Being liked is nice. Being alive is essential.

The following is a post from https://x.com/AP_from_NY/status/1927071023339331715. Not sure the original authors name, but I wanted to share this perspective. I am not saying I share it, I think building bridges and communication with the other side is important, but I certainly understand and appreciate the sentiment. Let us know what you think in the comments.

---

We, as Jews, need to stop trying to be liked. It’s a hard thing to say out loud, but it’s true. For generations we have held onto this idea that if we just explained ourselves better—if we were more open, more moral, or more patient—maybe people would finally understand us. Maybe they would stop hating us. Maybe they would come around. But they didn't and they won’t. Because the hate that we are up against isn’t logical. It’s not based on policy, politics, or misunderstandings. It’s older than any of that. It’s inherited, recycled, dressed up in new language, but it’s the same old hatred our grandparents and great-grandparents knew all too well.

There are people who support us, and we should cherish them. But the people who don’t—they are not sitting around waiting for the perfect argument that will suddenly change their mind. If someone could look at what happened on October 7th—see women dragged through the streets, children butchered, people burned alive—and still say, “Well, it’s complicated,” then they’re not confused. They’re not on the fence. They have already decided we are not worth mourning.

And that’s what makes this so painful. We still believe in the power of truth, because we know how much truth has mattered to us. We come from people of books, debate, ethics, and relentless questioning. We think if we just teach history the right way, if we show people what really happened, they’ll get it. But the world saw the Holocaust. Not just in hindsight—during. There were reports. Photographs. Eyewitnesses. And most of the world did absolutely nothing. The trains kept running. The borders stayed closed. The silence was louder than the screams.

After the Holocaust, people said “Never Again,” and then promptly forgot almost everything. We remember six million names. The world remembers a handful. Anne Frank. Elie Wiesel. Maybe one or two more. Six million people turned into two or three acceptable symbols of Jewish pain. The rest were too Jewish, too messy, too difficult to include in the world’s moral story.

So when people don’t care about Israeli Jews being massacred today, we shouldn’t be surprised. And we need to stop thinking it’s our fault for not explaining it well enough. The people who hate us aren’t looking for better explanations. Their hate is not built on logic, so it can’t be unraveled with facts. It’s built on stories they were raised with, a culture that normalizes suspicion of Jews, and a long history of blaming us for everything from plagues to power.

I understand that It’s hard to accept that there are people who simply don’t care if we live or die. But that’s what history teaches us. People are perfectly capable of watching Jews suffer and moving on. In many ways, they’re more comfortable when we suffer. They know how to talk about dead Jews. They hold memorials and light candles. They feel righteous remembering us—once we’re gone. It’s living Jews who defend themselves that make them uncomfortable.

So we need to stop seeking comfort in their approval. We were not put here to be liked. We were not put here to win anyone over. We were put here to survive, to protect our own, to build, to love, to outlast every empire and ideology that tried to erase us. That’s our legacy. And it continues—not because we convinced the world to accept us, but because we stopped needing their permission.

We don’t need to justify our existence. We don’t need to apologize for defending ourselves. And we definitely don’t need to beg for sympathy from people who watched what happened on October 7th and kept scrolling. We should speak to our own. Strengthen each other. Teach our children who they are and where they come from. Remind them that being hated is not new. It’s not their fault. And it has nothing to do with how “good” or “moral” or “explained” we are.

Being liked is nice. Being alive is essential. Let’s choose the one that matters.