By late in the day on Oct. 7, 2023, I already felt the world begin to crack down the middle and people scramble frantically to one side or another to stake their positions.
Within moments, it seemed, freedom of speech and its ugly twin, hate speech, were hauled out to justify the vile insults and threats against Jews, as well as the firings, cancellations, arrests and deportations of Muslim and other supporters of a free Palestine. As the expected horror in Gaza unfolded, academic and arts institutions—often under unexamined pressure to pick sides—began falling into line. I watched as Jews became a stand-in for a flag; watched them get ignored, rejected, disinvited or forced out of events. The old familiar role of scapegoat.
Organizations position these decisions and non-decisions as taking a principled stand and not being wishy-washy. I see them as knee-jerk, un-nuanced, bandwagon choices that rarely end well. Not only because I’m one of those Jews.
My debut novel, White, was published in October 2024. It’s about a young woman who grows up in a white supremacist family in Southern Ontario, rejects those beliefs, and attempts to take down the movement from within, with dire consequences. It was turned down by five literary festivals and a lot of media.
One rejection letter explained the decision as a “tricky balance between celebrating bold work and creating a space that feels comfortable for a broad audience.” Nazis and trauma were mentioned as areas of potential discomfort. That rang false to me. Not the discomfort part, that’s precisely the right word. What I don’t buy is that the problem is Nazis and trauma. Many are eager to talk about these things. And literature should make us feel uncomfortable.
It’s possible I’m looking for excuses to justify my exclusion. Maybe it’s a case of low priority—boohoo, cry me a river for a poor ex-white supremacist girl and her ‘issues.’ But the rejections— gentle and flattering—contain words like timely and important, alongside “a bit too heavy.”
I suspect the discomfort they are worried about is less a Nazis-and-trauma problem than one with a Jew writing about antisemitism in the current political climate. The in-your-face title, White, a word and concept that has gone from census category to rallying cry for the good old days, likely doesn’t help.
Inviting me to participate in a festival could imply taking a side in a conflict that Jews are now de facto associated with. My publicly stated opposition to the horror perpetrated by Israel in Gaza, is irrelevant. Things could go sideways on a panel. Funders might pull out. People might squirm. Best not to risk it.
But is the decision antisemitic?
I often find myself isolated as I struggle to avoid knee-jerk yes or no answers to this question. My process often lands me in a different place than the mainstream Jewish community or the progressive left. It can seem easier to pick a position. I just don’t understand it as a choice.
But there is no easy path. Organizations large and small, like TIFF, Montreal Pride, the Vancouver Comic Arts Festival, local literary festivals, face pressure to show that they care about humanity. Unfortunately, it’s often by cancelling those who ostensibly don’t. How painful it must be for leaders to make public-facing decisions that raise the ire of one ‘side’ or the other. There is no compromise to be found, only hell to be paid.
Somehow, Jews have become the third rail that no one wants to touch. And God forbid anyone should mention antisemitism despite the clear and growing number of horrors: from mass murder, to arson, to defacing graves, to lethal threats, to graffiti on synagogues and Jewish-owned businesses.
To many progressives, the mere mention of antisemitism detracts from true problems and suffering. Whether real or ‘imagined’, it is always deemed exaggerated and undeserving of a place alongside other forms of oppression like anti-Black racism, Islamophobia, transphobia or attacks on immigrants. And then there’s the popular perception that Jews whine only about their own fears, and get heard because they are wealthy or well-connected.
This narrative of privilege (itself an antisemitic trope) gets amplified by right wing law makers who do us no favours by using ‘fighting’ antisemitism’ as a trumped-up rationale for shutting down speech and the right to protest.
White was well-received by readers but otherwise mostly ignored. It came out weeks before Donald Trump was re-elected in a surge of unabashed white supremacy. People commented on the incredible, albeit devastating timing. Surely it would spark a lot of interest. I was nervous and over-prepared for the worst kind of attacks, confrontations and perhaps even accusations of Jewish ‘supremacy.’ Instead, I had deep and provocative conversations in indie bookstores across southern and Eastern Ontario and in Montreal. But while the CBC in these places expressed serious interest, as dates drew near, they stopped responding.
I suspect, as Nathan Whitlock of The Walrus’s What Comes Next podcast said to me in an interview about White, it’s not that there were bigger local stories needing coverage, but more a case of media liking to be surprised—just not that surprised. Controlling the narrative is paramount.
Unfortunately, this moment seems to be characterized by a loss of control. And with that comes a lack of moral courage. Organizations may pay lip service to open and nuanced conversation about competing oppressions and divisive tensions. They may even tout them as the path to building solidarity and possibly saving the free world. But in reality, many are cowering.
It’s terrifying to no longer count on journalism or arts institutions to speak truth and take risks. In the end, Jews and other marginalized and vilified groups are forced to talk amongst themselves, which reinforces fear and insecurity, and resolves nothing, or worse.
Take the cancellation of Australia’s largest literary festival in Adelaide in January. 180 participants withdrew after the board caved to pressure and disinvited Palestinian Australian writer and academic Randa Abdel-Fattah, citing “previous statements” and “cultural sensitivities” so soon after an antisemitic mass shooting at Sydney’s Bondi Beach. Is that why we sometimes rescind invitations? Bad timing? The festival has apologized and asked her back next year.
What was accomplished in this decision to shutter speech, yield to political pressure, paternalistically spare people possible discomfort, was the implosion of an important festival that may never recover.
Am I disappointed that my novel didn’t get more attention? Sure. Was the response due in part to my being Jewish and writing about these issues at this time? I think that’s obvious. Is not being invited to a literary festival, or five, a form of antisemitism? In the sense that it’s a trend and that Jews are being treated as a monolith, yes. The same way that it is racist to treat any group of people as homogeneous—as categorically good or bad, worthy or unworthy.
As someone who regularly writes things I fear will offend either my Jewish community or my progressive community, I understand the pull of doing the ‘right’ thing. In a way, like institutions, I am also concerned about my existence and relevance, about being liked. But since nobody is threatening to withhold my funding (wouldn’t it be nice to have funding that might be withheld) I am not, unlike them, paralyzed, flip-flopping and pressured into making one bad decision after another.
If the goal is to superficially appease either the people or the powers that be by scapegoating one group or another, then we are in deep trouble. It terrifies me that in a world where change is happening way too fast, nuance, asking hard questions, and supporting the true diversity that sustains democracy, will always be early casualties.
Aviva Rubin is a Toronto-based writer of memoir, essays and social commentary. Her work has been featured in The New York Times, The Globe and Mail, Chatelaine, Toronto Life and Zoomer as well as numerous anthologies. Rubin is the author of the memoir, Lost and Found in Lymphomaland, a harrowing and funny trip through a cancer diagnosis and treatment. White is her debut novel.