Ideologically Homeless

I have long felt ideologically homeless.

The right hates me because I am a progressive Jew, the left hates me because I am a straight white male Jew.

This is an oversimplification of course, but there is truth in the broad strokes, or at least, that’s how it feels to me.

Never have I felt the weight of this ideological limbo more than in the Post-October 7^th world. I support Israel, not because I hate Palestinians or love Netanyahu, but because I remember growing up with stories about how the entire Arab world has been trying to wipe Israel and all the Jews in it off the map since long before I was born.

Hearing about kids on college campuses accusing Israel of genocide, when I know that actual genocide of Jews has been the Palestinian political platform time and time again, that it is the platform of the Palestinian-elected Hamas right now and has never remotely been the platform of Israel, I am so unspeakably offended that I am filled with rage, to say nothing of when they accuse Jews of being Nazis, given the horrors visited upon the Jewish people by the Nazis during the Holocaust.

I think most of these protesting kids are naïve, imagining they are, as per college student dictum, aligning with an oppressed people against an oppressor, rather than recognizing that Jews are a massively small minority compared to Arabs in the Middle East, or compared to virtually any ethnic group anywhere, really; that all of Israel’s “imperialist land grabs” are defensive and a direct response to the previous owners of that land trying to commit the genocide they are supposedly victims of, just as is happening in Gaza today. Also, the idea that you can be anti-Zionist without being antisemitic is a nice one, but it should be clear that in America at least, the two can blur into one in a heartbeat, with catastrophic consequences for American Jews.

So who can I share my rage with? Not the right wing pro-authoritarians who have turned a blind eye to Netanyahu’s corruption and have been indifferent to Israeli restrictions of Palestinians in the West Bank. Not the left wing democratic socialists who seem to be validating the use of terms like genocide and colonialist in regard to Israel, despite their inaccuracy and the clear effect of normalizing American antisemitism.

Can I find a safe space among other Jews? Which ones? With none on the political spectrum truly accepting us, we have spread all across it. Who do I commiserate with? Not the rich Republican Jews who think Strong on protecting Israel = Strong on protecting American Jews, in the face of all evidence to the contrary as antisemitic hate crimes go up and up, who support leaders like Trump and DeSantis as they treat Muslims and members of the LGBTQ community in exactly the dehumanizing way Jews have been treated throughout history.

Not the “Jews for Palestine,” who seem to be self-hating, or at the very least, naïve to the fact that for every inch you give to Hamas they will reward you by taking a pound of flesh later on down the line.

Not the Orthodox Jews, who would reject me for driving on Saturdays and enjoying the occasional shrimp cocktail, to say nothing of taking a gentile wife.

As for the Jews who allegedly pull the levers in Hollywood? They don’t seem to have paid me much mind so far. As I said. Ideologically homeless.

I consider myself progressive as an emergent property of my belief in what is right and what is logical as a member of a humanistic, civilized community, not out of any desire to be aligned with a particular team. There is something comforting about being able to anger both sides with my opinions, but something very isolating about it as well. While I feel most at home on the left side of the political spectrum, I know that the instant I publicly suggest a white person has been a victim of racism or a man of sexism, or that Israel’s actions are justified, I will be immediately cast out.

This won’t stop me from expressing my political opinions of course, but it does give me more pause than it should. People like to talk about having “honest” discussions about politics or race or other hot button issues, but I’m not sure such a thing is possible anymore.

I think I am fortunate enough to have friends who know my heart, and would not condemn me for having a political opinion they disagree with (within reason), but I wonder how many others are so fortunate, anywhere along the political spectrum. I wonder how many people wish to share more nuanced political views but just don’t see any benefit to it in their particular polarized community.

I don’t know if there’s any answer to this problem or even if there should be. Just thought I’d do my part to try to start an honest conversation about it.

Is Barbieland its own self-contained multiverse? Barbie contains more questions than answers

Warning: Many Spoilers Ahead for the Barbie movie.

In “Barbie,” Gloria, played by America Ferrera, is having an existential crisis in the “Real World,” which results in her daughter’s old Barbie doll “Stereotypical Barbie,” reflecting her very out-of-place emotions and concerns in Barbieland, sending Stereotypical Barbie, played by Margot Robbie, on a journey of self-discovery.

But why is there only one Stereotypical Barbie?

When we see Barbieland, we see every variation of Barbie doll in the Barbie universe. There’s Doctor Barbie, President Barbie, Physicist Barbie, and so on. There are also multiple variations of Ken, and side characters like Midge the Pregnant Barbie and Allan, Ken’s friend. But there’s only one of each of them. None of the Kens or Barbies look exactly alike. There only appears to be one Stereotypical Barbie, one Beach Ken, etc. etc. But we know from the plot that this Stereotypical Barbie is tied specifically to Gloria. She’s the Barbie Gloria played with with her daughter Sasha when she was younger. So where are all the millions of other Stereotypical Barbies that all the other kids played with?

The only conclusion possible is that we are in Barbieland Prime, and this Barbieland is one of a million parallel Barbielands, one for each Stereotypical Barbie doll that Mattel produced. This gives rise to another question. Are each of the other Barbies in a Barbieland Universe tied to a girl in the real world, or only one? And if it’s each one, how does the multiverse decide which Barbies will populate which universes? In other words, does the Prime Universe Doctor Barbie owned by Real World Girl A live with the Stereotypical Barbie owned by Gloria because the two Barbies came from the same toy store, or because Gloria and Real World Girl A who owns Doctor Barbie Prime live in close "Real World" proximity to each other? Or are all the Barbies in this particular Barbieland toys of Gloria's daughter? Do poor kids create Barbieland Universes populated only by one or two Kens and Barbies?

The Midge Problem

Then there is the problem of Midge. Midge is the “Pregnant Barbie,” who we learned was discontinued because the concept was a little too disturbing. This means there are fewer Midges out there than other Barbies. Does that mean that certain Barbielands have Midges and some don’t? If each Barbieland Universe represents one child's toy collection, this works fine. But if different Barbieland Barbies in the same universe have different "Real World" owners, this is a problem. Are there Barbielands with Midges who aren’t tied to people in the “Real World?” Or does Midge ONLY appear in Barbieland prime and represent all Midges in the Real World?

(Fun fact: Any guesses who the father of Midge's baby is? Here's a hint: It's not Ken!)

Mattel World

The “Real World” presents another problem. It doesn’t seem like it can really be “our” world. The “Board of Directors” of Mattel is a caricature. They’re all clueless men, when in reality Mattel’s BOD is roughly half women. They dance and run like action figures/dolls. They effortlessly travel back and forth between their world and Barbieland, and they also know the “correct” Barbieland to travel to when seeking Stereotypical Barbie Prime.

I propose that Mattel World is not “our” world at all, but a hub universe around which all the Barbieland Universes are connected, while also having some connection to “our world,” so that what the Barbies do in Barbieland affects the owners of their dolls in the Mattel World Universe, which in turn affects those dolls and their owners in our actual real world.

Other Universes

So if the Barbieland/Mattel Multiverse is its own distinct multiverse within the omniverse, where does that leave related Universes/Multiverses? For example, does the Mattel Universe also connect to other universes where Mattel toys are real, such as the Big Jim Universe or the American Girl Universe? And are these also self-contained multiverses, with a universe for each toy produced or purchased? What about the Toy Story Universe? We know that Barbie exists there. Is the Toy Story Universe a Barbieland Universe, far from Barbieland Universe Prime, where “Barbie Reality” has been distorted due to cosmological distance? Or is the Toy Story Universe part of its own multiverse adjacent to the Barbieland Multiverse?

I’m certain that all these questions and more will be answered in “Barbie 2.” Until then, we can only speculate.