{"id":110435,"date":"2024-02-08T18:05:31","date_gmt":"2024-02-08T16:05:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/?p=110435"},"modified":"2024-02-04T13:50:43","modified_gmt":"2024-02-04T11:50:43","slug":"04-05-93","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/?p=110435","title":{"rendered":"White People Are Going to Colonize Mars, and Other Fears From Today\u2019s Campuses"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>White People Are Going to Colonize Mars, and Other Fears From Today\u2019s Campuses<\/a><\/strong><\/span><\/h5>\n

EMILY BENEDEK<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

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When Ilya Bratman\u2014the Moscow-born linguist and head of eight CUNY and SUNY Hillels\u2014looks out at the students facing him, he sees a familiar threa<\/span>t<\/strong><\/h4>\n<\/div>\n

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\nCity University of New York (CUNY) alumni who support Palestine, protest outside of Chancellor office of CUNY at Midtown Manhattan in New York, United States on December 05, 2023. \/ SELCUK ACAR\/ANADOLU VIA GETTY IMAGES<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

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It was a belated awakening. For many American Jews, Oct. 7 uncovered the deep rot in the elite institutions they had invested in for decades, psychically and financially. A recent poll<\/a> found that 73% of Jewish students experienced or witnessed antisemitic incidents since the beginning of this academic school year, a 22-fold increase over the year before. Jewish students have been punched, spat upon, assaulted with sticks, shouted at, and corralled by students in kaffiyehs.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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But it shouldn\u2019t have come as a surprise that the DEI regime has fostered the flourishing of campus antisemitism under the Palestinian banner. Having established Jews as members of the \u201coppressor\u201d class and defined \u201cjustice\u201d as the dismantling of this class, the officially sanctioned ideology has given license to the Palestinian vanguard to demand fulfillment of the progressive promise, \u201cby any means necessary,\u201d while turning Jewish students into pi\u00f1atas.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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In New York City public colleges, a kippa-wearing, red-headed leprechaun named Ilya Bratman\u2014former U.S. Army tankist, applied linguist, long-distance runner, and immigrant from the former Soviet Union\u2014has witnessed up close the socialization of young Americans into this toxic worldview. A teacher of English composition at Baruch and John Jay colleges who holds a Ph.D. in education from the Jewish Theological Seminary, he also serves as executive director of Hillel at eight CUNY and SUNY colleges.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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On the day we met, Bratman was hosting dinner for 200 Jewish students at a synagogue on 23rd Street near Lexington Avenue. After passing a phalanx of security guards into a social room, they began filling their plates with grilled meat and salads prepared by Bratman\u2019s favorite Georgian caterer.<\/span><\/p>\n

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The narrative of victimhood has become welded to these young people\u2019s identity, leading to a sense of grievance toward America.<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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After the students use cookie cutters to shape chocolate chip cookie dough into Stars of David, Bratman grabbed a microphone and stepped forward. \u201cLast week, everybody was already seated in my 8:00 a.m. class, and a student comes in and she says to me, \u201cWow, I can\u2019t believe you bombed that hospital last night and killed all those people.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The social room, for the first time, went dead quiet.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The student of course was referring to deaths and injuries at the Al-Ahli Hospital in Gaza, whose courtyard was hit on Oct. 17 by a rocket misfired from inside Gaza by Palestinian Islamic Jihad, but which was widely misreported as having been the result of an Israeli missile.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Bratman\u2019s reaction, as a teacher, was to affirm the importance of sound reasoning and argumentation\u2014and, of course, language. \u201cI told her, \u2018Wow, I can\u2019t believe you forgot completely everything I taught you about the accusative voice and the proper use of the pronoun \u2018you,\u2019 because you just said that \u2018I\u2019 did this,\u201d he recounted. \u201c\u2018I\u2019 bombed the hospital. What hospital? Where? Who?\u2019\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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He went on. \u201cDid you hear that Hamas said they<\/em> did it?\u201d Bratman said he asked the student, referring to a conversation Israel had recorded between two terrorists apparently acknowledging the bombing was an own goal.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The student\u2019s response was emblematic of the sectarian worldview into which young Americans are regimented, whereby the value, even the truthfulness, of an argument or action is assessed based on the identity of its author, rather than on its own merits. \u201cI will never believe that,\u201d she told him, \u201ceven if they came to my face and say, \u2018Hamas, we did it.\u2019 I will never believe it.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Bratman told me the students think he\u2019s a fool to read the newspapers and interrogate different sources in search of the truth. They tell him that mainstream media is all fake news, and they get their information from TikTok, which is real people talking about real things. \u201cI\u2019ve seen it,\u201d they tell him. \u201cOn Instagram, on TikTok, I\u2019ve seen it.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cThey don\u2019t read anything. They just read headlines and pictures and memes. And they base their whole worldview on a set of memes.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Ilya Bratman was born in Moscow. He emigrated to the U.S. in 1992 with his parents, graduated from college at the University of Pittsburgh in 1999, then joined the U.S. Army, where he served four years in active duty and four years in the reserves.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Bratman believes strongly in America and the American dream. Teaching American students in New York City has brought him face-to-face with an entirely different worldview\u2014one that appears to be particularly common among students from officially sanctioned \u201cminority\u201d backgrounds. The students don\u2019t appreciate what a gift they\u2019ve been given to live in America. Instead, they are lost in a zero-sum game of calculating relative oppressions. This fixation stops them from learning, Bratman believes, in part because it assures them that they will fail.<\/span><\/p>\n

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In his composition classes, he explained, he tries to get his students to create and support an argument. One week, he asked them to write about space exploration. Should we go to space? Or should we not?<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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One girl argued in favor of space travel because \u201cwhite people will move to space, maybe to Mars, or wherever,\u201d creating a gap, or an opening into which the \u201cindigenous brown and black people can move up in the class structure and fill that gap left behind by the white people who will move to Mars.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cThere\u2019s a lot to unpack there, isn\u2019t there?\u201d Bratman responded. \u201cFirst of all, the belief in this structure where white people are on top, everybody else on the bottom, and the only way to move up is if the white people leave.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Another girl wrote that no, we should not have space travel because then the white people would colonize the Martian people, as they always do, and ruin the Martians\u2019 lives.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Bratman said he asked, \u201cDoes it help you to blame somebody? Do you actually become better? Do you strive further? Do you succeed better because you can blame someone?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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He told me the students have no answer, but they know life \u201cis a victimhood competition. I\u2019m a victim and therefore you owe me, and therefore I don\u2019t have to do anything because I cannot succeed.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The narrative of victimhood has become welded to these young people\u2019s identity, leading to an increased detachment from, and a sense of grievance toward, America\u2014the irony of course being that they and their parents chose to immigrate here. One girl in the class told him: \u201cI am here in this country against my will.\u201d Bratman asked her: \u201cWho\u2019s holding you? Tell me, please. I\u2019m frightened for you,\u201d showcasing his high-energy, high-drama style. \u201cEverybody\u2019s laughing, and I asked her, \u2018Where are you from?\u2019 And she says, \u2018Haiti.\u2019 OK. \u2018And where were you born?\u2019 And she says, \u2018Brooklyn.\u2019\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cSo you\u2019re actually from Brooklyn. Your parents are from Haiti,\u201d he repeated. \u201cWho\u2019s holding you back? Do you really want to go to Haiti today? You should actually go and see what life is like in a noncapitalist, depressed country that is in a desperate economic struggle. Or go to Gaza to a totalitarian, autocratic, hateful, homophobic nation. Or go to North Korea, go to Iran, go to all the places as a young woman, and see what life is really like.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cNone of that is understood,\u201d he told me. \u201cThe students are pawns of teachers who want them to believe they can never succeed. And these teachers have been spectacularly successful at convincing them it is true.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Bratman teaches his Jewish students to adopt a different approach to the world\u2014one anchored in tradition, learning, and the study of Jewish texts. At the dinner in the 23rd Street synagogue, he invited the students to let him know if they\u2019d like to join him in studying Pirkei Avot in honor of IDF soldiers called up for duty. He also has a club of about 80 boys who are laying tefillin every day.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Bratman told me that, in spite of the recent stresses, he\u2019s not worried about his Jewish students. \u201cNinety-nine point nine percent of them are rational people who go out and get jobs, they get married and I go to their weddings and brises.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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But there is something terribly wrong with the others, he believes. \u201cA lot of these students, they\u2019re nice, they\u2019re wonderful people, right? But they look at me as a Jew, and say, \u2018well, you know, because you\u2019re supportive of this Israel story and Israel narrative, you kind of stand with the oppressor, you know, and I\u2019m Hispanic or Black and I have to stand with the oppressed. Or I\u2019m gay and I have to stand with the oppressed.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Bratman\u2019s worry is that these students, by adopting a worldview of grievance, are keeping themselves down with imaginary obstacles and denying their own volition. \u201cWhat they don\u2019t understand is that [these invented obstacles] are all surmountable. It\u2019s my mission to uplift and empower these young people to actually strive for the opportunities that exist and to dispel the false and limiting idea that it\u2019s all impossible.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Bratman told me he had a student at John Jay whom he will never forget, a student struggling mightily at school. \u201cI had many conversations with him,\u201d Bratman said. \u201cI\u2019d say, \u2018come, come on, keep going, keep going.\u2019 And he said, \u2018No, I\u2019m thinking of dropping out.\u2019\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cAnd I\u2019m like, no, no, get through this class. I got you. I got you. And I carried him through this course. And on the last day he came to see me, and he said, \u2018I dropped out of all the classes except for yours. Everybody in my family, including my mother and my grandparents\u2014I don\u2019t know my father\u2014my uncles and everybody said, \u2018What are you doing? Why are you going to college? You can get a job now for $20 an hour, and when you graduate, you\u2019re gonna get a job for $20 an hour. What\u2019s the purpose?\u2019\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Bratman seemed genuinely sad\u2014not angry or offended, just sad\u2014about what he heard next. \u201cNo one ever believed in me,\u201d the student said. \u201cI can\u2019t believe that the first and only person who\u2019s ever believed in me is a white Jew.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

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Emily Benedek<\/strong> has written for Rolling Stone, The New York Times, Newsweek, The Washington Post, and Mosaic, among other publications. She is the author of five books.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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White People Are Going to Colonize Mars, and Other Fears From Today\u2019s Campuses EMILY BENEDEK When Ilya Bratman\u2014the Moscow-born linguist and head of eight CUNY and SUNY Hillels\u2014looks out at the students facing him, he sees a familiar threat . City University of New York (CUNY) alumni who support Palestine, protest outside of Chancellor office […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[6],"tags":[26,24],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110435"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=110435"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110435\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":110566,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110435\/revisions\/110566"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=110435"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=110435"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=110435"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}