March 23, 2017

This post was originally published on JOFA’s Blog at The Jewish Week on March 22, 2017.

When we talk about inclusion, we normally think of it as a general strategy. Let’s be accessible! Let’s be welcoming! But the goal of inclusion is not just to apply these broad values in a community, but to also tailor inclusion practices to specific needs so that the efforts actually make a difference. Personalization in partnership with difference is the ultimate inclusion strategy.

At B’nai David-Judea, a Modern Orthodox synagogue in LA, this is exactly how we are approaching our inclusion of individuals of all abilities. In order to truly be inclusive, we believe we need to identify the individualized needs first so that we can properly and in the best way respond to them. We took this tailoring strategy because it is in alignment with our greater mission: To include all in prayer, Torah study, and the sacred work of being a Jew.

Whether we are raising awareness and decreasing stigma around mental illness or if we are addressing the delicate balance between upholding Torah law and welcoming our LGBT friends with love and respect, we recognize that inclusion is not one size fits all.

Close to a year ago, however, we wanted to step up our efforts to include individuals with physical and cognitive challenges. As a result, we started building awareness, implementing ‘people-first’ language, and acknowledging and responding to that which was going unseen.

We first saw the need during a women’s learning session, in which the issue of disabilities was raised. What began as a conversation discussing the needs of various community members from our synagogue turned into the formation of an Inclusion Committee, a volunteer-run group of individuals with a joint desire to help individuals with all needs. With help from HaMercaz, a local organization (funded by the Jewish Federation of Greater Los Angeles) with expertise in Jewish special needs inclusion, we began by determining areas of strength and areas of growth within our synagogue and ways we could impact the broader Los Angeles Jewish community.

Our initiatives within the Inclusion Committee focus on three major areas: physical accessibility of the synagogue, culture and awareness, and youth and families. Subcommittees were formed to focus on these areas.

In order to promote accessibility, we procured large print prayer books, magnifying sheets, and put up signs around the synagogue to publicize wheelchair-accessible bathrooms and elevators. Other future initiatives include developing better accessibility to our third floor where youth groups meet weekly and a wheelchair ramp to the bima for the women’s section in the sanctuary (the men’s section is already accessible).

Within the culture and awareness group, we devoted a section of our synagogue website to inclusion, providing resources for individuals of all ages and bolstering awareness of the need for inclusion within our community. The newly created Janet Wolf z”l Inclusion Fund, in memory of a congregant whose passion was working with children with special needs, will help provide monetary support for the Inclusion Committee’s important work. We joined with a local organization (ETTA) to host a Shabbaton for adults with special needs, and we continue to encourage extending Shabbat meal invitations to those who may be left out.

Our youth and families subcommittee is focusing on counselor training and how we register kids for our Shabbat youth program, and we are offering alternative options for bar/bat mitzvah kids to celebrate the unique abilities of each participant. In the works is an initiative to provide young adult learning and social activities, as well as family mentoring and a buddy program.

In implementing our ideas, we have also seen even more opportunities for inclusion, and we are eager to tackle those challenges.

As an Orthodox shul, we believe our inclusion efforts must be based in Torah and mitzvot. In Pirkei Avot 4:3 Ben Azai teaches, אַל תְּהִי בָז לְכָל אָדָם, וְאַל תְּהִי מַפְלִיג לְכָל דָּבָר, שֶׁאֵין לְךָ אָדָם שֶׁאֵין לוֹ שָׁעָה וְאֵין לְךָ דָבָר שֶׁאֵין לוֹ מָקוֹם “Do not scorn any person, and do not discount anything. For there is no person who has not their hour, and no thing that has not its place.”

This is the purpose of all of our inclusion initiatives at B’nai David-Judea. Every person who walks into our shul has something unique to give and receive. Each person has her hour and his place, and no one should be discounted or overlooked. Our job is to make our synagogue the right place at the right time for each individual, in partnership with those expressing the need. This is what we strive for when we tailor our inclusion efforts. Because inclusion is not one size fits all, we are committed to tailoring our garment so it truly fits each individual.

Debra Mizrahi Smith is the co-chair of B’nai David-Judea’s Inclusion Committee. Adynna Swarz is the executive director B’nai David-Judea. Rabbanit Alissa Thomas-Newborn is a clergy member at B’nai David-Judea.

Note from Michelle K. Wolf: Synagogues interested in starting their own Inclusion Committees can order the definitive guide, The Jewish Community Guide to Inclusion of People with Disabilities on how to get started, create a plan and implement a customized program, written by Shelly Christensen, MA, a national leader and innovator in this field.

[Countless articles have been written since the November election about the electorate and the voting habits—present and future—of various demographic segments. For example, in a recent Slate.com article a Harvard prof suggested that Millennials (a cohort of some 95 million young Americans) were going to become more conservative and that the Democrats ought to beware. Community Advocates asked two of the leading mavens on Millennials, Morley Winograd and Michael Hais, to offer their analysis.—David A. Lehrer]

The Future and Young Voters?

By Morley Winograd and Michael Hais*

“The man who is not a socialist (read ‘liberal’ in the United States) at 20 has no heart, but if he is still a socialist at 40, he has no brain.” That aphorism has been variously attributed to Winston Churchill, George Bernard Shaw, and French World War I-era Prime Minister Aristede Briand. Most recently, the idea that people move from liberal to conservative beliefs and votes as they age was stated by Harvard political scientist, Yascha Mounk. However, as so often happens when conventional wisdom comes up against empirical data, the outcome is quite different.

First, young people are not always liberal (or socialist). Mounk, in fact, provides an example when he writes that “in France…Marine Le Pen’s National Front does much better among the young than the old.” The same can be said about Hungary, Poland, and Slovakia and, to a lesser extent, Germany.

Closer to home, a longitudinal analysis of survey data by political scientist, Patrick Fisher, indicates that, “In every presidential election from 1960-1976 the 18-34 year old age group was the most Democratic age group, but in the presidential elections from 1980-1992 the 18-34 age group was the most Republican age group. Especially notable is the strong preference of younger voters for Ronald Reagan, which dispels the stereotype that younger voters tend to support relatively younger candidates.” It also refutes the canard that younger voters always support liberals and Democrats.

But, could it be that those “younger voters” who start out as liberals or Democrats eventually turn to the right as they age? In most cases, the answer is no.  A classic example is the GI or Greatest Generation, those Americans born in the first quarter of the 20^th century who lived through and overcame the Great Depression and then won World War II. That generation voted heavily for Democrats starting with Franklin D. Roosevelt, awarding him 85% of their vote in 1932. (Generations, Strauss and Howe, p. 262) As late as 2004, the last measurable segment of GI generation voters gave Democrat John Kerry a majority of their votes.

So, there is no clear tendency for voters to move right or left or toward either party as they age, as Mounk suggested. Instead, as Professor Fisher indicates, due to differing socio-economic conditions experienced during their formative years (generational theorists would add differing parental child rearing practices to the mix), “different generations have distinct political leanings that they will tend to maintain over their lifetime.”

In fact, there is data from Pew Research demonstrating that there is a direct relationship between the identity of the president when voters were 18 years old and the partisanship of those voters in the elections that followed. The perceived success or popularity of a president during a voter’s formative years influences their vote even decades later. Younger Boomers and older Gen-X’ers who came of age during the term of the popular Ronald Reagan voted disproportionately Republican in elections from 1996 to 2010. On the other hand, Boomers who were 18 during Richard Nixon’s tumultuous administration have consistently cast Democratic votes in later years while Boomers and X’ers who came of age during Jimmy Carter’s presidency have normally been Republican in their partisanship.

Meanwhile, in Pew’s initial survey of the Trump presidency, Millennials disapproved of his performance by greater than a 2:1 (64% to 28%) margin. Even among white 18-29 year olds, 59% disapproved. A just published survey conducted by NORC at the University of Chicago similarly found that Millennials disapprove of Trump at rates ranging from 55% (whites) to 71% (African Americans). Unlike Mounk’s unfounded predictions of the future voting behavior of Millennials, this data point alone suggests that Millennials’ Democratic tendencies are likely to be reinforced unless the president’s appeal to their generation increases significantly.

There is a body of accumulated academic research and current polling making possible a realistic forecast of how America’s most populous generation will vote in the future.  Not surprisingly, those projections suggest that the Democrats currently have the edge in winning the long term loyalties of Millennials. While Mounk points out that white Millennials voted for Donald Trump over Hillary Clinton by a plurality of 47% to 43% in 2016, it should be noted that the Millennial generation is not only America’s largest, it is also the nation’s most diverse. About 40% of all Millennials and close to half of the generation’s youngest cohort are nonwhite. Around one in five have at least one immigrant parent. Latinos 18-29 voted for Clinton by a greater than 2.5:1 margin (68% to 26%). Among African-Americans in that age range the ratio of Clinton to Trump voters was nearly 10:1 (85% to 9%). That overwhelming Democratic vote among nonwhite Millennials meant that Clinton carried the entire generation handily (54% to 37%).

Party identification is an even better indicator of the deeper partisan proclivities of Millennial (and other) voters than their choice in a single election. That is because in each of the five presidential elections of the 21^st century, about 90% of those who identify with a party voted for the nominee of that party. And, by 1.6:1 majority (57% to 36%) Millennials identify with or lean toward the Democratic rather than Republican party.

Younger (18-25 years old) and older Millennials (26-35 years old) are equally likely to call themselves Democrats. Two-thirds (66%) of Latino and 84% of African-American Millennials identify with or lean toward the Democratic Party. White Millennials are evenly divided in their party ID (47% for each party). White female Millennials are decisively Democratic (54% to 39%). It is only among white males that the GOP has an edge over the Democrats among Millennials (57% to 40%).

Yascha Mounk may be right in saying that nothing in politics is foreordained. But, in the contest to capture the loyalties of the Millennial generation and control the future of American politics, the Democratic Party continues to hold a clear advantage.

*Morley Winograd and Michael Hais are co-authors of “Millennial Makeover, Millennial Momentum and Millennial Majority.”