Last year I agreed to become a once-a-week volunteer for the Friendship Circle when a friend asked me to do so.
At first, I had no idea what the Friendship Circle was or what I was getting myself into. I went to The Shul where I watched a video about the project, which is organized by Lubavitch of Wisconsin.
The video talked about how, sometimes, special needs children don’t have friends like their brothers and sisters might have, and how important it is to them to have someone who comes to their house just to play with them.
It also talked about how a volunteer coming to the house to play with the child can give the family members a chance to relax.
In the video, the special needs children were so happy when they were with the volunteers. Parents talked about how they loved seeing their child with a friend.
I had never thought about how special needs children might not have friends of their own and feel left out when their siblings spend time with friends.
I thought it sounded like a nice way to spend my time, but it also seemed like a pretty big commitment to go to the special friend’s house every week. I decided I would give it a try.
The first time I pulled up into my special friend’s driveway, I did not know who I was going to be spending time with each Sunday or what I was going to do.
I rang the doorbell and Jonathan opened the door with a huge smile on his face and a warm welcome. Right away he began telling me about his favorite activities and about his family. Each week we played a different game and most of the time Jonathan would beat me, which he enjoyed.
It was a good feeling knowing that Jonathan was happy when I spent time with him each week. I realized that in order to get to know him and to be a friend, seeing him every Sunday was important. It was a big commitment, but it was worth it.
This year, I began seeing a new special friend, Ben. Before I began seeing him, all I knew about him was that he used a computer to talk. On my first visit, I walked into his house and saw Ben sitting in a wheel chair with a keyboard in front of him.
At first, I didn’t know how I was going to have a friendship with him because I didn’t know if I would be able to understand him. I quickly learned that talking with Ben would not be a problem at all. I also found out right away that he has a sense of humor.
Every week we have done something different from going shopping, to seeing movies, walking around his neighborhood, and visiting the Wisconsin Humane Society. We also went to a Chanukah bowling party, Shabbat dinner at The Shul and the Purim carnival with all of the other friends and volunteers.
Spending time with Ben has given me a new perspective and I admire him for meeting the challenges he faces every day of his life. I have learned and realized that I take for granted every day just the simple ideas of walking and talking.
I really enjoy my Sundays with Ben and when I see a smile on his face it makes me feel good to know that he is having a good time, too.
I never thought when I joined the Friendship Circle last year that I would learn so much about what life is like for people with special needs, and I never imagined that my experience would be so rewarding.
Rachel Goldberg is a sophomore at Nicolet High School and a 2004 graduate of the Milwaukee Jewish Day School. She and 50 other Friendship Circle volunteers will be honored at a dinner on Thursday, May 25, at Brynwood Country Club. For more information, call The Shul at 414-228-8000.
Immigration flap is another dangerous distraction
By James D. Besser
“Distraction” is the operative word when it comes to the current debate over illegal immigration, as politicians try to divert attention from lobbying scandals, high gasoline prices, deficits, record pork-barrel spending, a faltering war on terrorism and the body count in Iraq.
Forget bird flu and al-Qaida. The biggest problem facing the nation is the massive invasion of illegal immigrants, according to a burgeoning group of politicians, not to mention assorted racists, white supremacists and the “Minutemen” vigilantes patrolling the border with Mexico.
Yes, those 11 million illegals aren’t just here because they are the latest seekers of the American dream. They’re an alien invasion, like Spanish-speaking Martians.
They bring crime, drugs and probably terrorism. They have provoked outrage by singing our national anthem in Spanish (forget for a minute the Polish, Yiddish, French, Samoan and many other versions).
Maybe they are even part of a “reconquista” plot by Mexico to retake Arizona, Texas and California. This favorite theory of the crackpot right seems to be spreading to the more rational segments of society.
The danger in this debate is that it takes a real problem and pumps it up with exaggeration, distortion, bigotry and fear mongering.
Two years ago, facing a war in Iraq that was looking like it wasn’t “mission accomplished” after all, the nation’s political leadership played the diversion game with gay marriage.
They claimed an all-out assault on the American family required drastic action, like amendments to the U.S. Constitution or state constitutions.
After the election, ardor cooled, and there’s no evidence that “traditional” families are any worse off. But gays and lesbians were demonized, and more threads were stripped from the fabric of American tolerance and pluralism.
Out of control?
This year the distraction is illegal immigration. The House of Representatives has responded by passing an immigration “reform” bill aimed only at punishing illegal immigrants and the people who help them. Vigilante groups are planning to build a wall across the border.
According to a new poll by Democratic pollster John Zogby, immigration is a close second to the war on Iraq as a concern of the American people.
Many Republicans are practicing demagoguery on the issue. One, Rep. Tom Tancredo (R-Colo.), hopes to ride the wave right into the White House.
Democrats, fearful of getting caught in the surge, are mostly trying to keep low profiles, hoping the GOP self-destructs on the issue. That may be good politics, but it doesn’t do much to suppress a social and political fire that threatens to rage out of control.
Insidiously, the debate starts with real problems — the uncontrolled flow of immigrants willing to work at substandard wages and the lack of control of our borders in an era of terrorism — and whips them into a poisonous froth of fear and intolerance.
Even some progressives who support civil rights and pluralism are swayed as anxiety mounts over terrorism and an uncertain, changing economy.
But this isn’t just political hype. It has real-world consequences.
Recently the Anti-Defamation League released a study documenting how the vehement agitation is already producing violence and bigotry against Hispanics, legal and illegal.
Today’s anti-immigrant surge may be directed primarily at Spanish speakers; but unchecked, Jewish leaders fear, it will encourage a broader mindset of bigotry and scapegoating that will inevitably affect Jews, the longstanding favorite targets of nativists and xenophobes.
It’s hardly surprising that the anti-immigrant agitation of the mainstream politicians has been welcomed by white supremacists and classical anti-Semites, who hope it will boost their equal-opportunity bigotry.
There’s some history that the Paul Reveres ignore. Since the first big wave of immigration more than a century ago, politicians have sought to boost their own careers by inflaming the electorate about foreigners in our midst.
First it was the Chinese peril, later the Irish and the Italian invasion, then the Jews — all said to bring crime, disease and un-American ways.
The values of tolerance and pluralism have long been pillars of Jewish security in America. Both are under assault as the immigration debate rages.
In the current debate, Jewish leaders agree that the unchecked flow of illegal immigrants is a problem, but argue that we need a balanced approach — better border controls, more active tracking of those in this country; but also a clear path toward citizenship for those already here and compassionate treatment for immigrants and their families.
Leaders in both major parties have long chosen a different route — ranging from timid indifference to cynical, self-serving incitement. The results could prove dangerous in this uneasy, volatile time.
Former Madisonian James D. Besser has been Washington correspondent for the New York Jewish Week, the Baltimore Jewish Times and other leading Anglo-Jewish newspapers.
Using old numbers, forecasts offer
wrong predictions for Arab growth
By Bennett Zimmerman, Roberta Seid and Michael L. Wise
Los Angeles (JTA) — “Arab demographic momentum” has become part of the Israeli lexicon.
Under this theory, the Arab sector, with its rapid population growth, will soon overwhelm the Jewish population, as “baby boom” generations of Arabs give birth to an even greater number of children. Arab births will accelerate even if birth rates remain stable or drop slightly because such a large number of women will enter their childbearing years.
But the evidence is now in, and it shows something surprising: Demographic momentum indeed exists — but among Jews, not Arabs.
Jewish births grew rapidly, from 80,000 per year in 1995 to 96,000 in 2000 and to more than 103,000 in 2003. The demographic outlook for Jews has been improving because the Jews’ total fertility rate, or the number of children a woman is likely to bear over her lifetime, has been rising.
In 2005, the Jewish fertility rate reached 2.7, the highest of any advanced industrial nation. While the fervently Orthodox contributed to this rise, secular Israelis and immigrants from the former Soviet Union also experienced increasing fertility.
When returning Israelis who have lived abroad — an average of 20,000 per year from 2001 to 2004 — and aliyah are added to the mix, the demographic weight of the Jewish sector grows even further.
In contrast, the absolute number of births in the Israeli Arab sector grew from 36,500 in 1995 to 40,800 in 2000. After rising slightly to a record 41,400 births in 2003, the number of Israeli Arab births fell in 2004 for the first time, back to 40,800.
The overall Israeli Arab fertility figure — which includes Muslim and Christian Arabs and Druse — declined from 4.4 in 2000 to 4.0 in 2004.
Israel recently enacted policies that are impacting the highest fertility sectors of the Arab population. In 2004, the government stopped granting stipends for every child born to a family, restricting them to the first two children. There was an immediate drop in Bedouin pregnancies.
Fewer Arab births
The problem with demographic predictions is that they apply yesterday’s or today’s fertility rates to tomorrow’s forecast. However, earlier childbearing patterns may have little relationship to the number of children the next generation will have.
Applying Muslim fertility rates from the 1960s — nine to 10 births per woman — Israeli demographers had projected that Israeli Arabs would overtake Israeli Jews by 1990.
When the fertility rate dropped to 5.4 in the early 1980s and 4.7 in the second half of the decade, demographers applied this rate to their next series of forecasts. However, by 2005, the Arab fertility rate had dropped even further, echoing dramatic drops reported throughout the Middle East, where most nations display fertility levels of about three births per woman.
Furthermore, Israeli Arab women now in their 20s won’t necessarily repeat the childbearing characteristics of their older counterparts. Israeli Arab women who are having fewer children in their late teens and 20s might also have fewer children in their 30s than do today’s 30-year-olds, who still display the fertility characteristics of earlier generations.
In contrast, Israeli Jewish women in their 20s who are having more kids might carry that choice into their 30s at rates above those of current 30-year-olds.
The practice of forecasting tomorrow’s population growth from yesterday’s rates is a common mistake. The United Nations’ Population Division predicted in 2000 that the world’s population would balloon to 12 billion people by 2050.
Four years later they dramatically revised the forecast, and now predict that today’s global population of 6.3 billion will plateau at 9 billion by 2050.
With constantly changing birth patterns, what’s a forecaster to do? To have any relevance, a forecast must constantly be updated with the most current information and to reflect any changes in trend.
The Gallup organization recently published the results of a survey that showed a convergence in desired family size among Jews and Arabs west of the Jordan River.
The ideal family size has fallen to 5.1 for Arabs in Gaza and 4.5 in the West Bank. The desired family size among both Israeli Jews and Israeli Arabs is now 3.7.
While Gallup found no difference in the preferred number of children among younger Israelis, younger West Bankers, aged 15 to 19, believe an ideal family should have 4.1 children, compared to relatives over 50 years old, who believe the ideal family should have 5.0 children.
The convergence in desired birth activity among Israeli Jews and Israeli Arabs, and particularly among younger West Bankers, is likely to further impact the future demographic outlook for Israel and the West Bank, where Jews now form a two-thirds majority.
Demographers who concentrated on past patterns in the Arab population missed the evidence of a slowdown in the Arab sector and the demographic revolution occurring among Jews.
By focusing on the past, forecasters anticipated demographic momentum in the wrong sector and produced an outlook that couldn’t even get the present correct, let alone the future.
Bennett Zimmerman, Roberta Seid and Michael L. Wise are authors of “Arab Population in the West Bank and Gaza: The Million Person Gap,” recently published by the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies in Israel. “Forecast for Israel and West Bank 2025” debuted at the Herzliya Policy Conference in Israel and at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington. The studies can be found at www.pademographics.com.
When killing them isn’t an option: A guide for mothers of teenagers
By Wendy Mogel
Los Angeles (JTA) — When stuck with a rebellious child, gluttonous and thieving, the Torah has a tidy solution: Kill him. Or her.
For those of you excited by the opportunity to practice a new mitzvah, be mindful that the rabbis, worried about the edict, say in the Talmud (Sanhedrin 71a), “The case of the wayward and rebellious child never was and never will be.”
The tradition both recognizes the impulse to do violence, and then brings us to our senses and to our obligations.
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