batsignal

Batsignal

On the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau and as we commemorate Holocaust Memorial Day, Harlow College creative writing student Mica Isaacs writes about being Jewish today.

The Jews have a Batsignal. I know that sounds like the kind of horrifically antisemitic rumour a neo-Nazi group would spread, but this one is actually true. When a Jew is in trouble, they will shine a giant beam of light into the sky that reflects off the clouds to project an image of a Star of David. On a clear night it will not work, but on a cloudy night, any Jew who sees the Batsignal will have a cousin or an uncle or a friend who knows exactly how to help with the problem at hand. 

When I was 15, I was sitting in my bedroom watching YouTube when the screen of my laptop suddenly broke. There was a huge crack across the inner layer of the screen and the video I was watching was glitching out and soon the whole thing went black. Of course we were going to take it to the shop to be fixed, but I needed to be able to use my computer in the meantime. My mum told me, “Don’t worry. We’ll just turn on the Batsignal.” 

She made a post to the London Jewish Facebook group she was in, and it just so happened that somebody in that group had recently bought a brand-new desktop monitor that they hadn’t even taken out the box and that they didn’t need to use quite yet, and they could let me borrow it for a few days in the meantime. My dad drove over to this person’s house, and within the day I was using my computer again. 

That was the first time in my life that I had ever felt Jewish. Properly Jewish. I mean, I’d had many Hanukkahs and Passovers and Purims in my life. But that was always just the stuff you’re supposed to do. Just part of the year, like any other part of the year. It was never

anything particularly special. 

I remember, when I was younger, hating the fact I was Jewish. I didn’t believe in God, and I didn’t know yet what being Jewish was, and I thought that if I was Jewish, I had to believe in God, but I didn’t want to believe in God, so I desperately, desperately didn’t want to be Jewish. I don’t know why I believed this. My family has always been very accepting, very forgiving, very free. I was never in any sort of situation that could reasonably make me think this way. But I did think this way. And I remember, once, when I was 11 or 12, my mum telling me that anybody born to a Jewish mother is automatically Jewish as well, and that it’s impossible to stop being Jewish no matter what. She told me this, and I cried. “It’s not fair,” I sobbed. “Why do I have to be this thing that I never asked to be?” 

I don’t remember what she said in response. 

For a long time, I thought I was born with a curse. The Curse of the Jew. Oh, how I despised this curse. I refused to have a Bar Mitzvah, and I was annoyed whenever I had to wear a kippah, and I would roll my eyes at the mere mention of God. I don’t believe in the Curse anymore, but I also don’t feel properly Jewish anymore. I don’t know if I ever really did. I always see my older siblings making efforts to remain connected to their Jewishness. My brother is the most Jewish person I know. He makes it central to his identity. And he’s so proud of it, and he seems so happy about it. And I’m his brother, and I’m not like that. And I can’t see myself ever being like that. And I’m so angry at myself for not being able to be like that. For tearing too early the rope that connected me to Judaism, before I could even know what that rope meant for me. I don’t know if I’ll ever get that rope back.  

 

I’m supposed to write this about the Holocaust. Shit, I don’t know how to do that! I wasn’t there! There’s no way for me to ever comprehend what it was like, or what it means that it happened, or even the fact it happened in real life. No matter how many stories I hear about it, they’re nothing but tiny drops in that massive ocean we refer to as “The Holocaust”. Humans are notorious for being awful at comprehending large numbers. Most people couldn’t even wrap their head around a thousand, let alone 6 million. And then all you have is that number, 6 million, instead of the real, lived lives of all those people. Isn’t that hilarious? One way or another, everyone ends up being reduced to a number! 

The Nazis burned all the Batsignals. They hunted down every last one and burned it. The Batsignal would have been more visible than ever, given all the smoke, and that’s why they burned it. I guess that “6 million” figure is wrong, then. The Nazis never killed any Jews, because they forced the Jews to not be Jews anymore. No Batsignal means no community. And what is a Jew with no community? 

Every so often in my house, we’ll have a guest over whom I don’t know and have never met. But that guest is a friend of an acquaintance of my mum’s, who is stranded in London with nowhere to stay, and we let them stay with us because they’re Jewish, and so are we. And that’s the same reason I had a spare monitor for my laptop that one time. And it’s the same reason we’re all alive today. 

The Nazis were right. We’re pests. We’re cockroaches. You can’t get rid of us, no matter what. There’s a reason almost every single Jewish holiday is about standing up to oppression, because that’s what our entire history has been about. We survive, and we endure, and we help each other for no reason other than that we’re Jewish. And that’s what it means to be Jewish. Without that, we’re not Jewish at all. 

And the Nazis knew that. And that’s why they did so well. Because they knew how to tear that apart. 

 

All that said, I’m still only ever really Jewish when I need to be. Like when I’m expressing support for Palestine, and I have a chance to prove that even a Jewish Israeli such as myself can be opposed to Israel’s actions. Or when someone online says something antisemitic and, being Jewish, I am by default the expert on the subject and the only one qualified to correct them about it. Or when I’m asked to write a piece for Holocaust Memorial Day, and I can give a phony Jewish perspective on the subject, writing a corny message about “what it means to be Jewish”, as if I know anything at all about that. Because I’m Jewish! But only technically.

The first and last time I’d ever felt Jewish — properly Jewish — is when my laptop screen broke, and I learned what this is — to be Jewish. I wish I could always feel like that. I wish I could be like my brother. I wish I’d had a Bar Mitzvah. I wish I’d been Jewish from the beginning. I wish I could be Jewish now. 

I wish I could be the Batsignal. 

Caption to photograph: The image, taken by Mica, is of a torn-up piece of paper with the Jewish symbol of the Star of David on it. It is placed on a dark background to mimic the image of the Batsignal. The image is representative of Mica’s fractured connection to Judaism and the Jewish community.

Share this post

Skip to content