“Extreme, insufferable, close-minded”: Allison Josephs criticises media outlets’ depiction of Orthodox Jews
Allison Josephs, the Founder and Executive Director of Jew In The City, a non-profit organisation that seeks to change negative perceptions of religious Jews, appeared on the most recent episode of Podcast Against Antisemitism where she spoke of the often-used tropes used against Orthodox Jews in the media.
“I think the general way that we see Orthodox Jews depicted is extreme, insufferable, xenophobic, close-minded,” Ms Josephs said. She added that “that’s not to say that those types of people don’t exist,” but lamented how the “normative religious Jew” was portrayed as “dysfunctional and abusive”.
Speaking on the hotly debated Netflix drama series Unorthodox, which revolves around the life of a former Hasidic Jew from Brooklyn, Ms Josephs described the premise as “troubling”.
“Put that dynamic on any other minority community, where you put ‘un’ in front of it,” she said. “Unblack? Unhispanic? It’s a really gross dynamic that you become celebrated when you become less of what you are.”
Also discussed during the conversation was the Netflix film ‘You People’ and the myriad of tropes it used in depicting Jewish people. Campaign Against Antisemitism produced a short review of the film earlier this year.
When asked why she felt that much of the media depicts Orthodox Jews in a negative light, she said: “There are not a small number of Jews in media. Hollywood was founded by Jews because of antisemitism, and so they started their own thing out west, and a lot of them were running from their own persecution. And when you’re persecuted for being a Jew, that leaves you with a lot of complicated feelings about your relationship to your identity.”
Ms Josephs criticised media outlets for disproportionately telling negative Jewish stories over positive ones.
“What doesn’t happen is the happy people, who are happy and healthy and living meaningful lives as religious Jews, they are not contacting The New York Times, they are not contacting Netflix, they are going about their business living their best life, so their stories don’t get told,” she said. “There’s also something salacious about all of the drama.”
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Podcast Against Antisemitism, produced by Campaign Against Antisemitism, talks to a different guest about antisemitism each week. It streams every Thursday and is available through all major podcast apps and YouTube. You can also subscribe to have new episodes sent straight to your inbox.
Previous guests have included comedian David Baddiel, television personality Robert Rinder, writer Eve Barlow, Grammy-Award-winning singer-songwriter Autumn Rowe, and actor Eddie Marsan.
