The Jews and “Mental Health” Liberation Workshop
We—Leah Thorn [Regional Reference Person for Essex and East Sussex Coast in England] and Cherie Brown [International Liberation Reference Person for Jews]—led a Jews and “Mental Health” Liberation Workshop in April for 177 RC Jews—from Israel, Australia, Denmark, Nigeria, Scotland, England, Canada, and the United States.
The workshop was a profound contradiction to isolation, discouragement, and the many divisions among us as Jews. It was also an opportunity to notice the wonderful diversity of Jewish people around the world.
We made significant progress in defeating Jewish internalized oppression and exposing and challenging the huge impact of “mental health” oppression on Jews.
There had been three previous Jews and “Mental Health” Liberation Workshops, all led by Cherie and Janet Foner [former International Liberation Reference Person for “Mental Health” Liberation, who passed away in July 2019]. We took time at the beginning of the workshop to remember Janet and honor her contributions to RC’s work on “mental health” liberation. We invited everyone to discharge about Janet and then put themselves in our hands for the workshop.
The following are thoughts from each of us and highlights from our classes.
FROM CHERIE
A core of “mental health” oppression is not believing, or ignoring, someone when they say that bad things have happened to them. The core of anti-Semitism is denial that there is an oppression. When anti-Semitism is denied repeatedly, we can feel “crazy” or meshugenah (in Yiddish)—as if all the bad feelings are just in our heads and not based on anything real coming from the outside.
In my family, everyone called everyone else meshugenah all the time (it was often said with affection). Because of the horrors of our oppression, I think we are all meshugenah Jews—no one has been spared, even those who think they have!
Genocide and internalized genocide have had a huge impact on Jews. This has been hard to face. There was a lot of denial in our homes.
It can be terrifying to face and discharge on the full impact of genocide. We fear that we won’t “come back,” that we will be overwhelmed, that we will go “crazy.” However, we are now building the safety to face this material [distress] and, most important, to know that we can get through it [heal from it].
One way to work on internalized genocide distress is to talk openly and discharge in answer to the question, “Where do you live ‘inside,’ moment to moment, or in the middle of the night when you are by yourself?” We can also share feelings of not wanting to live, not wanting to get out of bed, and so on.
Distress recordings about suicide are just that—recordings. We internalize the message that the world doesn’t want us alive so we have recordings of not wanting to live. We can listen deeply to each other, but we need not treat the recordings about suicide with special reverence.
Many years ago when I had feelings of not wanting to live, my counselor gave me this direction: Instead of “I want to slit my wrists,” I was asked to say, “I really, really, really want to slice an apple.” In other words, we can often discharge suicide recordings more quickly when our counselors hold out a loving contradiction [to the distress], sometimes with humor.
A key part of “mental health” oppression is being targeted for showing strong feelings. A key part of anti-Semitism is the targeting of Jews who openly show their difficulties. Because of this, many of us Jews struggle to get enough safety to show and discharge on how scared we are. Loving each other while we show, and discharge, intense fear is key.
Two movies that powerfully demonstrated Jewish “mental health” issues were Sophie’s Choice (about a Holocaust survivor) and Shine (about a possessive Jewish father who wouldn’t let his son “shine”).
“Mental health” oppression divides us as Jews. Three aspects of Jewish internalized oppression are
1) feeling like we are better or worse than other Jews, based on their “mental health” stories;
2) limiting who we can be close to, get good counseling sessions from, and so on, based on where it “feels” safe; and
3) offering “helpful” suggestions to other Jews because it feels dangerous if things aren’t correct.
These divide us from each other and can be contradicted.
On Sunday morning I did a panel on intergenerational issues with two young adult and two older Jews who had relationships with each other. The questions were, “Where have you felt supported by each other?” and “Where have you felt terrified or endangered by the positions the other takes?”
Before the panel, I spoke about three issues that are dividing many Jews along generational lines: Israel/Palestine, Transgender issues, and RC policies on “mental health” oppression. We are terrified of having disagreements with each other, particularly where we feel our survival or integrity is at stake. We need to discharge the terror of having different positions so we can stay close, no matter what, and listen to and learn from each other.
Amy Leos-Urbel did an outstanding job of organizing a complex workshop. She modeled putting her whole heart into organizing and staying close all along the way.
In the last class on Sunday, Leah and I counseled each other in front of the workshop, with each of us showing where we struggle as openly as we could.
FROM LEAH
Re-evaluation Counseling is “mental health” liberation. “Mental health” liberation means reclaiming our ability to access full-out [unrestrained] discharge and to take full charge of our minds, consistently and reliably.
“Mental health” oppression affects us all. It acts as a “checklist” for “how to be normal.” The ways it does this vary from country to country, and culture to culture, but they include messages like, “If you discharge, there’s something wrong with you,” and “Be very careful. Limit your life. Don’t do anything that’s going to bring up big feelings. Distract yourself constantly, so that you don’t feel things.”
I modelled how these messages threaten to diminish my ability to lead and what it means in the moment to refuse to believe them. I discharged to communicate. This set a tone that enabled others to have full-out sessions in front of the workshop on issues such as war, the climate crisis, young people’s and young adults’ oppression, and elders’ oppression.
Both Cherie and I referred to the Hebrew/Yiddish word meshuga, meaning “mad” or “crazy.” It first appears in the curses in Deuteronomy [in the Torah]: “You will be meshuga from the vision before your eyes that you will behold.” But being meshuga is not all negative. When prophets receive prophecy, they are referred to as meshuga: “Their limbs tremble. . . . Their minds are free to comprehend what they see.” [Yesodei Hatorah 6:2.] We need to relaxedly reclaim the creative, liberationist aspect of the term.
Many of us got into the “mental health” system—including psychiatric drugs, psychiatric hospitals, day care centres, one-way therapy/counselling—because we couldn’t hide our struggles or we couldn’t “function.” I heard at this workshop that I don’t have to “look good” and that it works best when I lead as me. I started each class by noticing my connection to individuals and acknowledging how central and crucial our relationships are in doing this work.
Before and during the workshop, Cherie and I faced everything that came up in our partnership as working-class Jewish women and “mental health” system survivors. We triumphed over the internalized oppression that could have separated us, had us feeling bad about ourselves, or forced us to compete. We backed [supported] and loved each other publicly—a blow to sexism, anti-Semitism, classism, and “mental health” oppression, all in one go!
Yesher koach (“from strength to strength” in Hebrew) to everyone who was there,
Folkestone, Kent, England
Reprinted from the RC e-mail discussion list for leaders of Jews
(Present Time 208, July 2022)