Dinner highlights identity crisis
'It's particularly difficult to be an LGBT Jew in a very kind of liberal left-wing world,' Jarod Rhine-Davis said.
A SOLD-OUT Queer Rosh Hashanah dinner in South Yarra has highlighted the growing difficulties faced by LGBTQ Jews navigating identity conflicts within progressive political spaces.
More than 80 people attended the event at the Positive Living Centre on September 13, hosted by Melbourne LGBTQ Jewish organisation Jewmos in partnership with Thorne Harbour Health.
Jewmos director Jarod Rhine-Davis said the dinner aimed to address a community “in a chasm between two communities” as Jewish LGBTQ individuals increasingly find themselves unwelcome in spaces that once provided refuge.
“It’s particularly difficult to be an LGBT Jew in a very kind of liberal left-wing world,” Rhine-Davis said.
“A lot of people are in a chasm between two communities.”
Rhine-Davis described how many LGBTQ individuals who previously found safety in LGBT spaces now experienced those environments as sources of “vitriol or trauma or negative energy” due to progressive attitudes towards Israel.
“Those safety nets are sources of vitriol or trauma or negative energy,” he said, forcing people to “rethink” their relationships with communities that once supported them.
Paradoxically, Rhine-Davis noted it was “much easier to be LGBT in Jewish spaces than it is to be Jewish in LGBT spaces,” citing support from an Orthodox rabbi who wrote a letter endorsing their event.
The dinner drew attendees from both Jewish and non-Jewish backgrounds seeking to engage with Jewish culture.
Federal MPs Josh Burns, Mark Dreyfus, Victorian MP David Southwick and independent MP Monique Ryan sent messages of support for the initiative.
Rhine-Davis described the evening’s atmosphere as “incredible,” with participants joining in traditional songs such as Shalom Aleichem.
The next LGBTQ Shabbat dinner will be held on November 14 at Temple Beth Israel.