As an introduction to this post I must let everyone know that I am blessed with a boss who has a fabulous sense of humor. It really makes the day move along when he stops the office to start some shananagen or another.
Have you ever heard the indium “To every jest there is truth?” Today I saw that in action…and even though the office was laughing the situation has quite a bit of truth to it.
I work for the NY city council, for one of the few Orthodox Jewish members. Our office recently introduced a resolution calling for all of the major TV networks doing buissness with China for the 2008 Olympics to refuse to put money into China until China stops trading with the Sudan.
So we get a call from some company that is trying to sell us printers. The legislative affairs director picked up the call when it came in. Normally I would take the call and direct the company to our city hall office because we don’t buy our own hardware. But the Councilman himself felt like picking up the call, really more to create problems then anything else. His first question to this poor kid (who we later found out had a name, it was Pat) was “does your company sell or make products in China?” At the time he got on this call he was avoiding a meeting with his legislative director and his chief of staff and warding off messages I kept trying to get him to return, so the fact that he was taking time to talk to someone who he could not even buy anything from anyway was so observed that we could not stop laughing.
He went on for a long time explaining to Pat that we don’t buy from companies that have anything to do with China because we believe that China can really help negotiate in Sudan and help millions of people. The poor kid got flustered and had to go ask a supervisor. When he called back (because they were disconnected) the Counciman was on the phone with someone in Israel and actually had to work.
While the conversation created a great break for us it brings up a question that has been set in front of the Jewish community for the past 5 years or so. Is the Sudan issue a Jewish issue? Is it a humanitarian issue that happens to hit home to Jews more so then other ethnic groups in the US today? That also leads to a bigger question, what IS a “Jewish” issue? Is it something that affects the Jewish community directly? (ie work discrimination, antisemitism, tution in Jewish Day Schools) Or can it be defined as something broader like feeding starving people, or advocating for abused women? Judism belives in feeding the poor and while I can’t pin point the exact Mitzva that would tell someone to help an abused woman I am sure it is there somewhere.
Of course the broader definition would give a lot more responsibility to Jews around the world. And that is not always an easy thing to take on. More on this next time…..unless my Boss does something exceptionally funny between now and then..
