Rabbi Jay Michaelson is a contributing columnist for the Forward and the writer of Both/And with Jay Michaelson. He is the author of 10 books, and won the 2023 New York Society for Professional Journalists award for opinion writing.
Jay MichaelsonContributing Columnist
By Jay Michaelson
-
Culture The Surprising Jewish Flavor of Hayao Miyazaki, King of Japanese Animation
There is much that is unusual about Hayao Miyazaki’s latest film, which the master says will be his last. It takes place in our own world, not the mythical past of “Princess Mononoke” or the magical universe of “Spirited Away.” It has a mostly adult, male protagonist, unlike those in many of Miyazaki’s other movies….
-
Opinion 5 Reasons You Should Talk to BDS Supporters
Getty Images Writing in Tablet Magazine, Liel Liebovitz — or perhaps Tablet’s headline writer — recently asked the apparently rhetorical question “Why Talk About Israel With People Who Want It To Disappear?” Here are five answers. 1. Because many of them and their supporters are Jews. Hillel, the Jewish Museum, Ramaz and other organizations that…
-
Opinion Hobby Lobby Discriminates in the Name of Religion With Help from Orthodox Outliers
Next month, the Supreme Court will hear the most important abortion case in decades. Like the recent anti-gay law vetoed by Arizona Governor Jan Brewer, it turns on the meaning of the term “religious liberty.” The case — actually a consolidation of two similar cases, Hobby Lobby v. Sebelius and Conestoga Wood v. Sebelius —…
-
Opinion Will Arizona Go the Anti-Gay Way of Uganda?
Will Arizona become the next Uganda? As we go to press, Arizona Governor Jan Brewer is debating whether to sign a “Religious Freedom Restoration Act” that will allow discrimination if the discriminator claims a religious justification. It’s been nicknamed the “Turn The Gays Away” bill because it will allow any business — restaurants, nail salons,…
-
Opinion Call It Sochifreude
Call it Sochifreude. For the past two years, human rights activists have decried the conditions of the Sochi Olympic games, which wrap up this week, often to deaf ears. They’ve reported accounts of migrant workers being abused, environmental laws being trashed, billions of dollars being embezzled, and, of course, the ban on gay “propaganda” which…
-
Opinion Why Woody Allen’s Thing for Younger Women Doesn’t Make Him a Pedophile
Hopefully, Woody Allen Fatigue has now settled in. Every major newspaper in the country has run op-eds on this horrible situation, some by family members themselves. This publication has published four: one demanding that we “stand up for Dylan Farrow,” one likening the pursuit of Allen to a “lynch mob,” and two professing ambivalence about…
-
Opinion Why Climate Change Denial Is Biggest Conservative Lie of All
Are conservatives ever right? They were wrong about slavery, wrong about women’s suffrage, wrong about segregation, wrong about gay rights. They were wrong about trickle down economics – it’s never worked and never will, as the ballooning wealth gap proves once again. They were wrong about Iraq (where are those WMD’s, anyway?) and wrong about…
-
Culture What’s More American Than Bob Dylan — and Super Bowl Car Ad?
“Oh, how the mighty have fallen,” people who don’t know much about Bob Dylan have said, in response to his surprising, patriotic Super Bowl commercial for Chrysler. To them, Dylan is still someone he never was: a Sixties icon, a protest singer who would never sell out. “Sad, sad, sad,” moaned one of my Facebook…
Explore
Most Popular
- 1
News What We Know About Jeffrey Epstein’s Childhood
- 2
News An audiobook narrator told Zionists to kill themselves. A popular romance novelist hired him anyway.
- 3
Opinion The dark message behind Tucker Carlson’s attempt to drum up drama in Israel
- 4
Opinion The ‘Hymietown’ affair degraded Black-Jewish relations. Jesse Jackson wasn’t the real culprit
In Case You Missed It
-
Fast Forward Israeli bobsled squad is disqualified from Olympics after trying to swap in Druze teammate
-
Fast Forward Leaked DNC autopsy found Biden’s Israel backing cost Harris votes for president
-
News Young Americans increasingly likely to view Hamas as ‘resistance,’ not terrorists
-
Fast Forward At Berlin screening, former Israeli hostages see film about their captivity rewritten after redemption
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
