Rant #2,764: Don't You Forget About Me

Happy day-after-Election Day, and at least early on in the polls, it looks like a lot of people thought like I did … and got rid of people who have contributed to making it almost impossible to live during the past year.
 
At least in my neck of the woods, a number of those who ruled the roost during the length of the pandemic have been voted out of office, and rightly so, because they did absolutely nothing to help our quality of life during the past more than a year.
 
And yes, the legislator who leads my county might also be on the way out … and good riddance, because a week before Election Day, you do not turn down a request for help from a constituent.
 
If the polls hold up, she got what she deserved, at least from my personal viewpoint.
 
New York City … well, they once again proved that they are without a doubt the must ignorant, and yes, stupid voters on the face of the planet, and the only thing I can say is that I hope all the good people of the city continue to move out of the Big Apple in droves.
 
So what else happened yesterday?
 
Toward late afternoon, the Brooklyn Nets made an announcement about a group of events that they plan on holding this season, events to demonstrate the unique and diverse community that Brooklyn is … but funny, they seemed to forget something, and this “omission” is such an obvious one that it really is quite embarrassing for both the Nets and the Barclays Center which is their home.
 
(And this is not a sports story, per se, so please, non-sports readers, read on!)
 
The Nets have created something called the “United Games,” which are games that they have designated where they will honoring a facet of the Brooklyn community.
 
Ten games have been so designated, and they honor such groups as veterans, Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Hispanics, women and gays.
 
That is fine, no problem, I can’t argue with any of this …
 
However, there is one glaring omission from this list, one group of Brooklynites who, somehow, didn’t make the cut to be honored during these games.
 
I will give you a moment to guess …
 
That moment is over.
 
Where is Brooklyn’s Jewish population on this schedule of honorees?
 
Funny, the Nets have honored their Jewish fans before, and they have honored all of these other groups before, but why didn’t Jews make the cut this time around?
 
It is kind of obvious, but let me go further before I explain it to you.
 
When I saw this list, I really had to go over it twice, just to make sure that I didn’t miss something, and evidently, I didn’t.
 
I went onto the Nets homepage on Facebook, and yes, one person did complain, in kind of a flippant sort of way.
 
“Why nothing for Hanukkah?” he posted.
 
I went one further, and I wrote the following:
 
“Why is there no celebration of Brooklyn's varied Jewish population? You have done it in the past, why not now?
 
I do think it goes a bit further than just a simple omission. It has to do with the current "agenda," and Jews and other groups are not part of the current narrative.
 
Funny, the 75th anniversary of the first NBA game was yesterday, and if you look at the team makeup in 1946, you will see that a majority of the players who laid the groundwork for this league were Jewish. Without these players, there would be no NBA. Interesting how Barclays Center and the Nets have forgotten this fact.
 
So what's the deal, Nets? I won't ever go to another game there without a credible explanation. I have trekked in there each year, but I won't go where I am not wanted, or more importantly, where I am not recognized.
 
I've supported the team since the 1970s on Long Island ... no more. You have lost me with this exclusion.
 
And by the way, the number of Jews is especially high in Brooklyn, where 561,000 residents—one out of four inhabitants—is Jewish.”
 
So what’s the story?
 
I called the Nets, and I could not get through to them, and was only able to relay a voice message where I told them at my displeasure with their “omission.”
 
Somebody else wrote on the site something to the effect that because of such an omission, the Nets have created quite a “s—tshow” for themselves.
 
Another person posted a question in relation to my post: “Why is everything anti-Semitic?”
 
In answer to that question, I posted the following:
 
“Did I mention the phrase "anti-Semitism" in my post?
 
I simply said that if you are going to celebrate Brooklyn's rich community, you can't do it by excluding the Jewish population.
 
Ask yourself why you asked such a question, and the answer is clear.”
 
So while the Nets celebrate the PC existence of certain groups, they have forgotten about Brooklyn’s long-standing Jewish population, and I take that kind of personally.

I was born in Brooklyn, living on Avenue N in my first breaths of my life.
 
My maternal grandparents lived in Brooklyn just about their entire lives, on Ocean Parkway and Cortelyou Road.
 
So even though I haven’t been a Brooklynite in more than 60 years, I have the borough running through my veins.
 
And yes, I am Jewish.
 
To not honor a group which makes up about 25 percent of residents of the borough seems to me a bit absurd, not just a slap in the face to Brooklyn’s Jews, but to Jews everywhere.
 
I will call the Nets again and ask for an explanation, but here is what another responder said on the Nets’ Facebook site about this situation. Somebody else stated that no other religion is being honored in this way, so why should the Jews be included? Here is the response, and again, this was not by me:
 
“Meaningless labels like "AAPI" and empty exhortations like "women's empowerment" pass for religion in the Disneyreich.”
 
Again, I did not say that, but it was worth mentioning.
 
Look, the whole thing boils down to “inclusion,” which on the surface, it a good idea, but when it is put into practice, all that it means is “exclusion.”
 
When you want to include everybody, you are almost certain to leave out somebody, and that is just wrong, period.
 
Stay tuned. This could be an even more interesting story than it already is.