The sky isn’t falling, but our strategy might be

The Jewish community in the Diaspora is facing a genuine, deeply troubling rise in antisemitism. That is undeniable. But what is also undeniable—and increasingly uncomfortable to admit—is that the way we talk about antisemitism is beginning to work against us.

The constant drumbeat, the nonstop warnings, the breathless proclamations that everything is a crisis have begun to backfire. Not because the threats aren’t real, but because when every instance, every comment, every policy disagreement becomes labeled as antisemitism, the power of the word collapses under its own weight. The boy who cried wolf eventually discovered that even a real wolf couldn’t get anyone’s attention. Chicken Little never convinced anyone that the sky was falling, even when acorns actually did hit him on the head.