i am poor, black, trans, and deaf. the process of conversion ALWAYS is intensive -- and often expensive -- but it took me years and years longer than most because do you want to guess how easy it is to find places that will make CLASSES accessible to you when you are deaf? https://twitter.com/JustSayXtian/status/1280930482130006017

guess what... there's almost none.

most places laugh at the very idea. i was also told, repeatedly, for years, that i was presumptuous and rude and demanding for even ASKING about accessibility because why should anyone care about including me since i wasn't jewish.

& that i was making trouble and playing "identity politics" for mentioning racism (such as... literally having people call the POLICE on me when i turned up TO CLASS at shul... an active threat of VIOLENCE when i just wanted to learn) and that as a nonjew i had no place to speak.

that it was just stirring the pot to ask how mikveh would be handled as a nonbinary conversion candidate and that i had no right to ask questions about how a shul handled gender non-conforming people because i should shut up as a nonjew.

i was told all this over and over and over for YEARS. there was a repeated attitude of, well if you care so much about being jewish you'll just shut up and deal with all these things it's not your place to talk about these things...

but INTERESTINGLY now that i am a black deaf trans jew who... still deals with racism and ableism and transphobia... im ALSO told it's not my place to talk because im not Jewish Enough and if i criticize literally anything, ever, it brings my motives into question.

wild how that works!! almost like some people just don't want to deal with three bigotry in the community and it has nothing to do with converts at all!

anyway all the places that told me it was Totally Not Possible to accommodate me as a deaf conversion candidate like... they aren't magically going to be accessible to deaf jews.

i live in dc where there is one of the highest deaf populations in the country and even here? the options for accessible services are EXTREMELY limited.

(and several of the ones that exist literally exist bc i, PERSONALLY, fought for them.)

if you go to shul and look around and 99% of the faces you see are not jews of color there's a REAL good chance jews of color don't feel welcome at your services! if cops are guarding your doors at shabbat probably many black jews don't feel safe coming!

if you have steep membership fees, if you HAVE membership fees, there are plenty of jews who your synagogue isn't accessible to. (yes, i know staff has to get paid; i am on my shul board and know what the budget is like. that doesn't change the fact that people get excluded.)

if all your activities are clearly geared towards getting Young Jewish Singles to hook up; if there's not a lot to keep families with children or teenagers past their bnei mitzvah or elders there, that's it's own kind of inaccessible.

there are a million and two ways that we tell SO many jews that they are the wrong kind and then simultaneously get baffled and mad that they aren't staying in community after being shooed away.