Commentary: Some Of Us Still Face the Racism of Centuries Ago

 Someone on Reddit observed that racism in the U.S. is often not as bad as in other countries, where it is essentially woven into the cultural fabrics. This was my reply: 

 While that’s true, some of us do have to face racism. I (Jewish and White) literally had to recently report someone to the FBI for calling me (I kid you not) a “walking lampshade”, and he made very clear in the subject line of his email that he intended to make an Anti-Semitic threat. I’ve also received at least two other Anti-Semitic threats over the past five to six years. For some of us, then, the fallout and ugly revitalization of Early and Mid 1900s racism is real—and my father’s paternal grandfather’s parents had to pass as Poles and Lithuanians just to survive in little out-of-the-way Sugar Notch, Pennsylvania. They could’ve tried to pass in a larger city, although relatively-large Białystok (then the seat of Grodno Gubernia, now the capital of Podlaskie Voivodeship) in Poland (then Russia) was not too far from Szumowo (which we called “Sumeve” or “Shumeve”) or Lipsk (where we lived before we were exiled to Shumeve). Incidentally, writing this, I think that I now understand some of my father’s ancestors’ adversions to living in larger cities: if we weren’t banned from living as open Jews in them (and other ancestors of mine were confined to and/or baptized as Crypto Jews in small towns such as Óbudai and Verseg, Hungary), then we had to face pogroms and/or other dangers (e.g., individualized Anti-Semitic attacks in them).