People Are Getting What Whoopie Goldberg Said All Wrong

Racial language has evolved.

A few days ago, TV personality, Whoopie Goldberg made some damning statements on The View about Jews.

The topic of discussion was “To Kill a Mockingbird” and “Maus” being removed from school curriculums because they detail the harsh reality of racism. The Holocaust was also brought up to compliment Whoopie’s point about how education on racism should not be removed from schools.

But…she made a “crucial mistake.”

She said that The Holocaust wasn’t about race.

“It’s about man’s inhumanity to man.”

After she made those statements she was suspended from The View for two weeks. Here’s the thing.

With all due respect to the Jewish community, I don’t find Whoopie’s comments damaging or heinous.

Here’s why.

Most Black People Think of Judaism as an Ethno-Religious Marker — Not a Race

I’ve taken multiple sociology classes on race.

Today, Judaism isn’t considered a race. Most people don’t understand that race, ethnicity, and nationality are completely different things.

I’d consider Judaism more of an ethnicity than a race. Heck, most people in school never learn about Judaism as a race. You’re either black, white, Asian, or a mix of those.

However, I also learned later in this class that western and eastern Europeans who migrated to America in the 1800s weren’t considered “white” when they got here. For example, the Irish immigrated to America to escape the famine, but they couldn’t get the best jobs at first. They were often grouped with blacks and other racial minorities.

But as more racial minorities (meaning people of different colors) immigrated to America (e.g. Japanese people, Haitians, Jamaicans), the guidelines changed on who could be considered white. The “Aryan race” was becoming more scarce and there was too much diversity to separate white Jews and other Europeans from the classic white protestant Anglo-Saxons.

Thus, all European immigrants became “white” whereas people of color remained at the bottom of the totem pole.

That’s the history of what “white” means in America, but I had no idea that this similar line of thinking was done in Germany during the Holocaust.

I Educated Myself

I had to do some digging in the comments section of the video to figure out why people were so mad at her statement.

Here’s one that stuck out to me:

“Jewish people, Romani people, and everyone who wasn’t part of the Aryan race was a treat for the Nazis.”

Ahhh…*lightbulb*

It makes sense to me now why the Jewish community would be upset. But when Whoopie made that comment, it didn’t come from a malice place to me. It seemed like she genuinely didn’t know.

And if we’re talking about the language we use today, Whoopie is technically right.

The Holocaust was about race when it happened. But since our language is more developed today, most people, including myself, don’t view Jews as a race.

This isn’t to say that Jew aren’t marginalized, but Judaism itself isn’t a race in America.

You can’t check a box for your race on your job application that says “Jewish.”

Final Thought

This confusion is exactly why Critical Race Theory is crucial in classrooms.

People have different understandings of what race is. For some people, Judaism is an ethnoreligious marker — not a race. For others, Judaism is a race because it was not the “Aryan race” and therefore, the Nazis decided to murder them en masse.

This situation is touchy, but that’s why both parties must understand racial language during World War 2 and racial language today.

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