The Boomer Rebellion isn’t just against Millennials and societal perceptions of Boomers as inept emerging fossils. At age 64, I have made a long list of sub-rebellions to carry me through the rest of my life. (This is my bucket list.)
The rebellion-of-the-moment is rooted in a sense of responsibility towards my USC students.
Setting an Example
Two points of focus are being fused here into one rebellion:
- The first is against strategy always being considered most important. It’s really the power of creativity that produces change.
- The second is against the actual funding models that perpetuate the tension between Muslims and Jews on campus.
Among these students of the last few years have been 30 Muslims from all over the world. Given the opportunity to learn to love each one of them, and to feel their respect and love in return, I now feel indebted to take action for Jews and Muslims to recognize and embrace each other’s humanity.
A positive and creative interaction between Muslim and Jewish students isn’t happening on many American university campuses. An increasingly shrill discord between these groups is encouraged, strengthened by local, national and international funders on both sides of the equation.
Each is trying to trump the other for advocates and winning true believers for their mutually intransigent individual positions — positions leading to absolutely nowhere with no solutions. Is this teaching an example to our next generation how to deal effectively and positively with conflict?
USC is a different animal. For a major American campus of 40,000 students, there is little if any tension between its Muslim and Jewish populations. Not that they know each other. I came to realize this USC campus atmosphere is a rare creative opportunity to do something extraordinary, rather than pouring angry energy into conflict.
For this essay, I am forging these two rebellions as one, illuminating it as an example of how other rebellions and causes need to connect creativity with change and outcome.
I Owe My Students.
I’ve learned over five years teaching Masters in Communication students at USC-Annenberg that to teach them well, you have to find the path to love each one of them. One benefit of this approach is that it opens your mind to see the human essence in every individual as he/she struggles to succeed in class.
Faculty Rep for Groups.
This year for the first time, I walked into Hillel at USC, the Jewish Student Center and offered my services to work with the Israel organizations on campus. I wanted to see if we could use peaceful thinking, rather than conflict to help build their numbers. I immediately became their faculty rep.
Then as fate would have it, a very strange thing happened. In my new capacity as the Executive Manager of the Annenberg Third Space Initiative, a global reconceptualization of the Communications business in a digital-driven era, I was thrown a question during a lecture to a group of undergrads studying Third Space. Immediately after, a young woman in a hijab (Muslim head covering) approached. After 10 minutes of a great Third Space dialogue, she said, “Professor, I like what you are saying. I wonder if you could help me with something I am doing on campus. I’m the president of the Muslims Students. We need a faculty rep.”
Angel of Peace
“I’d absolutely love to,” I answered, suddenly realizing there must be an Angel of Peace who is now on my side. “But you need to know something first, “I’m Jewish. I’m what you would consider to be a Zionist. And I just became the faculty rep for the Israeli students on campus. If you guys can handle that, I would love to work with you.”
Three days later she contacted me. “Everyone says it’s fine.” I thought, “Okay!” The next week I met with 12 Muslim student leaders from all over the world—Dubai, Egypt, Afghanistan, India, Indonesia, the U.S. along with other places. The Muslim students organization identified the exact same problem as the Israeli and Jewish students. Not enough students were showing interest in either groups.
After a great ninety minutes discussion, I closed by saying to the Muslim students, “I would love to keep working with you, but if my background causes discomfort, I certainly understand.” They talked to each other in a babble of languages for a minute and then one of them says, “Stop asking us this. We like you.” I said, “I like you folks too. Let’s move forward and discuss the next sensitivity. The Israel-Palestine issue. Would you be interested in an interchange with the Israeli and Jewish students on campus?” They all spoke to each other for a minute and then said, “Sure.”
So I went back to the Jewish students and told them of the offer. They immediately agreed.
Can Peace Overtake Conflict?
I decided to bring them together not on campus, but in my home, where everyone would feel compelled to be on good behavior as invited guests. (At least I felt the Muslims would be. From my intimate and wide experience, you never know with Israelis.)
As an observer and participant in countless Mideast peace efforts, I also knew that the longer dialogue persists, the more opportunity there is to reach an impasse, ending the interaction. Yet, from my experience as a creative professional, I also knew that if I could forge them into collaborative creative teams, actually co-creating and producing their own ideas, the interaction would be more focused on their shared ideas and the implementation, rather than on their disagreements. The outcomes would be better.
Video Game of Peace.
I contacted USC Prof. Chris Swain, an internationally recognized expert in the hugely emerging field of video games. “Chris, do you think you could work with USC’s Muslim and Jewish students as I put them into creative teams, to design and produce a video game of peace?” Chris jumped on it.
Soon after, I hosted a Creative Sunday Morning with students for brunch in my backyard, as I have been doing for the last two years with both my Advertising and Creativity, and my Nonprofit Advocacy classes. Except this time it was Muslims and Jews. The students ran this event.
Every invited student showed. Contrary to what anyone would believe, they were excited as could be to meet one another. It was as if they were young people traveling abroad, enthusiastically encountering people of different cultures. Energy filled the space.
Fashion Show of Peace
There were three unexpected, creative outcomes.
- They agreed to move forward with Prof. Chris Swain, break into creative teams and design the video game of peace. They not only are learning about each other, but also professional skills for their future.
- The women determined they would create an on campus fashion show of Muslim and Jewish religious women’s wear.
- They agreed to work together and develop a collaborative and produce activities for USC Peace Week.
The Proof
The first positive outcome came the next week, an event with a visiting Israeli professor and the head of the Islamic Center in Los Angeles. When an issue about the conflict arose, the head of the Muslim students group informed the speaker about the Creative Sunday Morning event. “We are moving towards peace and interaction on this campus,” the student said. At which point one of the leaders of the Jewish students arose to communicate the same message.
The biggest challenge is yet to surface. It will be when the big funding guns on both sides of this conflict hear about a Muslim-Jewish creative interaction and feel the need to move into the campus to “right this wrong.” They don’t know yet know about the determination of this rebellion. This Boomer’s only just begun.
Spread the Word
Who dares to say Boomers are too old to re-invent themselves and be powerfully relevant for a new world? A rebellion is in the making. Spread the word.
Mr. Wexler may be contacted at gary@garywexler.com
