We obviously touched a nerve in the Boys’ Latin School community, judging from many comments posted on our website. (http://www.jewishtimes.com/index.php/jewishtimes/news/jt/local_news/painful_episode/)
Once so many missives are launched to and fro, it’s hard to ascertain the reality of the situation.

I think I can provide some insight based on my experience.

I attended Gilman School which the JEWISH TIMES had written stories about in the 1980s concerning anti-Semitism with the predominately Blue Blood institution. Personally, in my seven years as a student there, I never once experience anti-Semitism, nor did my friends. But, I knew it existed. Even though it never affected me, it doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. It did.

Reddy Finney, one the finest men you’d ever meet would have no part of it. One time an incident occurred, which I had not been aware of, and Mr. Finney shut down the school for a day and conducted sensitively training – decades before it existed. The whole school learned about the dangers of hate from various experts. It showed that while typical all-boy school activity involving kids would occur, racist and anti-Semitic behavior would not be tolerated at Gilman. And we learned why it shouldn’t.

There were some blacks kids at Gilman who exhibited bad behavior and started fights (and some white kids, too). Still, we knew that it would be absolutely unacceptable to tag the boy with the “N” word.

Now, we have two Jewish boys from the same family who were singled out with undeniable anti-Semitic incidents. The word “kike” was used. A noose was produced. Inappropriate names were uttered. We’ve been told about another case as well, but the parents don’t want to come forward on the record.

Everyone seems to want to blame the victims. (I’m used to people blaming the media, so I won’t go there.) Based on what people are writing in the comments, the younger boy may have had some behavioral issues at the school. The older boy, everyone seems to agree, is a gem. Yet he was called a kike and Jew boy.

Even if Aaron misbehaved, you don’t treat a boy – a fellow student—like that.

Let’s get real here people…

If it had been an African American kid who got a noose in his locker, both kids would have been expelled on the spot (even if rich daddy was on the board) and the school would be basically shut down. Baltimore would be in an uproar and those kids would have to move out of town.

Sharpton and his buddies would be all over that headmaster and the following week Ryland Homes bulldozers would be paving beautiful lots…

I’m ready to put a deposit down on one.

IF ONLY!  If only a school community had instilled a culture in which a kid who was, to quote one classmate, “a little chubby”, “annoying”, “followed people around” had not been the object of teasing and rejection, which escalated over time to bullying. IF ONLY school administration, teachers, counselors, coaches, and other adults had been TRAINED in how to address scapegoating, teasing, bullying WHEN THE KIDS WERE IN GRADE SCHOOL!  IF ONLY a boy who needed help in developing social skills had received such help and support from a school admin, teachers, counselors, etc. who were truly knowledgable and skilled in the shaping (and RE-shaping) of the social dynamics among kids. IF ONLY this boy had found constructive ways to channel his anger and loathing of kids who teased and tormented him. IF ONLY kids (and their parents) who appear “polite” and “nice” understood ON PRINCIPLE that using bigoted, racist terms are simply WRONG, that ganging up on another kid is WRONG (even if they are a pain in the butt). IF ONLY everyone stopped pointing fingers and screaming at each other, the Jewish Times, the Linkoff family, “everyone” at Boys Latin, etc. and pledged that such a situation will never escalate to such a mess again, pledged to create a school environment where NO ONE, student or teacher, is marginalized, demonized, tormented, pledged to get some outside assistance in figuring out what ACTIONS to take to change. I hope everyone involved will LEARN and, then, LIVE differently. I know I will be even more vigilan within my own children’s school.

Posted by on 05/28/08 at 02:27 PM

Many feel that the Jewish Times may have an “ax” to grind by writing such a “one-sided story.” I am wondering what that “ax” could be. Perhaps,that so many of the local Jewish Day conservative and reform schools just cannot and do not serve our boys properly? The teachers are not trained on current methods to teach boys(certainly in the early years),and,the science and math curriculum are just not up to par. Frankly, some of the teachers in Jewish Day School(at least the one my children went to)complained all the time, had a classroom full of behavior problems they could not and were not trained to deal with (many of these problems of their own doing).The physical education programs were a joke, and our boys suffer. They are berated and compared to girls until they either become effeminate or their parents’ have the sense to take them out. Thank G-d for the local schools whose faculty devote their lives to the proper education of boys,so many of us owe so much to them. When I took my children out of Jewish Day School, I was derided and treated as if I had committed a major crime against my people but my children gained so much more than we could have ever imagined. At Jewish Day School, you could be sure, the current favorite , would be the “Star” of every play(even if there was a more talented student). What freedom to go to a school where this stuff didn’t happen anymore and instead of seeing everything wrong with your child(unless your child has grandparents who are very wealthy, Old Pikesville) saw everything that was right. My children do not go to BL but a similar school, and, oh, what a joy it is!! Is the “ax” the JT has to grind to scare us into putting our boys right back into Jewish Day Schools that never could serve a boy’s needs in the first place. I do not know what happened in this instance, and ,while I would certainly stand by any Jewish family in peril, I wonder, if ,perhaps,the obvious poor reporting, was a result of a propoganda machine at work.

I currently attend the Boys’ Latin School of Maryland and I think these accusations against the school about the administration not doing anything is absurd.  My school take things like this very seriously when reported.  I remember in Middle School when a kid made an Anti-Semitic remark.  The kid was suspended and later withdrew from the school.  Anywhere you go in the world things like this exist.  If an incident like this occurred and he had notified the administration the kid would have been brought before the Honor Board and tried by a jury of his peers.  This story is extremely one sided.  I can say as a Jewish Boys’ Latin student since 5th grade, and knowing how most of the kids in my grade accepted the invitation to my Bar Mitzvah I can say that this was an overly exaggerated isolated incident.

I think many of us in the Jewish Community are missing an important point.I do not know enough about Boys’ Latin or the family in question to even guess at what the truth is, but , I do know what a rabbi is supposed to do. A rabbi is supposed to help support,comfort and help a family.It is tough to support a family in pain and steer them in a positive direction.It is puzzling that the Linkoff’s went to their rabbi but,perhaps, were not served as they needed to be. Maybe,the clergy support and direction of young people and their families is really what we should all focus our attention upon so that we can better deal with any future similar situations.

Claire.

My god you’re ignorant. Have you ever been to any of our games? No, just like I thought. What you “hear” is not really what happened. That’s why this came out. The Jewish Times decided to beleive two disgruntled bullies over an entire community. No one ever called Max a “kike”. I should know considering I was on the damn team. You don’t have to beleive me, because as ignorant as you are, you won’t.

I’m still shocked that an article as bias and one-sided as this ever passed through an editors office.

I am looking forward to the future, hopefully sooner rather than later, when we can come together as a community to show compassion for the Linkoff family to heal and aid for the Boys Latin community to make necessary changes.

Is it ironic or Freudian that you spelled Boys’ Latin incorrectly in the title of your current blog?  The way you’ve spelled it (Boy’s Latin) implies the school is of one boy, not many, which coincidentally, is what you’re article has also done…shown the school in one family’s eyes, certainly failing to represent the community as a whole.  Perhaps you should carefully research and correct what you write before you post it.

Not the JT’s finest hour. This is exactly the type of amatuer reporting that fuels and keeps anti-semitism alive and well. All that’s been accomplished is putting the non-Jewish community on full alert and in defense mode. Keep in mind we Jews are not perfect either—people like Harry Wineberg serve as great examples.

First: Claire’s virulent attack (5/19/08) on BL’s athletic tradition the community as a whole is absurd and childish. As she notes her children do not participate in sports—likely the cause of her heartburn. Perhaps if her children participated in group activities her family could begin to appreciate what it means to be part of a team, and how sacrificing individulaism is necesarry.

We all know what happened to the the Duke lacrosse team. We should all proceed with caution and discipline—not hysteria and the usual ritualistic indignation of identity politics which is as always predictable and pathetic.

To the JT,
I refuse to get into any long essay ..., it’s been done before and some very good points have been made by “both” sides.  With that said, I have decided not to renew my JT subscription (that I ironically just received in the mail) for two reasons; the overall irresponsibility in the way this article was presented (from lack of facts, to exaggeration of the noose picture presented, to the one-sidedness) and the arrogance of the staff in a general meeting with a few of parents after the fact.  Comments in that meeting I heard like “if you don’t like it you can walk out the door” ... there is no place for talk like that. You chose a stance and were not open to hearing more.  The road the Linkoff’s chose was their choice (that is not for me to judge) and I am not debating the posture they are taking - but the JT had a different responsibility and you failed.  I am not interested in reading any other piece from this publication, from politics to community “news,” to the most banal of topics, knowing there might be some “ax to grind” and not an accurate depiction.  I know my lack of renewing is akin to a drop in the bucket, but it’s about principle and I believe you did an injustice to the Jewish community, the Boys’ Latin School and unfortunately the Linkoff family as well.

THIS is the JT’s response to so many complaints?

The irrelevant anecdotal experiences of a student at a different school, 20 years ago?

You might be “used to people blaming the media” because you are simply a very poor journalist.  The idea that a single interview with a single side of the story translates into “undeniable” in your mind is *undeniably* evidence of your own BIAS - your reckless reaching of a conclusion which, as a journalist, you are not entitled to make.  You are supposed to report the allegations, investigate, and present facts, including all sides of the story.  If the JT was instead interested only in its own opinion and analysis of the facts, the article should have gone on the editorial page and been labeled as such.

To shrug off this very appropriate criticism as just a case of “everybody blaming the media” is to reveal what a hacky newspaper you represent.

By the way, your emphasis on the student’s older brother’s experiences highlights a very important error being made in this entire discussion—it MAY BE TRUE that the older brother was harassed for being Jewish.  What sounds likely to me is that these boys’ parents were blinded to their younger son’s social problems by jumping to the conclusion that the source of the problems was, again, anti-Semitism.  Different classes, different kids, years apart, but the parents seem to have carried a grudge against the school which prevents them from seeing the current situation clearly.  They may even have given the kid a complex, by branding BL as an anti-Semitic school in conversations at home even while continuing to send their younger boy to study there.  I can imagine that, when teased, the younger boy would be predisposed to assuming his classmates were anti-Semitic, prompting an unfortunate downward spiral in his social well-being.

In any case, alarmist reporting in the style of “the public must know!” is surely not what was in the best interests of this young student in the long term.  The parents could have used some better judgement and, again, so too the Jewish Times.

And as I heard, the kid who made the comment in the spanish class said it after being called a “homo.”  Which one might perceive as, I don’t know, a homo-phobic remark?  But then again, i don’t know what happened so perhaps i shouldn’t be making half-witted assumptions.

And I don’t really want to bring this into what we were talking about-
  - but this hardly mean much when someone from a rival school is bashing us. Once again, didn’t really want to, but thought I’d throw it in.

Un-deniable huh.

Once again, not anti-Semitism.  Aaron never claimed to anyone nor said to the newspaper that this was out of anti-semitism, this was all his mother’s ASSUMPTION. 

Maybe some people need to get their facts straight.
Look, I’m not going to lie and say there has never been anti-Semitism at Boys’ Latin, I can’t be everywhere at once.  I am just saying that I have never experienced it. 

WAKE UP PEOPLE.  There’s anti-Semitism is everywhere, and you know what?  They’re allowed to be.  Thats just part of this country. Sure its wrong, but as long as they don’t act upon it, its their right. 

And to the commenter who says “You are right on EVERY level”.. how would you know?

And Hey, lets say 4/250 people in the upper school REALLY ARE anti-Semitic.  Thats 1.6%.  Thats pretty good if you ask me, considering past records of anti-Semitism in the world.

Andy, I read your blog after reading the article, and I want to say you are RIGHT on every level.  You were right to report this incident at the JT, you were right to say there is NO reason to attack the religion, ethnicity, race of ANY student, and right to point to the role administration leadership plays in establishing the culture of a school (or any institution, for that matter). In the arena of high school athletics, Boys Latin is not known for the “fine character” of its students or parents—I have heard from parents whose children participate in athletics (mine do not) that a high school game against BL is simply dreaded—the student athletes are verbally nasty and the parents are equally obnoxious towards kids on the field, refereees, etc. to a degree that does not exist with other teams and parents in the league(s)AND NO ONE FROM LATIN STOPS IT!  While I am sure that not every BL athlete or parent behaves that way, clearly BL has a “culture” of intimidation and bullying that is tolerated, overlooked, excused by the rest. All the Jewish BL parents who have written comments to this story (very defensively, to my mind) should calm down, step back and remember that “evil flourishes when good people stay silent”. There is something amiss at the school to which they send their boys and they should use this opportunity to address it. To those who have written extreme responses standing by “the school” and blaming this ugliness on 1) the targeted child, 2) his parents, 3)the press and 4)others “who should mind their own business”, I ask : At heart, are you simply relieved that it is not your child who was called “kike” repeatedly or do you feel guilty for continuing to send your boy to a school did not intervene when anti-semitism reared its ugly, scary head?

To the scoop reporter and editor of the JT article on the Linkoffs:

My son attends BL lower school and I felt compelled to comment on your article.

An accusation of students’ serial anti-semitism and a private school’s apparent indifference is very serious.  Unfortunately, you utterly failed in your DUTY as a journalists to report the story fairly and accurately. 
It is entirely possible that the claims of the Linkoffs and their children have merit. 
However, your article does not give us enough information to draw our own conclusions as to whether a true problem actually exists at BL or whether this is an isolated incident among kids who didn’t get along. 
WHY DID YOU FAIL TO THOROUGHLY INVESTIGATE THIS CASE?

One possible reason:  You knew you would get a rise out of people in the Baltimore Jewish community by presenting this type of story.  Good for selling your rag, I suppose.  But failing to ascertain all important facts and printing your story regardless is fundamentally unfair and potentially amounts to an injustice.  Mike Wallace would have your head for not including substantive interviews or citations with someone outside the Linkoff family circle (like maybe other BL students who witnessed the incidents perhaps). 
As a result, you have now potentially hurt innocent people and have definitely upset a community.  If it turns out that the school was indifferent to anti-semitism, then your story needed to come out…..people should be fired, etc.(After all, they are supposed to have a Zero tolerance policy, right?).  Zero tolerance would imply expulsion for such odious behavior by students….If it happened.

Or, if the faculty and administration are blameless and reacted appropriately based on the evidence and past behavior of their students, then maybe these incidents should have remained confidential and not brought before the court of public opinion (as it is likely there have been anti-semitic incidents among students at other area “prep schools” that we haven’t heard about yet). 
There is simply no way to know what happened by presenting one side of a case.  That is for the Linkoffs’ lawyer to do, not a journalist. 

NOW THAT YOU OPENED UP PANDORA’S BOX, we all want to know what really happened over there but we can’t DETERMINE ANYTHING FROM YOUR HACK OF AN ARTICLE!  YOU ARE NOT SUPPOSED TO BE AN ADVOCATE AS A JOURNALIST. 

  Now, the only way BL will get a fair shot to explain their side of the story is if they have to defend a lawsuit which will make it a matter of public record.   

AND WHAT IS WITH the photograph of a real “old time” Klansman type hangman’s noose on the article page?  The facts, even as described by the alleged victim, clearly do not support your choice of using a real hangman’s noose a la “Mississippi Burning” to adorn your article.  Poor choice scoop. 

And yes, who could rationally argue that the ADL comment on the history of Jews and “nooses” wasn’t a stretch? 

IF A STORY LIKE THIS IS REPORTED, IT DESERVES MUCH MORE ATTENTION TO DETAIL THAN YOU GAVE IT.  IT IS APPARENT TO ME THAT THE JT FAILED TO APPRECIATE THE POWER AND RESPONSIBILITY THAT JOURNALISTS SHOULD HAVE.  I HOPE YOU AREN’T FORGETTING THAT LIVES AND CAREERS CAN BE RUINED.  THIS ISN’T A STORY ABOUT KIRSTIE ALLEY PUTTING ON A FEW POUNDS OR AN ELVIS SIGHTING.  YOU NEED TO BE FAIR. 

IF THE FACTS TURN OUT TO BE THAT THE SCHOOL IS INNOCENT OF WRONGDOING AND THE STUDENTS’ ANTI-SEMITISM TURNS OUT TO BE AN ISOLATED INCIDENT, YOU SHOULD BOTH BE TARRED AND FEATHERED ON LAKE AVENUE RIGHT BEFORE THE NEXT LACROSSE GAME.  I WILL BE THERE LEADING THE JEERS and CARRYING THE FEATHERS.  BUT EVEN IF THE ACCOUNT BY THE LINKOFFS PROVES TO BE CORRECT, YOU STILL MESSED UP.

As saddened as I am to read about what purportedly happened at Boys Latin, it is a relief to see Buerger take something other than the typical hysterical, histrionic approach characteristic of the BJT’s McCarthyite witch hunt of Orthodox Rabbis and his adolescent writings blaming President Bush for all of the United States’ current problems.

Certainly, the Gilman School under the leadership of Redmond C.S. Finney offered an education that far transcended the bounds of class room and the athletic field. (I would only add that it was no accident that Mr. Finney and the late Judge Robert Hammerman of the Lancers Boys Club, whom the BJT has wrongfully and shamefully smeared, were great mutual admirers).

However, I am not sure Buerger’s recollections are entirely correct. Gilman set aside a day to study the Holocaust in either the 1977-78 or 1978-79 academic year. This event was well-planned, and didn’t seem to be hastily thrown together in response to an “incident” of some sort. (Like Buerger, I never experienced anti-Semitism at Gilman, though I did not doubt it existed.) Whether Gilman repeated this in the 80s when Buerger was in the Upper School, I cannot say.

But, if so, this was not the first such day dedicated to this curriculum.

And (this is important), after the Holocaust study day I attended, the BJT published an article that was harshly - and, in my opinion as a teenager at the time, inappropriately -  critical of Gilman’s and Mr. Finney’s efforts.

Stuart Sachs
Stamford, CT