To ask you to help with a cover story for my Jewish child

[Aislyn]

My eldest is at secondary school and has suffered horrific racist bullying due to being identifiably Jewish. She never told anyone, but they guessed due to her appearance, and her saying Eastern European countries when asked 'where are you from?'

Unfortunately the school has been completely unhelpful, and refused to tackle this.

My second child is starting at second and has sen. They are at even higher risk of bullying. They have an appearance that would mean that they could be identified as Jewish, especially when citing Eastern European countries in response to the above question. Can anyone think of a cover story for my child?

(Yes, I have tried to get them a place at a Jewish school, but there is none available)

Just wanted to express my support, OP. I’m appalled that this has become rife in the UK, in this day and age. No child should have to hide their background in school.

Like pps, I strongly suspect there’s some wilful refusal on this thread to accept that certain demographics might be bigoted, since it ruins the narrative of the victim hierarchy they’ve chosen to believe in.

I’d agree with those suggesting Catholic schools, if it’s possible for you. Back in the 70s and 80s when I was at school I recall it being strongly instilled that Jesus was Jewish, so persecution of the Jewish people was akin to persecuting JC himself. Overall the ethos when I was at a Catholic school (admittedly over 30 years ago!) was one of tolerance for all.

Why are posters making points like this when in reality many people experience bullying based on ethnicities. Some Jewish people can be easily identified than others, so what. OP’s kids can be identified.

Why are people sidetracking by asking op about the British look, etc? Is making points so important?

So many people being (deliberately?) obtuse on this thread. I'm sorry your children are going through this.

I don't doubt your experience. Long story short, my great grandmother was Jewish from around Minsk and ended up in Broughton. My grandad had two sisters and one brother who had dark curly hair and dark features but my grandad, his sister, and youngest brother were strawberry blonde and fairly pale. My mum is a blue-eyed blonde but tanned, I was very pale (inherited from my Irish dad) with very dark curly hair, my son ended up with my curly dark hair, dark skin and dark brown eyes (inherited from his Irish dad).

Never assumed my son looked particularly Jewish. Went through Catholic high school (we're not Catholic) with no problem, but then when he started college with a different demographic, he started to get jokes about his "Jew fro" and about not having to study as his grades were promised to him 3000 years ago. So original. My son's got an Irish surname and has just told people that he's mostly Irish, which is true. If it wasn't true, I don't know if the "banter" would become less jokey. It must be terrifying living with that reality. That's just what a non-Jewish child gets.

Travelled quite a bit with my son and he could have "passed" in the Balkans (but maybe not Serbia), Armenia, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Spain, Romania, Greece, Turkey, Italy and Malta. Not been to Bulgaria.

I really hope everything works out for you and your kids.

Greek?

Because the op hasn’t done anything wrong. She wants to talk about the problems her dc are facing.

The BBC news output doesn’t skew left at all. In terms of art and drama there’s an argument to be made, but not for news.

Yes, I get asked, "Where are you am from" all the time by other Asian people, and the Midlands is never the answer they are interested in. Mostly it's a friendly/curious if irritating (for me) conversation. "Muslims" and "harassment" are not part of my post, those are your words.

What does ‘British’ look like?

Agreed. My daughter goes to catholic school, very diverse kids many different ethnicity's / social backgrounds / religions. Any antisemitism would be given short shift and taken extremely seriously. Very sad it's come to this though for ops kids, they should just be able to go to any school and be accepted.

So why do you think so many Hindus and Sikhs asking you about your heritage? That seems unusual to me.

I've no idea. Maybe go and ask them.

WTAF. What does a British person look like?

Would you consider moving? Because I can tell you that not all schools are like this!

I’m in a SW London borough, plenty of families coming from different countries and practicing different religions, and everybody just gets along.
At the school gates there are muslim mums with headscarves and jewish mums (I know because they said it, I wouldn’t have guessed to be fair), and christian ones as well.
Religion only comes up when we discuss specific events, Ramadan at the moment for ex.

I’m shocked at what you are describing. Not doubting you at all, but miles away from my experience, hence my question about moving.

You were the one supposedly talking to these droves of Asian people interrogating your Indian heritage.

Weird how they didn’t have jobs to do but had all that time to interrogate you.

I think that's something only an antisemitic person would conclude and they would have said the same to any non-anglo-saxon-looking person whatever their response to the "where are you from" question. There isn't a thing that your eldest child could have said to the antisemitic person that would have been an adequate shield - even if they lied and claimed Cyprus ot similar. If the new school your younger child starts at is just as full of antisemites then there will not be any answer that will be an adequate shield but if it's just mainly normal people - ie if it is away from the local area that has such an unusual demographic makeup where you have had previous bad experiences - then the vague answer will be fine.

Wider than Mail Online?

You'd be surprised (with regard to people in general asking about heritage): I've seen this in schools (both as a pupil as a teacher) and I used to get people of both British only heritage and Eastern European heritage asking about my background - my maiden surname was very obviously Slavic.

I've also seen children from one ethnic background picking on children from another ethnic background.

I've also come across medical professionals concealing their heritage in order to avoid harassment.

I agree with you that it often comes from that direction, but I guess a better response is that it doesn’t only come from that direction.

It’s taken me a very long time to see that it can come from all directions because to me being racist and left wing is a contradiction in terms - but some people do seem to manage it!

Oh, absolutely. Racist twats are racist twats and manage to have a range of other world views without seeming to see the hypocrisy.

Why can’t you? I’d homeschool rather than have my child exposed to daily bullying.

Sorry- I’m not blaming you, obviously. Go to the governors- contact your MP- you can’t leave your child in that situation without it causing damage. Again- not blaming you; the bullies are the ones to blame.

Please don't forget some people ask out of curiosity. Nothing nasty, nothing more serious than 'thats a name ive never heard before, where is it from?'

In Poland, Jewish surnames were sometimes a bit more Germanic-sounding. For instance, the Polish-Jewish author Bruno Schulz. Or the heroic children's doctor Janusz Korczak -his birth name was Goldszmit.

Moreover, I imagine the type of bullies OP is dealing with might be alert to stereotypical Jewish surnames like Rosen, Levy, etc. There are surnames that have traditionally been more common among Jewish people.

https://jewishcurrents.org/the-origins-and-meanings-of-ashkenazic-last-names

Being anti-Farage and being antisemitic are not mutually exclusive positions. Quite the opposite I’d say.

Jeremy Corbyn managed the two together quite well. His anti-Semitism has left its mark. Pity he wasn’t so effective in his anti-Farage-ism.

As above. People with racist views have a range of other views.