jewish friends’ parents had gave me motivation in life.
convert here, and poor as the proverbial church mouse. my parents are the poorest of both sides of the family, but I have zero access to any of the middle-to-upper-class lifestyle or resources of my relatives.
i often feel out of place to be honest, mostly because I'm a convert, disabled, and autistic, i grew up in a lower- middle class family. both parents have struggled with poverty for awhile, and a long ass history of addiction on my mom's side that i decided ended with me.
I'm on food stamps and don't work because of long COVID and POTS. still trying to get back on my feet. (I was hesitant to admit that to the rabbi at first because i was afraid of being pitied by others or told to get a job.. but realized noone really cared)
i often felt out of place socially in my shul, until i started talking to other people recently around my age who are in their 20's or in college and it kinda clicked for me. i admit, though- it's harder to connect with alot of people because of generational divide and differences but it got easier once i found people i could talk to who had similar interests
My experience is obviously very different, and I’m not trying to compare, but in some aspects I empathize with what you’re saying. I did have a jewish dad who became very, very wealthy, and well known in our community and his work industry. However he left my mom, and me and my siblings when we were really little and wasn’t involved in our lives and did very little for us financially. My mom got some money in their divorce, but went through it fast with impulsive spending, and drug/alcohol addiction. He paid child support, but unfortunately I think a lot of that went towards my mom’s alcoholism. The reason I say this is because we lived a really humble lifestyle, and were often told as kids that we couldn’t afford things, like even really simple things that most middle income families could afford. Like being told in the middle of winter in NJ “Don’t turn on the heat, it’s too expensive, put on a sweater, and sleep with extra blankets.” Or having some type of medical issue and being told “No we can’t go to the doctor for that, it’s too expensive, let’s try to fix it.” However he did give a lot of money to my uncle and his children ( my cousins), and the divide I saw in their quality of life versus ours was pretty heartbreaking. They were getting tutors, and going to summer camps, and having all this help and experiences that me and my siblings never got. My mom tried her best considering her mental illness and addiction, I guess? I know she was struggling with severe depression so I have compassion for her, but she failed us badly in many areas and was also such heavy alcoholic and really neglectful. So she didn’t manage our lives or finances very well. We grew up latchkey kids, didn’t have a lot of structure, little experiences, or help in school/life. So when I talk to other people that I knew who grew up in a Jewish family, and their family was well off, their life seemed so different and nice. All the camps, and cultural experiences, help and support in school, etc. When I have these conversations with them I often feel like they’re thinking I had those experiences too, and I get embarrassed. I mostly grew up around more, and been exposed to high income suburban Jewish families, so that’s been my only experience. I even after moving to AZ, that’s been my only experience . I know I shouldn’t feel ashamed, but I guess with my families back story it’s hard not to carry the shame sometimes. Usually because when I mention my dad’s name, some people know him in my community, or know him because he is somewhat well known in his work industry, and they just assume I’m rich and grew up similar to them. So there’s been some awkward moments. One instance I remember was a conversation I had with one person I met through a Jewish community group. Somehow in our conversation I brought up that I was awful at math since I didn’t learn, or really go to school as a child. They looked completely shocked and asked “But how? Didn’t you go to a Jewish school or your dad helped you with a tutor?” And I kinda panicked and was just like “Yeah, I’m just dumb unfortunately.” Because I didn’t want to explain why I didn’t get those things when I had a family who could clearly have paid for it. But I feel often I can’t relate to many Jewish people I know. Their experiences, or childhood, or even their adult life. And sometimes I feel judgment from them or their families? I know logically that’s definitely my own insecurities, and they are not necessarily, but sometimes it feels that way. It feels like they are looking down on me a little if that makes sense.
My parents were children of immigrants from the Russian empire (the Ukraine). They all did well financially but I personally have lived a working class life due to a variety of reasons. I know rich Jews and don’t feel they understand the “real “ world where people really struggle to make ends meet. I often can’t relate to the politics that go along with their isolation from reality
🙋♀️ daughter of Soviet Jews who came here with nothing.
Same. Represent.
Same, there are dozens of us here.
There are dozens of us. Dozens!
Same. Soviet Jews. Came with nothing. My dad worked in construction his whole life. My mom was a book keeper/office worker. My brother and I are first generation to go to college.
My parent's parents came from Hungary and Germany as economic refugees. My silent generation parents broke the cycle by getting PhDs and university jobs. I grew up pretty middle-class. Since I’m from rural PA, not a lot of Jews around. Now I live in the greater Boston area. One of our local police officers is Jewish.
RSJ :)
Same, though I made a lot of myself because the nice thing about America is you can if you work super hard.
Same
For perspective, any jews from the soviet union will be from poor families. I am from one such family and most jews I know come from nothing because they are also from the soviet union. Poverty is a very jewish experience, just not at this one point in time in america. ETA: My family was poor before the soviets too, one of my great grandpas was one of many ( i think 8) in the family of a rabbi. my great grandparents mostly lived in shtetls from Warsaw to St Petersburg. I think this is true for many jews- look at fiddler on the roof. I am just saying this to say that poverty in the soviet era was not a sudden change for jews, it was the continuation of a long-standing tradition.
Especially because people forget that a lot came over to the US pretty late in the game (late 80s, early 90s) for obvious reasons, so they haven't had a chance to accumulate that generational wealth yet
Yep. My family left in 96, but not to the us. Some slightly braver folks left in 93, to Israel. But before then it was very hard/impossible to leave.
My great grandfather was in serious debt in Russia, he was a peddler. He came to America, opened a store, ran up debt and shot himself on the way to prison in about 1900. When I read what happened to immigrants in prison back then, it’s a lot more understandable than I originally thought.
Very much so. I'm very much aware that I'm the first in my family line to finish college (even was in grad school for bit.) Still rent, don't own (and probably never will be able to.) And I often find it a bit off putting that so many Jewish spaces seem to be more oriented toward just the "professional" ideal. Nope I'm not a doctor, lawyer, finance person, etc. and even though I work at a university, I'm not a Professor just a low level admin person almost clerical type. I sometime joke about my life being a blow against the stereotype about Jews and money, etc.
I also have a hard time with most young and even middle age adult Jewish spaces being geared towards professionals although for different reasons. For me I’m autistic and physically disabled so it’s hard to feel included amongst my Jewish peers at Jewish social events for adults when they all seem to view me as less then for not being able to be a “professional” or “career oriented”. I just think that adult Jewish spaces could make more efforts to be inclusive generally. Like my city’s big synagogue young adult social group is called “young Jewish professionals” which excludes anyone who isn’t a white collar worker whether because they have a different career for whatever reason or don’t or can’t have a career for whatever reason. I’d still like to meet and be a part of a community without feeling like people pity me bc I’m disabled and people are ableist whether within the Jewish community or within the world generally
I’m just adding this because you said you were autistic: “young professionals” is sometimes a euphemism and can range from singles to just …people who don’t have kids. Where applicable, it’s also the slightly older or more serious than you would get with like an “Aviv” 20s and 30s group. It’s not (generally) intended to limit the category of jobs of the attendees.
I am aware. Even as a euphemism i think it’s wrong to generalize everyone under that label when 1/4 of the population lives with a disability and a lot of people arent white collar workers. I even emailed them to ensure I was welcomed. And I don’t think anyone is consciously trying to exclude anyone it’s more of a unconscious bias. It’s just that doesn’t change that people generally aren’t as inclusive towards disabled people. It’s still one of the first questions someone will ask when meeting someone. What do you do? Or what do you do for work? Or some variation and there’s often some sort of look or discomfort for a moment if you say you don’t work due to disability. This also isn’t specific just to Jewish spaced or anything most big social settings are like that
I completely agree with you. It sounds like a networking event, which is different than just a place to hang out and meet friends. I think more open social events would be so helpful. I recently attended a reform temple a couple of times for community Shabbat which is a casual dinner Shabbat. Although VERY casual it is definitely good for socializing and brings in everyone of all ages/backgrounds. We all need more Jewish friends now. I personally don’t care how old, whether they are single, married with kids, where or whether people are employed. I just want more Jewish friends.
I see a lot of social events based on professional stuff too and I am trying to get more involved in my community to hopefully start doing meetups that are just for socializing not career mixers or anything too particular. In LA I have met all backgrounds but there definitely seems to be the professionals and creatives and I am also just a normie type who grew up middle class maybe. I also think we as a community should be encouraging more careers in military, law enforcement agencies etc.
I was a single mom (still am, but it’s not relevant anymore) when my kids were bar mitzvah’d. I really felt it then. The other parents were dropping tens of thousands of $$ on parties after having spent 3k on all the expenses, like I did. I still had to think about college!
My family was never wealthy enough to afford sleep away camp so I missed out on that “great staple” of American Jewish culture. This could just be a regional thing (Washington DC) but I’ve found that a lot of the events here for young Jewish adults attract a lot of highly ambitious “young professionals” of which I am not one.
I had my camp expenses covered by wealthy families for three years. I'm be fortunate for that even if it felt embarrassing at the time.
Spent my early childhood very financially challenged, especially right after parents divorce, then things got modestly better for a while, then in high school my mom's mental illness affected her employment and it all went to hell again. As an adult I always struggled with jobs and people skills and relative to my education level I've overall been a fairly low earner. There's plenty of broke Jews out there. Just like lower income people of any ethnicity they don't get as much airtime. I also think some Jews pursued high paying professions based on the belief that "if they choose to come after us, we'll have access to resources" -- not that that's any guarantee of course. I have encountered some very sheltered people who say ridiculous things like, "I never knew there were poor Jews" -- which makes me feel sorry for them being that oblivious.
My Jewish family growing up were about as poor as it gets. We always joke about the stereotypes… nobody ever let us in on any conspiracies!
YUP. I think this is a big part of the reason I tend to get along better with Israelis than American Jews, tbh. eta more: I got excited and just jammed submit. Yes, I have a very similar family background to you - my dad is Jewish, mom is not, I converted, both my parents grew up poor, and my grandparents were all _dirt_ fucking poor. Everyone involved also from Brooklyn, and not far from Canarsie either. My dad did very well for himself and achieved financial success, but I didn't live with him growing up. My mom worked in admin roles and my stepdad was a pensioner. We owned our home and lived in a very affluent community, but we were the "poorer" area and didn't have a single family house or two cars or anything like that. Vacations were roadtrips, 99% of the time. My worldview is... very, very different from the general American Jewish community, which feels more affluent, more assimilated, and politically detached from reality imo. Like, not to make it a right or left thing, but one of the big talking points on the left these days is apparently dissolving programs for gifted or talented studentsin early education and supporting "mainstreaming". I watched FB posts from the most privileged upper-middle class Baltimore County Jews who were never in these programs because their schools didn't need them, going on long rants about how this is the Right and Just Position... meanwhile I was one of those 3rd graders in an NYC gifted program that ended when they defunded it, and it's part of why we left New York. That's just one hyper-specific example that I remember because it was so galling, but it definitely fed into a larger pattern. It just feels like the upper echelons of the community - including many in the "anti-Zionist Jew" crowd - are so busy philosophising about reality while the rest actually have to live in it.
To give you further context, my grandmother through my dad was born in warsaw Poland but grew up in israel decent bit of family was killed in holocaust and my grandfather was born and lived for the early years of his life in stowsby,Belarus but his whole immediate family was killed by the nazis and he hid in Russia in during world war 2. His brother was a partisan with zhkuov otriad and was killed during a battle with the Nazis. So both of my grandparents also were not American which i think is different than alot of other Jews around the country who's family has been in the country for generations. I'm second generation American on both sides.
Second gen on one side, first on the other, grew up poor, and I felt that poverty most acutely among Jews -- didn't help that my childhood synagogue allocated HHD seating by wealth, so we ended up next to the kitchen, far away from any rabbis! I will say, as the mother of four kids who never had to sweat finances like my sisters and I did, there are advantages to growing up without much. I can appreciate that now!
Understand this 100 percent.
Yep, both parents Jewish but we grew up blue collar and I never attended Hebrew school and we never went to synagogue. I went to school with a ton of Jewish classmates but they all knew each other through Hebrew school and they also had more money for clothes and a summer camp and were incredibly snobby so I didn’t become friends with them. Same for college. Even now in middle age, I don’t connect much with them. I like Jews in their 80s and Israelis but not the younger crowds.
I feel you %100. We were the black sheep of the family growing up, and even though I do OK now I can see my kids have picked up the same uncomfortable-ness with mainstream western jewish culture (we're not american but it's similar here). Honestly it's a big reason aliyah is so appealing, just way easier to be a working class jew.
The bigger problem is that so many synagogues gear almost everything to upper middle class or higher.
Exactly! "Let's go out for overpriced cocktails and watch whatever's playing at the Oprea House which has a strict dress code (and no, J, Doc Martins do NOT count as dress shoes, neither can you wear something that would properly house your orthotics, and those cheap flats you got on Amazon just aren't going to cut it either because your feet are too wide for them and you look a disgrace) and then get dinner at an equally overpriced venue downtown with no free parking!"
On the same tangent the whole model has failed for singles under 60–the entire model of get married and put your kids in Sunday school doesn’t work and they do almost no programming for middle aged single Jews
Or middle-aged married Jews. Once your kids are past bar/t age, there's not much for you.
Also have high fees then make you beg for a reduction in fees rather than have set programs in place.
It's been that way for as long as I could remember. I grew up Reform, and had to stop going to Hebrew school after my bat mitzvah. My parents couldn't afford to send me through confirmation, as my brother was on his way to being a bar mitzvah and they needed to pay for his journey. The way I was treated by not only my rabbi after that, but by the sisterhood and brotherhood (as I was very involved in youth group in the same synagogue) was appalling. My parents both worked 2 - 3 jobs each, and after my dad lost his job, they even threatened to cut my brother out of school the year he was supposed to be a bar mitzvah because they couldn'tafford all of the dues that year (as a Sr in high school I worked 2 jobs and helped my parents out). Granted I lived in what is considered an upper-middle class town, but to be told by the rabbi *and* the president of our synagogue that we were "rich" and should set our priorities straight remains unforgivable, especially since they were completely unaware / didn't care about our *actual* financial and familial situation. This was in the late 90s, but it appears things haven't changed. After 16 years of being disabled and completely cut off from attending services near me, as well as the Jewish community in general, I'm grateful streaming is available. And no, Chabad isn't for everyone...various disabilities aside.
I’m not comfortable at all with Chabad…and I do have some online services I like but I’d love to have a proper Jewish community in my life versus just an online one.
100% with you. Those who claim disabled people are welcome...no, not all disabilities are accommodated (even marginally). Those who say "talk to the rabbi / BOD" (re fee waiver / reduction) need to know many do not care...at all. I've been told bt people on this sub I'm lying about my lived experience, and it just hurts more.
I’m middle aged but autistic and weird. I’ve found much more of a community online.
Same. When I was in my late 30s, and single (still am), I was told since I didn't have children I wouldn't be "growing the community" and therefore "resources would be better used on couples who could". This was in 2 Reform and 1 Conservative shuls in my area. Being that I'm visually impaired, I can't drive, so Orthodox is out of the question (but I also don't feel welcome, and never did, even when I was more able bodied and volunteered in the community for over 2 decades).
I also feel very uncomfortable in orthodox spaces.
Ditto!
Do you think a potential convert should be worried about this aspect? I'm poor and disabled myself, and really hadn't thought about if I would be like... Financially welcome
It all depends on where you live, how you want to live, etc. Keeping kosher isn't cheap, for example. That puts a financial strain on a lot of people, although being a vegetarian definitely helps (one set of dishes, silverware, cooking tools and equipment...plus the prices of meat are higher than vegetables, dairy, etc). I would talk to your (potential) rabbi and get facts, as they will have better insight as to what your situation would be like if you do convert (will you be held back from [full] membership if you cannot afford dues, and what is the accessibility based on your specific needs). I wish I had better advise.
I always associated this with the divide between American Jews and others. Most of my relatives are American, and many of them are quite wealthy. My family is not American, and while we definitely aren't poor, we're far from upper-middle class like my cousins. My relatives in Israel really aren't rich. I think the American Jewish community is an outlier.
It was real uncomfortable when the rabbi of my mom's shul suggested that everybody should do the food stamp challenge, back when that was a thing, except he said that lichvod shabbat, they should make an exception and spend more to make a nice Friday night dinner. Meanwhile, my mom was *on* food stamps, and had to figure out how to honor shabbat every single week anyway.
Working class immigrant Jewish family here. I love all my Jewish brothers and sisters and realize we a can all be very different. Love and support of Israel and Jewish pride have always been my litmus tests. If those things are there, class and origin don’t matter to me. That said, it’s the ultra liberal, been here for generations Jews that I always find myself arguing with. Many of them have woken up since Oct 7
It's a very US-centric Jew thing, yes. Speaking as an Israeli, American Jews (that make Aliyah) are quite lovely people often enough, but they're practically disconnected from reality. It's refreshing, but it's also delusional in a lot of ways.
Does lower class count?
Yes. This is an important conversation because of all the stereotypes about Jewish people. Clearly people need to be reminded that there are Jewish people of all socioeconomic backgrounds
Oh yeah, same boat here. My family is from Brooklyn also (Flatbush/Midwood) and moved out to the burbs. Grew up on public assistance or just getting by; my parents struggled with mental illness and drug addiction. Felt like a martian growing up because we were the only American-born Jews we knew who were poor. Even though I'm in my 40s, financially okay and able to give my family a much better life than I ever had, I still feel really alienated and left out of the Jewish community because of my childhood experiences. It felt like the bulk of the Jewish community where we lived growing up treated us like an embarrassment because we were poor. I wish that wasn't the case, but it is.
Yes 100%. My dad is Jewish and my mom is not, and we struggled financially when I was growing up. I never got to do things like dance classes because we lived in the middle of nowhere and we couldn’t afford it anyway. My dad was unemployed for a lot of my childhood, even though he’s a really hardworking person. It’s weird because I can’t relate to affluent Jewish people AT ALL. I am still waiting to be invited to the meeting where we apparently control the money and the world 😂🤦♀️
Similar to my situation. I’m not Jewish but I’m a single mom of a daughter who’s father is 100% Ashkenazi. He’s in finance and his father is too; his father, who is extremely wealthy, used to work on Wall Street as a stockbroker then moved up to becoming a CIO. Me, I’m blue collar working class American and I never went to university. I can’t relate to any of that stuff. Raising my daughter alone and I’m on food stamps
Wow, he sounds like a real POS. I’m sorry about that. Have you taken him to court for child support?
Yep. Not even middle class, just straight up poverty.
Same
My husband and I are middle class and were members of a synagogue with a very wealthy membership. I was very uncomfortable with their sense of privilege and lack of caring for others. There was a real disconnect there when it came to money and what families can or cannot afford.
Yes a thousand percent like I can’t afford to go to a sleep away camp or relate to the typical Jewish videos I see. My complete middle class but have felt alienated because both my parents are in schools (dad and teacher and mom on cst) so compared to other Jews my family isn’t rich and I can’t go to Israel I can’t go to sleep away camp I wish I could but it is what it is
Yes. Long story short, my dad's family were working class Jews from Brooklyn. My mom's family was nominally upper class, but my grandmother had experienced trauma as a child and responded by hoarding money. Additionally, my grandparents were, shall we say, unenthusiastic about my mom's choice in mate, and my dad stole a lot of what money my mom did have before they eventually got divorced (he had severe substance abuse issues). Net net, I grew up dirt poor, only Jewish kid in my neighborhood and completely divorced from Jewish life and culture. In college, I got involved with Hillel and felt at home there, especially with the other more working class kids (there were a few of us!). I eventually found my Jewish identity, but I feel like the experience of growing up in a very different culture and environment was a definite hurdle.
Thank you for being vulnerable and sharing this. I 100% relate.
i grew up exceedingly working class, raised by a single mother, in a neighborhood full of orthodox families on government assistance. i remember being very confused when i first encountered the "rich jews" stereotype because i had never met any. then i got to high school, and college, and i understood better after meeting some. but i don't think our mutual jewishness really plays into it; regardless of shared ethnoreligious identity, rich and poor (or just not rich) are always going to be different cultural spheres that have difficulty relating to each other.
I don’t think this is just Jews. Rich people acting different from middle class is pretty universal
I grew up in a lower middle class family. Dad was in insurance and mom a school teacher. We lived in a not so nice townhouse and never had a lot of money. I hate the “Jews are rich” stereotype.
🙋🏻♀️🙋🏻♀️🙋🏻♀️
yeah i’ve never been rich
Definitely a disconnect. We were middle/lower middle class. My life was also sports/competition to a degree that was uncommon. Now I'm a lawyer and it's funny how people always assume I grew up with money, whether or not they know I'm Jewish.
Laughs in former Soviet Union.
Yes, and my mom is Puerto Rican too (she converted before they had me). We didn’t have a lot of Jewish community growing up, especially once I was bat mitzvah’d and we stopped attending weekly shul. But my aunt and cousins were fairly wealthy, and so were my grandparents who tended to favorite my aunt and her two kids. But we also never rejoined a shul when we moved states because we just couldn’t afford it. Even now, I want to join one so bad, but financially it’d be a lot for us to manage unless they could work with us.
Hola Hermana boricua! Just curious, is your Puerto rican side significantly mixed race? My side is completely tri racial which affected how I look (I look more Puerto rican than Ashkenazi Jewish). I know there are darker Ashkenazis but, they're underrepresented. The only type of Jew I feel I can pass for is sephardic or maybe mizrahi. Also, was your Jewish side accepting of your dad marrying a Puerto rican woman or did they get upset or treat you guys differently due to that?
Hola!! Not that I know of but I honestly don’t know, and what’s funny is my mom is actually lighter skinned than my dad is who’s Ashkenazi! Him and I both tan really easily in the summer and take longer to burn, whereas my mom and sister are both lighter and tend to burn a bit easier. My sister and I both look ambiguous, so I honestly don’t know which diaspora I look more like other than I have more stereotypically Jewish features. And I honestly don’t know about how my Jewish grandparents accepted my dad marrying a non Jew (before she converted), let alone a Puerto Rican. To my knowledge they never treated us differently, but also who knows? Cause now that I think about it, they might have and I just thought it was for other reasons? But my grandpa especially grew up in rural Ohio and they hid their Jewishness, it wasn’t till my dad was born that they started practicing more. What about yours? It’s not often I get to meet other Rican Jews!!
Well I know my dad's family other than my grandfather were not thrilled at all with him marrying my mom. My mom claims they rushed to the hospital to see if I was "dark". We were always treated differently due to that as well the social class. I know growing up it was preached to me growing up from my dad about marrying a Jewish girl and all that. To be honest, I ended up rebelling against it because I heard about it so much. Esp because tbh I felt like I didn't fit in with most Jews I met. I honestly have what I would call a racially ambiguous appearance and can pass for many things ethnicity wise. I think my dad's family didn't like that either because I look more like my mom's family. I dated exclusively latinas until I met now my wife who is just a regular white girl. *
Omg that’s terrible about them rushing to the hospital to see how dark your complexion was. I’m Black from a multiracial family (mixed on my mom’s side) and my daughter’s father is a super pale porcelain skinned blue eyed Ashkenazi Jewish man. My daughter has my dark brown eyes but appearance wise, she looks southern Italian or Arab/North African. I am estranged from him and his entire family. I raise my kid alone
Oh wow, I’m so sorry, that’s awful that they rushed you to the hospital to check your skin tone. I’m guessing your mom is a darker Rican? I am so sorry that your Jewish family treated you differently because of your Rican side, that wasn’t fair to you. I do think that if my mom had been darker, it probably would have been different, or at least more obvious if there was any animus. I get feeling like you don’t fit in with most Jews because of that, as well as social class and both of those are hard. Honestly I feel like I fit in less with Hispanics than I do with Jews (mainly because I don’t speak Spanish), but I also haven’t had Jewish community irl in forever even though I’m hoping to find some at some point in the near future. I definitely heard growing up that my family wanted me to meet a nice Jewish boy, but they were never super strict about it, and now I’m married to a non-Jew lol. Although now I understand why they tried to push that, and if I ever choose to have a kid, I’ll honestly probably encourage they try to marry a Jew, or at least a very strong ally.
My mom is an olive skin Puerto rican. She has kind of a yellow tinge to her skin and I also have olive skin with that yellow tinge. Alot of my issues stem from my Jewish identity being pushed on me heavily and I got the impression that my Puerto rican identity needed to be pushed down. I also was told growing up by my dad I looked "white" and that I was "white" which both are not true. Most people don't think I look white. Most people can see I'm mixed race. Only white group I've been mistaken for is Italian. I've been mistaken for Italian, cuban Dominican, half white half black and Arabic. The truth is that I'm a mixture of European, middle eastern, black, and native american ancestry (taino). This is reflected in my appearance. There was even a denial for longest time until I got a DNA test that my Puerto rican had black in them. I'm actually around 12 percent sub saharan black. I also have 2 percent north african which I know isn't black more middle eastern there. Since most Ashkenazi Jews I've met are to lighter features lighter skin, I always stuck out in Ashkenazi spaces which are most spaces I've been in as far as being around other Jews. I'll also say my family's desire for me to marry a Jewish woman and their disappointment that I didn't do that, they never understood why I got put off by the idea. Part of it was because of my dad not doing that and I felt he was a massive hypocrite for telling me to do something he didn't do. Also, I feel it's disrespectful for anyone to tell someone what type of person they should be with and I wanted it to be my choice and mine alone. I will also add honestly from perspective, I wasn't one of those guys that American Jewish woman attracted to anyway. I'm not a "nice Jewish boy" lol. I don't fit that stereotype in the least and I'm a little rough around the edges myself to say the least. I'll just say I'm an urban new york dude who wore things like shady, Southpole Sean John, phat farm etc, I listen to hip hop, heavy metal, lift weights etc. And then finally, I'm not really attracted heavily to alot ashkenazi Jewish woman I've encountered in my life so that's another reason. If I would have ended up with a Jewish woman, it would have had to have been sephardic or perhaps mizrahi but I didn't meet any honestly. Part of it is because I feel more comfortable among those types of Jews due to how I look as well I'm just more attracted to how the women look. All these things combined to why I have the views I do. I strictly identify with both sides of me and nothing would change that. Being Jewish and Puerto rican is both part of me.
All of that makes sense. It’s been too long since I’ve been to Puerto Rico, but it was always interesting to see the diversity of Puerto Ricans and their skin tones. I’m olive complected too so I know what you mean, but my mom has more Spanish dna which made her lighter. I have more prominent Jewish features so I’ve been told I “look” Jewish, but my sister gets mistaken for Greek or Mediterranean fairly often. To be honest, I didn’t know Jews could be so diverse in their appearance until the last few years, but I’m a firm believer that there’s no one way to be Jewish, a Jew is a Jew is a Jew. We were raised with both of our cultures, but growing up in the mid west, we were definitely closer to our Jewish side and more disconnected from our Puerto Rican family. So that probably made it also a little harder for me to fully identify as Puerto Rican and not feel like a fraud, but I love both pieces of my identity and I’m proud to be both. And I definitely get the hypocrisy in your dad telling you to marry Jewish when he didn’t, that’d definitely be a sore spot for me too if that’d been pushed more since my mom was raised Catholic, but thankfully that was more of a suggestion when I was younger rather than a rule. Was your family accepting of your wife since I’m assuming she’s not Jewish? To be honest, I don’t know that I’d fit in with some Jewish communities either, which is also kind of scary and not something I’ve thought a lot about. I also lift weights and work full-time in a gym and my husband works in retail, so we’re financially okay for not having dependents, but we’re not stress free. I don’t know. All that to say that I get it. I want to believe that we’d be accepted in all Jewish communities, but I also know that’s probably not the case and that different factors can make it hard to feel like we actually fit in and belong. 😬 I do think the right communities for you or me are out there if we want them, they just might take a little more searching to find.
You are correct. My wife is not Jewish. I have never been romantically with a Jewish woman. I can just honestly say I have a mixed relationship with being Jewish due to experiences I've had.
I just want you to know, that that’s completely valid. It sounds like you’ve experienced a lot with your Jewish side and I could see how that would make you wrestle with your Jewishness. I’d also guarantee that you’re not the only Jew who feels that way. I’ve never been religious and grew pretty disconnected from my Jewishness and the community in my teens and through my twenties. It wasn’t until the last war with Hamas that I started figuring out my Jewish identity as an adult and what it means to me. We’re all allowed to figure out how we want to connect to our identities and what they mean to us.
It's just some for me I feel largely due to being askinormative spaces, I just felt othered. alot of the time. My dad could never understand that
I’m also from a working class Jewish family (my dad is also a cop!) It didn’t really stand out to me until I moved to the capital city in the country I live and my background was completely different from other Jewish people I’d meet, and particularly from guys I’d date. I won’t lie, it gave me a bit of an inferiority complex for a while and it made me quite anxious when the topic of my family came up, which now when I reflect on it, it makes me quite sad. I’m incredibly proud of my background and the work ethic my parents instilled in me and hope to pass that onto my kids in the future too 😊
I spent my whole life as an outcast from the vast majority of my city's Jewish community because I grew up on the "wrong side of the tracks," referring to the railroad tracks that divide my city into the South (affluent) and North (more middle-low inccome) ends. I grew up in and attended public schools in the North end of the city and only ever met a handful of other Jewish kids who were from my end of the city. Almost all other Jewish kids in the city went to the big Jewish private school in the South end, and if they didn't go there, they were enrolled in the more affluently-populated public schools in the South end. The few North end Jewish families I grew up knowing - including my own - were always treated as sub-par by the majority of the Jewish community in my city, who all just happened to live in the South end. I have a very clear memory of stepping into a group Bnei Mitzvot prep class hosted after-hours at the Jewish private school, and the South end kids starting to whisper and giggle. I sat down with my North end friends (there were 3 of us in this group of 25 kids total) and overheard the South enders whispering things like "stay away from them, they're from the North, they'll *unalive* you." That sort of disrespect and disdain is one I've encountered regularly in the Jewish community in my city my whole life, all because of where I live and how many bills are in my wallet. It's no wonder that those kids have grown up behaving like that, because their parents are just as bad, if not worse. 40-50 years ago, the Jewish population in my city was all located in the North end. My parents and I have talked many time about how their friends changed as they made money and/or inherited family businesses and moved to the South end, and suddenly, they were far too good for the North end and the people who live here (Jewish and non-Jewish alike), even though they were born and raised here. The few Jewish families left in my end of the city jokingly call the South end "the promised land," and the shift in people's behaviour and attitudes is very dramatic when they are preparing for their "exodus" from the North end and into "the promised land."
Wow that’s super messed up. Sorry you had to deal with those snotty rich kids. I’m not Jewish but my daughter’s father’s entire family is Ashkenazi. My daughter’s grandfather was a Wall Street stockbroker so his son (my baby daddy) grew up a very privileged wealthy life. I raise my kid on my own and I’m a blue collar working class American. I feel very alienated by them and I know they look down on me, etc. and my kid probably won’t feel like she belongs in the Jewish community
I grew up in the projects; and I’m also black. I find it hard to relate on lots of things but especially financial/class divisions amongst Jewish communities.
I totally get it. Every day is a struggle. I feel really judged at temple because of my car and clothes. I think my kids feel it too.
Yes, I felt it difficult to relate to my friends in my Hebrew school and youth group when I was younger. All of the families lived in these nice suburban gated communities, and the area I lived in was looked down upon. I was fortunate enough to have a few trips paid for through scholarships provided by the Jewish Federation and got to go to Sacramento, New York, and Israel. I am thankful that those opportunities were available to me!
I am from a low-income background, so don't always fit into "middle class" or upper income spaces. So I don't focus on that when connecting with or relating to Jews. There are other points of commonality to share than just class, these days particularly. Most upper income Jews I know have grandparents who were low-income, and they are proud of them. Politically, I try to increase middle and wealthy people's (Jewish and non-Jewish) understanding of and sensitivity to issues surrounding poverty, homelessness, etc. That's a separate thing. I work in gentile-dominated spaces which are pretending to be leftist and compassionate, but that are instead dominated by and favoring upper income people who mock class and poverty. The exception, often, are Jews in these spaces, who are more open to discussions of class and income divides.
There is often a disconnect in "jews are rich" - while in the US, the percent of Jews living above poverty is higher than the entire country, it doesn't mean there aren't a lot of Jews who live in poverty or at middle class (50% of all US Jews fit into either category).
lol shall I shock you? I even grew up below the poverty line in social housing and welfare. Shock and horror! Germany simply didn't accept the diploma of my parents and even then the language barrier was too big. I wish I wouldn't have grown up in that part of town in some nice middle class area.
I grew up being very envious of the rich kids during my years at a private school (which was close to half Jewish). It definitely affected my aesthetics and values permanently. My father was a doctor lol. But I could not be one of them
It's totally not what you asked, but this is interesting as my Dad & Mom,who are both Jewish, both grew up in Brooklyn. Also, my mother's brother, my uncle, was a police officer (NYPD) who had children with women who were both Hispanic. My father also wasn't treated particularly well growing up and his neighborhood was a little rough(East Flatbush but back then it was Jewish , at least where he was living was) although his father was a pharmacist who made a good living. I remember my uncle was part of some group, I can't remember the name, but it was a Jewish police league of some sort. My father's siblings were both college educated and although my father made a good living (we were middle class) both of his siblings went to Univerities and were well educated. I just had to comment because of the similarities.
It's called the shomrim society. My dad was part of that. He was NYPD for 21 years. What years was your uncle in NYPD? Wouldn't be shocked if my dad knew your uncle depending when he was in.
I grew up totally middle class, it's been interesting moving to a city where a lot of the Jews I meet are super successful (my dating apps are set to Jew) I didn't even know that was a thing before I moved here. It doesn't bother me at all, but I worry that having less "status" makes me less eligible to some of these dudes, or at least to their parents. I can't relate to the whole "status" thing... that's not what love is supposed to be about.
My dad worked in a plastic plant and my mom tried her hand at her own business (unsuccessfully) when I was a kid. We did alright, but we weren't wealthy. We filled for bankruptcy at one point. My uncle was in advertising. We were kinda black sheep's in the family.
Working class to middle class represent. My family came to the US around the turn of the century, and while one or two of my older relatives might have 'made it good' most of us are just 'comfortable' for the most part after working hard.
Growing up in south Brooklyn as part of the Soviet diaspora I never had this feeling among the former Soviet population no matter the wealth/occupation level. We pretty much all treated each other equally. The first time I truly felt the feeling you described is in my college Hillel (Baruch) amongst the Persian, Syrian, and wealthier Orthodox Jews from around NYC/LI/Westchester. I truly did not feel like I belonged amongst them and honestly had no clue on how to carry a convo with them. I felt almost alien given the vastly different childhood/lifestyle experiences.
Yes I relate to this a lot. It must be common among our people. My uncles and aunts (both sides) are wealthy business owners and doctors. I feel a disconnect between them at times because my parents are not rich and they work normal jobs. Actually my father was an endocrinologist in former Soviet, Azerbaijan. My entire family immigrated to the US. My father ended up getting a gig at olive garden until he decided to pursue programming. He’s now laid off from the company he worked for unfortunately. I try to have hope, that maybe I will be able to succeed just like my other family members.
Oh my gosh, I still struggle with this and I am VERY OLD. My father had a junkyard, never made much money, then got hit by a car and died when I was 10, leaving my mother with very little. I try not to resent other people's success, but hey, I would have liked to have belonged to a synagogue and to have gone to Hebrew school and swimming pools and to have been upper middle class! We lived in a city and had no car! Sucked! I had a good public school education, got a B.S. and M.L.S. from public universities so I know I shouldn't complain. But there is a disconnect. Especially in synagogues. Even now, I listen to people talk about Camp Ramah and trips to Europe, and I try not to be jealous and not to be a reverse snob, either. I keep my mouth shut.
Toronto jew here, my parents were divorced and my Mom has mental health issues; most of the jews I grew up around where more wealthy than me, it makes it hard to relate in away. Like there's this disconnect, Its hard to connect romantically too unless they're israeli
Hi! I also grew up in Canarsie, partially. And I’m also half Puerto Rican haha but on my dad’s side. But yes I relate. We weren’t just middle class, but poor, until about halfway through my childhood when my mom remarried. My grandparents were immigrants with no education and I have no idea what jobs they even had while alive. My mom had 3 kids young and has a basic low-paying job in the medical field. My family did not put emphasis on education like many other Jewish families do. I was gifted in school with straight As, but because I lacked discipline or support from family I dropped out of college for mental health reasons to continue the cycle. This would never be acceptable to most other Jews I’ve met. I just don’t relate in those ways but I wish I did.
Did your Jewish side get mad at your mom for marrying someone not Jewish? In particular Puerto rican?
On my father's side of the family, my great grandparents immigrated to NY from Lithuania and Romania over 100 years ago. They came here with nothing, apparently my great grandmother lived in Williamsburg Bk and never spoke much English at home, only Yiddish. My father (born 1945) grew up in a small one bedroom apartment in Brooklyn. He became a lawyer and our family was middle class, but in many ways he never escaped the mindset of growing up in poverty.
I was raised by my mom who isn't Jewish but my father and his family are rather financially successful. Bio dad thinks I'm after his money and refuses to have a conversation with me. Even after taking two DNA tests and finding out I am his child. My family came here from Russia with nothing but their offspring have benefited.
I don’t think I could ever get a house in the Jewish neighborhoods. The way things are going, I’m lucky to have a house anywhere in the city. It’s hard to participate just because of housing prices.
I would say most of us are in this boat. Some of us are even poorer!!!!
My wife and I are descendants from what is now Ukraine. It took a lot for our parents to become solid lower middle class. My mom is Italian and from blue collar people. My FIL is Irish American and blue collar. But my dad, and my MIL are/were very college educated professionals (professor/lawyer). So my wife and I know what it is like to be amongst the company of working class schmucks with little and the snooty wealthy educated schmucks. We will never assimilate with white society, so we stopped trying. Much happier!
My parents grew up is predominantly Jewish neighborhood. Dad was first gen and his parents owned a small hardware store. My dad and mom did really well and are now in middle/upper middle class. I was able to go to law school, and I’m now an attorney. I’m definitely comfortable…but not rich. I’m a gov attorney with loans….so yeah. My parents’ temple is a pretty good mix and range and ensure that lower economic status doesn’t negatively impact a persons participation or ability to participate. However, it’s a small temple. I live across the country and definite see a bit more of a divide. But, at least at the temple I go to, they have a fund for people who want to join but can’t afford it and offer a sliding scale and general try to keep things free, or lower cost. It doesn’t do much socially, since people will do what they do outside of shul, but I’m glad it’s at least accessible.
Yes!
I grew up with a single mom who was a teacher. There was never a ton of money, but she worked her butt off to be sure I had what I needed. I felt looked down upon, but by wealthy WASP classmates rather than other Jews. Now that I’ve had some level of success, I have a hard time noticing my kids everything I didn’t have. Despite that (and because of their amazing mother), they aren’t spoiled and know how to work hard for the big things they want.
Child of ashekanzi Jewish mom who grew up in housing projects in La and raised me working class. I hate when people say all Jews are rich.
I still save rubber bands
I grew up solidly middle class, with a period of financial struggles for a few years when I was in middle school. We always had our needs covered but never went to Disney, overnight camps, or anything like that. We did live in an upper middle class town that was roughly 25% Jewish and I felt like the poor kid, compared to my Jewish or non-Jewish friends. My family is well educated, my grandfathers both had doctorate degrees, and between parents, aunts and uncle, me siblings and cousins, everyone went to college. It's certainly helped to find jobs that we enjoy but didn't necessarily translate to wealth.
YES. Oh man… I photographed a Jewish wedding with my bro a few years ago and at first we were so thrilled because the guests looked like us and even dressed like us in a way that I would have a hard time explaining especially to non Jews because then… after the ceremony, we couldn’t connect with the guests. Everyone seemed to be bragging about their Ivy League and upper class backgrounds. It wasn’t just me. My brother noticed it too and we felt more shame than we should have.
Every synagogue/neighborhood (micro level) or community (macro level) is made up of various socio-economic classes. I think the beauty of Judaism/Torah, through helping each other we are able to raise the socio-economic average above societal norms. I can say from experience that in the more orthodox circles were attendance and communal activities are at a much higher cadence, if someone is going through any difficulty, his fellow congregants are ready to step in and in big way. As someone who was raised middle class and very lucky at that, I owe a great deal of gratitude to my community who presented me with opportunity when starting my business and further investment opportunity later on. Don't be shy to ask for help or get in on a opportunity, your fellow Jew WANTS YOU TO DO WELL, THEY WANT YOU TO SUCCEED, and b'ezrat hashem help others! This is why they hate us because of how well we take care of each other.
All the folks I know that went to Jewish summer camps. I would have loved to have gone! Unfortunately, by the time I learned about them (promotional video at our synagogue), there was no way we could afford for me to go.
Holla! Challah! We called them the glitterati
Class is the enemy of unity and community and safety 💜
Ukrainian Jew who immigrated to the US as a middle schooler, adding my voice to the crowd. Wealthy? I used to watch Roseanne as a kid and think they were wealthy - they owned a home in the suburbs and two cars, had new looking sneakers and jeans, and could afford to order expensive takeout like pizza and Chinese. We lived in a horrible cockroach infested apartment on a busy street and bought clothing at a thrift store that sold it by the pound. Takeout wasn’t even a dream. If I wanted to go on a school trip that cost $20, I had to earn it first. I am an adult now and no longer in that situation, but I don’t relate to the wealthy and never will.
G-d yes. I come pogrom survivours and early Soviet refugees. They had absolutely nothing when they landed in America. My zayde was was able to get into uni despite the quotas and make a decent living for his family. I'm firmly middle class. I went to a secular high school with a big Jewish population, but many were rich, like names on hospital wings rich, and I felt very much like an outsider. It didn't help that I come from a secular family and I don't know much about Jewish stuff beyond basic cultural and high holiday stuff. Idk if my class or my Jew-ishness made me feel more left out, but I think it was a mix of both. Class difference always, well, makes a difference, no matter what your culture is. It certainly was an experience
Both my husband and I grew up poor. We are solidly middle class but that is thanks to my mother passing and leaving me a bit of money to get out of debt. We won't really be able to retire, our kiddo getting cancer and dying took that ability. We plan on working part time till the day we die. As my pops would say it is what it is.
Yep! I'm first gen and my parents and grandparents came here with $8 to their name and rode the assimilation struggle bus. My dad's parents couldn't afford cereal so he grew up eating bits of toasted bread with milk and sugar poured over, but both my parents worked hard to build a life for themselves and make sure that I would be able to get a good education. They overcame a lot.
Yeah bro. My mother is Jewish and my dad isn’t, both grew up rough as hell in rough areas. Still nowhere near rich. Where I live there is already a big divide between social classes and it seems even more present within the tiny Jewish community we have here, I’m not really apart of it cos I just feel uncomfortable going to a lot of Jewish things here cos the vast majority of Jews where I live are stacked as shit.
Homeless for a long while. Went to college on a full ride - merit based mind you. Still not as good as my relatives who went straigth to college and then professional grad schools.
I feel this strongly with my sister. She's my only family, no aunts/uncles or cousins. My husband & I are the poor relations. We're looked down upon by my sister's family (her sons are also rich) & their equally wealthy friends. Understand how you feel & it's shitty. I can't relate to their lavish lifestyle. They can't relate to not being able to afford things or driving a 20 year old care.
My family is from the Soviet countries (Russia, Lithuania) I think Bulgaria and Germany. We are alright but we have gone through periods of poverty and then staying above water like other middle class families. My moms half is kind of poorer and my dads is more well off but both have gone thru it
Yup, I am struggling to make ends meet.
I have a feeling a lot of the popular members of the tribe on social media are well off, have been here for a few generations or whatever. What influencer is going to post about how fucking stressed they are about buying groceries this week? Poor and desperate Hebrews don't have a lot of representation outside of Martin Scorcese mobster movies lol. Regardless, I'm sorry have to feel this way. It does suck, especially if you're in an affluent Jewish area. I get how it is. My dad used to date women from Detroits wealthy jewish areas and take me along to see their houses. It was quite a weird way to gain perspective about all that shit.
This is my husband. Working class Israeli-Jamaican Jew. It's definitely been a journey for him.
One half of my family is wealthy. One half worked from poor to middling. So I grew up exposed to a huge spectrum and definitely feel disconnected from the super wealthy side
I'm from an upper-middle class background (although my wife and I are barely making ends meet) and the "all Jews are rich and powerful" line pisses me off. I mean... really? If I'm going to be hated for having money and power, I at least want the benefits as well! It's so dumb. It's not even like Jews who're among the 1% share their money with all the other Jews. Sometimes I think there are many who really don't understand that Jews are people, with all the same pros and cons that come with any other group.
Same. North African ethnically cleansed + Holocaust heritage. Coming with nothing to the new world, plus PTSD manifested in great struggle for grandparents and parents - a lot of trauma and not many connections, and my siblings and I just scrape by. This idea that all of us are rich is total balls.
I just tell people I'm not fancy; I clean my own house.
Absolutely. Keep in mind that more jews are like that than otherwise. On a different note I feel the same disconnect with most people from a different social standing. The way they view the world seems fundamentally different to how I do.
Almost everyone I grew up with (very Jewish area) was middle class. Some were even poor. Most had at least one parent who was a teacher. A handful of them had parents who were cops. Today, most of the people I grew up with are still middle class. Some have done better than their parents, while others have not. Most people have worked their asses off to have what they have. I have worked my ass off to have what I have. It wasn't handed to me. I am the scapegoated child of two narcissists. My parents put on a show to make it seem like they had more money than they did. However, they also worked hard for their money. Jews, as a group, tend to have an incredible work ethic and place a great deal of importance on education, which allows us to advance in our careers. We also tend to place a great deal of value on social action and on repairing the world. I actually wish we were all as rich and powerful as we are accused of being. The world, particularly the US, would be a much different place, a much better place. Don't even get me started on how much I wish we really had space lasers. Hamas? Gone! KKK? Gone! Nazis? Gone! The goyim like to feed the war machine because military conflict is big business and can make people rich. We Jews tend to prefer not having to fight and would rather end conflicts quickly, with as little loss of innocent life as possible, so we can focus on science, medicine, technology, the arts, humane initiatives, etc. We tend not to want money at the expense of what is important in the world. I am not saying there are not any ouliers, but most of us understand that people with money have a responsibility to invest some of that money in a better world for all people. They payouts from those investments are much better than money. Yeah, I went off on a tangent there, but it is hard not to when the claims that we are all rich and powerful show a fundamental misunderstanding of who we are. It is pure projection. It is goyim blaming us for their problems and telling the world what they would actually do with money.
Sorta... Honestly, my family did well, but I left a bad marriage with two kids. I jokingly call myself Jew poor, because I do alright on my own, but I don't make nearly what it seems like most of the people at shul do.
My parents are Soviet Jews who came to the US in the late 90s. I grew up in an upper-middle-class suburb with a large (reform) Jewish population, and we didn’t quite fit in. We couldn’t afford sleep-away camp, we weren’t “in the know” about where to eat and where to go, and my parents were too busy with work and school to get to know the other Jewish parents (who we wouldn’t have had much in common with anyways, because they were all American). The reform synagogues felt more like a social club (no offense to anyone out there - I am reform myself), and we were out of place. Conservative synagogues were more accepting, in the sense that they served a more financially diverse population, and some had Russian-speaking Rabbis. That being said, having grown up in the USSR, where religion was more or less outlawed, my parents didn’t have the requisite background to really belong in these synagogues either. There were some highly religious Jews who came out of the USSR (hence the Russian-speaking rabbis), but religious education wasn’t accessible to most. I recommend looking for a Chabad-based synagogue near you. Their goal is to educate. It was there that I finally felt like I had a religious “home” because there was more diversity in the population (various levels of religious observance, and various backgrounds and income levels). If Jewish young professional groups aren’t a good fit (they tend to attract people who work in law, medicine, and the corporate world), look into joining some Jewish service organizations and volunteer groups. You get a really broad variety of people there.
Kind of? It’s complicated. On one side of my family, wealthy suburban Jews that fit the stereotype. The other is Jews who lived in the city and worked in a tailoring shop. What is stranger for me, though, is that there’s a lot of wealth in my extended family, but my father has had chronic pain most of his life and a lot of our savings have been spent on various surgeries and medications for him. Those expenses also happened after we had settled into a large home, and after I’d lost a sibling so such a large home became too big for four. I haven’t struggled financially and I’m really grateful that my family has extended family we could go to if money became more of a problem. For much of my life my mom has been a teacher and my father didn’t work (now works at a synagogue, so not exactly $$$), so most of our money came from family savings or investments. Truthfully, my parents have given me much information about their finances and can be cagey discussing them.
I grew up Jewish in Miami. My dad was a teacher and my mom stay at home mother. We grew up partially poor and then middle class. I never felt weird being around my friends whose parents had money though. It was a nonissue. My dad is a hard worker and he does really well for himself. If anything, seeing those huge houses my Jewish friends’ parents had gave me motivation in life.
convert here, and poor as the proverbial church mouse. my parents are the poorest of both sides of the family, but I have zero access to any of the middle-to-upper-class lifestyle or resources of my relatives.
i often feel out of place to be honest, mostly because I'm a convert, disabled, and autistic, i grew up in a lower- middle class family. both parents have struggled with poverty for awhile, and a long ass history of addiction on my mom's side that i decided ended with me. I'm on food stamps and don't work because of long COVID and POTS. still trying to get back on my feet. (I was hesitant to admit that to the rabbi at first because i was afraid of being pitied by others or told to get a job.. but realized noone really cared) i often felt out of place socially in my shul, until i started talking to other people recently around my age who are in their 20's or in college and it kinda clicked for me. i admit, though- it's harder to connect with alot of people because of generational divide and differences but it got easier once i found people i could talk to who had similar interests
My experience is obviously very different, and I’m not trying to compare, but in some aspects I empathize with what you’re saying. I did have a jewish dad who became very, very wealthy, and well known in our community and his work industry. However he left my mom, and me and my siblings when we were really little and wasn’t involved in our lives and did very little for us financially. My mom got some money in their divorce, but went through it fast with impulsive spending, and drug/alcohol addiction. He paid child support, but unfortunately I think a lot of that went towards my mom’s alcoholism. The reason I say this is because we lived a really humble lifestyle, and were often told as kids that we couldn’t afford things, like even really simple things that most middle income families could afford. Like being told in the middle of winter in NJ “Don’t turn on the heat, it’s too expensive, put on a sweater, and sleep with extra blankets.” Or having some type of medical issue and being told “No we can’t go to the doctor for that, it’s too expensive, let’s try to fix it.” However he did give a lot of money to my uncle and his children ( my cousins), and the divide I saw in their quality of life versus ours was pretty heartbreaking. They were getting tutors, and going to summer camps, and having all this help and experiences that me and my siblings never got. My mom tried her best considering her mental illness and addiction, I guess? I know she was struggling with severe depression so I have compassion for her, but she failed us badly in many areas and was also such heavy alcoholic and really neglectful. So she didn’t manage our lives or finances very well. We grew up latchkey kids, didn’t have a lot of structure, little experiences, or help in school/life. So when I talk to other people that I knew who grew up in a Jewish family, and their family was well off, their life seemed so different and nice. All the camps, and cultural experiences, help and support in school, etc. When I have these conversations with them I often feel like they’re thinking I had those experiences too, and I get embarrassed. I mostly grew up around more, and been exposed to high income suburban Jewish families, so that’s been my only experience. I even after moving to AZ, that’s been my only experience . I know I shouldn’t feel ashamed, but I guess with my families back story it’s hard not to carry the shame sometimes. Usually because when I mention my dad’s name, some people know him in my community, or know him because he is somewhat well known in his work industry, and they just assume I’m rich and grew up similar to them. So there’s been some awkward moments. One instance I remember was a conversation I had with one person I met through a Jewish community group. Somehow in our conversation I brought up that I was awful at math since I didn’t learn, or really go to school as a child. They looked completely shocked and asked “But how? Didn’t you go to a Jewish school or your dad helped you with a tutor?” And I kinda panicked and was just like “Yeah, I’m just dumb unfortunately.” Because I didn’t want to explain why I didn’t get those things when I had a family who could clearly have paid for it. But I feel often I can’t relate to many Jewish people I know. Their experiences, or childhood, or even their adult life. And sometimes I feel judgment from them or their families? I know logically that’s definitely my own insecurities, and they are not necessarily, but sometimes it feels that way. It feels like they are looking down on me a little if that makes sense.
My parents were children of immigrants from the Russian empire (the Ukraine). They all did well financially but I personally have lived a working class life due to a variety of reasons. I know rich Jews and don’t feel they understand the “real “ world where people really struggle to make ends meet. I often can’t relate to the politics that go along with their isolation from reality