Hello everyone and welcome back to People Juwan and O podcast.
Today's guest is someone who has been nominated by at least five
other guests of the show. Her name is Bellamy Bellucci.
Bellamy Bellucci is a South African born dancer, model,
filmmaker and advocate whose journey bridges continents,
identities and communities. A black transgender Jewish
woman, she has become a singular voice for inclusivity and
representation, using her artistry and lived experience to
spark conversations. Raised in Johannesburg, Bellamy
trained at the National School of the Arts and the South
African Ballet Theatre School before earning a scholarship at
the Washington School of Ballet. Through the inaugural South
African International Ballet Competition in 2009, she
achieved international recognition as a top 12
finalists at the Youth America Grand Prix, the world's largest
student ballet competition. She travelled all over the
world, five different continents and performed with some of the
most acclaimed companies. And as is the case for a lot of
professional dancers and athletes, Bellamy ended up
needing medical care after some injuries.
Following. Bilateral hip replacement
surgery. She then transitioned into
teaching, private coaching and modeling while expanding her
creative work into filmmaking. Now, Bellamy is working on
Finding Home, a feature length documentary exploring belonging,
identity and resilience through her own lens.
Of course, she is also a passionate advocate for Israel
and a bold voice against anti-Semitism.
Bellamy and I met in person for the first time at the AJC Global
Forum and we instantly hit it off.
There's something complimentary about us and I remember telling
her that together we're like a black and white cookie.
There's so much going on in Bellamy's life and so many
identities that she's straddling.
You'll get to hear all about it first hand.
In this episode, I really want you to listen to how Bellamy
takes her pain and she converts it into positive energy and
value and activism. One of the things I heard from
Bellamy is the pain she feels over how the Jewish community
has treated her as an activist. When organizations don't want to
pay, when they treat you like you should, be grateful you're
in the room. You'll hear all about this
shortly, and this is what I'd like to add as my own opinion on
the matter. As a product manager by trade, I
really believe that if one person said it, 10 people felt
it and 100 people experienced it.
What Bellamy is talking about is, frankly, the total truth,
and it's just that a lot of activists won't complain or say
anything because then they won't make money.
Now I can talk about it all day long because I don't use
activism as my income and I honestly feel like I should say
something for the greater good of others.
It is common practice at Jewish conferences and amongst Jewish
organizations to bring in keynote speakers and panelists
their events. When this happens, the smaller
creators or younger creators, they're often asked to attend
and speak for free and they're told that no one else is getting
paid an honorarium. Once again, when activists try
to advocate for themselves and ask to get paid, the Jewish
organizations first line of defense is always we'd love to
pay you, but actually everyone is doing this free of charge, so
it wouldn't be fair. And respectfully, this is just
untrue. And all of us know that it's
untrue, as Bellamy put it in an offline conversation.
If Caitlyn Jenner is attending your conference, you cannot look
me in the eyes and in good faith tell me that no one is getting
paid. The organization is just
choosing not to pay you. I think it would be a lot more
palatable if they just said things like, sorry, you know, we
don't have the budget for this. But turning it on the creator
and framing it as if the creator is asking to be treated with
some exceptionality is just a bad faith rebuttal.
And no one can really do anything about it because if
they cause too much of A stink, they'll successfully work
themselves out of a job. That's why when you go to these
conferences, you feel a lot of resentment from Jewish activists
when you talk to them. In fact, many of them have
pivoted to become brand influencers or something other
than Jewish activists. Unless you're a Hen Mazig or a
Noah Tishbi, there's really no money to be made in Jewish
activism. And even Hen and Noah are still
like workhorses. So what does it say about how
much everyone else would have to do to make a living off of this?
And of course, there are influencers who have made six
figures from the war, profited from the war, but they are few
and far between. I can count them on two hands.
That's just simply not the reality for the other 99%.
Anyway, that's some inside tea for you on the world of Jewish
activism, but you'll also get to hear Bellamy's take.
I'm excited to see what's next for Bellamy, how her documentary
evolves, and of course, her journey with Aliyah.
She is truly a people. Do you want to know?
And please enjoy this episode. Hello Bellamy, welcome to
PEOPLE. Do You want to Know podcast?
Thank you. Thank you for having me.
I would have you every day if I could.
You'll be my Co host if I could. It's an honor to have you here.
For those who are not familiar with you yet, please tell us
about yourself. What do you do and how did you
get there? I am a very insane person that
just believes in sovereignty of the state of Israel, but also as
a Jew, just the importance of who we are as a people and
changing the narrative that I think has been going on for so,
so, so many years. And using my life and making
sure that I can echo every single inch of who we are, not
just as a people, but what we've given to the world.
Because it seems that people just think that Jews are a
monolith. So that needs to change.
Insane indeed. What an insane idea.
I want you to take us back to your upbringing in South Africa.
You were a professional dancer for years of your life growing
up as a black person in South Africa post apartheid.
Tell us a little bit about your upbringing and how that shaped
you. It was definitely different.
I would say I had both worlds that were very different, like
in terms of like socio economic, both parents were very different
and both gave different things. I was never really close to my
family. I'm still not very close to my
family at all. I was shipped off the boarding
school at the age of 7 and just had to suit up.
I just had to get on with life. I fell in love with classical
ballet after I'd started acting at the age of 9 in Johannesburg
when I they got out of private school and I went to public
school afterwards. And that led me to something
that I was super passionate about, fell in love with, but
also knowing that it might be my out out of South Africa being
around family that had gone through apartheid and the
remnants of apartheid that was still there.
I think a lot of people that read about it historically think
that OK, great. So Nelson Mandela became
president and then apartheid was over.
No, on paper it was over. But the remnants of it is
something that runs very deep in the the veins of the South
African human body and as a source for what it stands for to
this day. I was very privileged to be
first generation of post apartheid, to be educated better
than my parents were and have more opportunity.
So I sought every single opportunity that I could get.
Luckily for me, I stayed away from the indoctrination in which
the education system had been pushing on somebody that looks
like me, obviously, and what we see and hear today coming out of
a country like that. So I wouldn't say that I had the
happiest of childhoods, but I was also so busy that I really
didn't care and I wanted out since since I think that as long
as I can remember, South Africa is such a beautiful country.
But there's more damage than beauty for somebody like me, and
especially as somebody that went through everything that I did as
a child and not really feeling that whole sense of family or
community or country or nationalism.
I never had it for for South Africa.
So the best thing that I had was classical ballet and acting to
make money from the age of nine. That's what I did for money.
So how, how joyous is that for a childhood?
That's a lot. And while I empathize as a
former child performer, I don't understand because to me it was
joyous. It wasn't work.
And so it breaks my heart to hear that it felt like to you
more of like a necessary evil in order to survive than anything
else. And I wonder as your friend, you
and I haven't talked about this before, but I, I'm wondering if
you'd be able to share. At what point did you realize
that, you know, I don't quite fit into the body that I'm in
right now? And at what point did your trans
journey kind of start? I think for a lot of people that
don't understand gender dysphoria or where it comes
from, they, they hold space for it.
That term, Thank goodness Wicked is over because I can't stand
it. They, they hold, you know, space
for it and, and try to understand.
So for me, from the age of four, I knew that I was different.
We all are different, But you know, I'm, I'm also a child.
What do I really know about what difference is?
Every single day is different. I'm learning something new every
single day. But there was always this very
innate sense of there's something off with my body
because I don't identify with whatever this meat suit thing is
that I'm in. And I'm very, you know,
conservative in how I was raised as well.
Very tribal, very traditional in a South African way.
And it's one away. So I was, I was a pariah in the
family from a very, very young age.
But knowing that I was different from a young age, I wouldn't say
was the worst thing because one thing led to another and then
all of a sudden, oh, they do ballet.
OK, whatever. I, I came out of the closet as
self identifying gay person at the age of 12 because it just
made life so much easier to be around my family and the
so-called, I would say my surroundings, not community, but
my surroundings. For a lot of people they might
think, wow that's brave or that's so young.
I just thought I want to be left alone.
So that was the easiest thing for me to do while I spent life
growing internally as myself, to accept myself.
I think a lot of people have this strange sense that all
trans people or anybody that has this very distinct gender
identity struggle or dealing with gender dysphoria or
homosexuality or anything else that just makes somebody more of
a minority than they already are, that there's this
acceptance that they need from the world.
For somebody like me, I never understood that because I needed
to accept myself. It was never about the world
opening its doors for me as I, I grew up in a country where gay
pride was normal, it was normalized and gay people being
married was normal. So when I came to the United
States of America, the fact that gay marriage wasn't even legal
was a odd thing, considering that I come from a country that,
you know, blacks and whites couldn't walk on the same side
of the street when I was, you know, growing up in spaces.
And these on things like you have Soweto and you have
Alexandra where you put a a bunch of people that basically
what we would call those like racial concentration camps that
were surrounded by the army that if you dropped a nuke, you could
wipe out a whole race. So my upbringing was very
different. Growing up getting to see the
army go by. I did have some sort of a
balance in reality from everything that was happening
around, which again, to this day brings me to explaining how, you
know, me being trans is not my whole personality.
Me being black is not my whole personal.
There was always so much going around and coming from a country
on a continent where I'm a predominant race also kind of
separates me from a black person in America.
So understanding who I was psychologically was more of an
interest to me than, oh, I need to, you know, say that I'm, I'm
different. I think it was, it was harder
for me to tell the world that I was gay than it was to say that
I was trans because that was the lie.
And, and I had to grow up with a lie that was uncomfortable for
me and be in spaces that made me feel very uncomfortable where I
think a lot of people who are probably straight feel that way
or pretending to be heterosexual and still in the closet.
For me, that part of, oh, you came out of the closet was very
much like, I just put myself in this box and in the closet
because I was not somebody that I was ever going to be growing
up and living my life. At some point, it was that or
OK, at some point I'll probably just end my life.
I'll just do as much as I can really quickly, achieve as much
as I can really quickly, and then peace out, morbid as that
is. But yeah.
I think what you're saying is really powerful here because
often I find that people who are self-conscious about their
identity, they walk into a room and they're like, oh, by the
way, you know, I'm gay or by the way, I'm this and you need to
know about me that I'm this, this and that.
And I even feel that myself where I sometimes come into a
room and I'm like, oh, and by the way, I'm Jewish, right?
And I need people to know that right away because I want to
make sure that I'm accepted by them.
But what you're saying here is it's irrelevant whether you're
accepted by anybody else. You have to be accepted by you.
And that's one of the things that you when I laugh about
whenever where Jewish events or conferences, how, you know,
careful people trod around you because they're like, what do we
do with with this? You know with this circumstance.
What are we doing right now? Right and you're just like, what
do you mean? I, I'm just a person and that's
the most important thing. The the most important lesson I
think somebody could take away from being connected to people
who are perhaps in an identity that's unusual to them or
uncommon to the world is that you have to just see them as a
person. It doesn't matter what the
labels are or how they identify themselves.
You are Bellamy, you are my friend.
You are a person. Yeah.
And, and, and the, the main thing that I had to come to
terms with, you know, by doing the work and really going inside
and, and understanding that the world is not coming to save me.
No one's coming to save me. No one's coming to long before
we got into struggles of, you know, BLM or anything else was
really understanding the importance of self acceptance
because at some point the world and, and people are very fickle.
So if you are already dealing with everything that the the
world and life is throwing at you universally or through
Hashem or so forth, you, you have to have a very strong
constitution for self. And it didn't come easy, but I
had to really knuckle down and make sure that I was comfortable
with myself because the world is not a kind place.
So 1 needs to create a reality and live in reality as well, but
create a reality within themselves.
What they understand that it doesn't matter how other people
perceive you or how other people talk about you or treat you in
rooms with that you're in or you're not.
How are you treating yourself? And that that's, that's one of
the, the most powerful thing that I think I'm very lucky to
have realized because it's helped me get out of bed.
It's helped me like walk in rooms and be confident within
myself. It it comes with work, but I
would definitely say that I've had grown straight men who are
very alpha, blah, blah, blah, behave like, you know, little
puppies with dogs with, you know what their with their tail
between their legs because they don't know how everybody's on
egg shells. I don't know what to say.
I don't know what to do. But at the same time, they can
see that I exude everything that I am.
I'm very, very authentic and I, I no longer care to, to make
those announcements of this is who I am.
If somebody wants to ask a question, I definitely think
they should ask the question. Because when we went through
that whole thing during COVID with BLM and all the celebrities
were like, I'm at fault. I'm at fault.
I mean, it was the most annoying thing that white people are
going around telling me that it's their fault that I'm black.
Are you OK? Something's very off with with
that. And now we look at what's
happening with with with this intense, disgusting volcanic
eruption of anti-Semitism, which I think has always existed.
But the volcano is just erupted and we're living within this
lava and a stained world because people need to feel that the
world has to tell us that, hey, it's not your fault that you're
that way. I could have used some of that
energy now. But ultimately I, I've already
gone through that part of being told, oh, it's my fault.
And I, I want to slap people like that.
Internally, I don't believe in violence, but internally I, I, I
want to say, why are you so weak in terms of constitution with,
with, with yourself? Why do you need to apologize for
what you look like? Why does a white man have to
apologize for being a white man like that?
There's a reason why we're all so politically and everywhere
else in this very uncomfortable shift where people feel as
though everything is so radicalized right now.
But yeah, because everyone's been living on a hubbly bubbly
for years going, I'm so sorry. Are you OK?
Did I say the wrong thing? I don't want to insult.
I don't want to offend. And then when you, when they
come across somebody like me and I'm like, please just ask the
question because you're wasting so much energy trying to digest
how to do something. If you're respectful in the
intention of what you're doing and want to know is coming from
a real place. I respect that.
There's nothing that drives me more insane than people that
walk around me, you know, on egg shells because energetically I
can feel it. Why are you?
Why are you lurking then? Like go do something else.
The lurkers I I want to dig into this more, but first I want to
take us on a little tangent. Tell me where Judaism found you
in all of this? What what was happening at the
time? How did you come across it, and
how did you know? Like OK, this means something to
me. So I grew up in a very Christian
Methodist base family where, you know, people were going to
church. My grandmother was like
basically a board member of the church until she passed away
when I was very young. My family is still very much in
the same, same church. There's there's no mixing of you
go, here I go. No same church, same family from
birth till death. And I had this very strange
because I'm a very inquisitive person, because I'm, I'm, I'm
weird enough, I think for the world as it is.
So I might as well get as much information as possible about
what's going on here. Why am I here?
And I kept asking questions from, from the Bible or in terms
of ritual. And they just kept saying
because and because it's not an answer for me, it's it's a very
lazy answer of people that are just following a recipe.
That you could have just baked cookies and said, I followed a
recipe. You didn't come up with it.
You didn't ask why you needed a little bit of this and a little
bit of that. You didn't mess up enough to
figure out why the formula is this way.
So I stepped away from Christianity.
And when I started doing ballet, I think it was around.
Yeah, no, it was around the age of 10.
I had, you know, teachers that were Jewish.
I, my friends were Jewish. So my whole world kind of
changed because I wasn't somebody that really grew up
with friends because I was working or I was in a different
school, in boarding school, in a different state.
So my schooling was very different term wise to everybody
that I was growing up with. When I was on holiday, they were
in school. When they were in school, I was
on holiday. So for the first time, I started
to really make genuine friends that I spent hours and hours and
hours with, and then start to get invited into their homes and
into events. And it was something that pulled
me towards Judaism in that way because it was a sense of
community. But ritual made sense and I
could ask questions, I could ask questions.
And people were excited that I was asking questions, annoying
as I was. But I needed more information.
I needed to know more about everything else.
And there was this pathway within Judaism that allowed me
to do that. But I also felt like myself very
much myself. And again for the second time, I
can't make a decision like that. I'm too young.
I have to wait. So from that age when people go
around to India at the age of 40, when they're, you know,
divorced with three kids and they go find themselves.
I found I I did the whole I'm going to find myself while I
grow up because clearly I'm developing and I'm I'm growing.
Might as well figure out if I'm a Buddhist, am IA Scientologist,
am I? I went on the this whole thing
and the chanting with the beads, Tina Turner style was not my
thing. It worked for a little bit, but
I think if you work something long enough and you believe it,
SA Baba, it's it's real, right? Didn't do anything for me at
all. And then I had, you know, people
that I was going to school with. They were like, I, you know, my
father is an alcoholic and he beats me, but I, I'm so in love
with nature and Buddhism because I can chant and I have my gahans
on. And I was like, there's a little
lot going on that you have to do and I'm tired kind of.
So I stepped away from religion. I was always very spiritual.
And then when I moved to the USI was there was still this, this
yearning for, for something beyond spirituality.
So besides the chanting, I was in a downward facing dog every
two seconds just trying to find some kind of message, some like
something from somewhere. And it only took me until 2011
when I came on tour to to Israel and we're performing at the
Opera House with my ballet company.
And on a Sunday, which is Monday here we went.
And we, we came to Jerusalem from Tel Aviv, got on a bus.
We did the whole thing. We ran to the show.
But it's when I got to the hotel that every question that I had
been asking internally and, and was throwing out into the ether,
Hashem was like, OK, great. Now I'm going to answer you.
And there was one word that I literally heard and felt.
And it was yes. So a question that I had asked
at the age of 10 of is this who I am?
Why does this makes it? And all I heard was yes.
So I was like, OK, let me go and do some more research, meet with
some rabbis, start attending services at different synagogues
in in New York. And that's how I ended up
finding my, my, my rabbi and converting one-on-one Orthodox.
I wasn't there yet. And I don't think that I was
ready to deal with a lot of the very, very amazingly halafic
values and that the way of life, because my life was very much
filled with it was everywhere. You know, I'm in one country in
two seconds and then I'm, I'm in Japan the next and then I'm
performing here, then I'm in New York.
For there was a way too much going on to truly say, OK, I'm
good. I'm going to get, have a Jewish
Home. I'm going to live a kosher life.
I'm going. So I, I slowly really started to
incorporate these things into my life where it made sense for
somebody who's living such a fast-paced life as a performing
artist and reform was a little too chill for me.
I still needed ritual. That was the one thing that I
was craving was ritual because I need to know that when I'm
connecting, there's a reason why.
And I have to work to have said connection.
We all have a connection with, with, with Hashem, even if
you're spiritual, not religious, we all have it.
But I had such a deep yearning to, to have a relationship with,
with God because I was missing it from my parents and I was
missing it from the world. So I knew that that there has to
be a reason why I have this very strong and in a sense that I'm
being pulled towards my, my parents.
Like if you, if we're calling him ABBA, we call him our
father, our sovereign. So if I'm being pulled towards
this, this magnificence that created me, then I wanted to
probably go in that direction. So when muscle T like
Conservative Judaism was was presented to me, I thought, OK,
great, because it's one step closer to Orthodox and kind of a
little bit more doable with with with my life at the time.
The conservative movement is also my favorite movement in
Judaism. That's the camp that I grew up
going to. I think they really balance, you
know, tradition with like, modern day in a beautiful way.
And I'm really excited in particular how this new chapter
for you in Israel plays out because you will get to
experience the concept of traditional in a new way, in an
Israeli way. And I wonder how you take that
on, whether you find that you enjoy it or if you prefer the
more conservative style. One of the things that has been
really touching for me to observe is how you stepped up in
the Jewish advocacy world post October 7th as a performing
artist. You never have to say anything
really. And considering you're like our
model minority in the US, you could have fit right in, you
know, with the woke mob. But you immediately go like, no,
that's not what I'm going to do. As you reflect back on this
roller coaster that you've been on, two years of painstaking,
thankless advocacy work, difficult life experiences,
beautiful life experiences, making Aaliyah, what do you
think is your proudest achievement?
I would definitely have to say making my way to Israel in a way
that I call it home, not in a way, but that there's been this
thing. It's also the name of the
documentary that I'm making as I get.
It's called Finding Home and I'm very much about finding home
because I've never felt as though I was home.
So even the story of, of our exodus from Egypt, historically,
I, I have this thing of not just where we all disperse throughout
the world that there was, there's this very magnetic soul
sense of I feel as though I've just been wandering in Galut.
I've been wandering in, you know, and in exile.
But there's this very deep sense of a homecoming and I and, and,
and also the people that I gravitate towards and the people
that gravitate towards me is something that I've never
experienced outside of this country ever.
And walking into a Shoal baked nest at shul, synagogue, temple,
whatever you want to call it, anywhere else in the world would
have been very different for me. But me going to a synagogue here
on Yom Kippur with a Mahita and being able to pray not just as a
Jew, but as, as a woman and, and with, with Orthodox people that
see me as a human being, but for everything else.
And like, you know, that life here is not a utopia.
But I feel more of myself. I feel more like myself than I
have ever felt in my whole life. So I think that was the the arc
of October 7th. But even before October 7th,
when they try to enact the another intifada during lockdown
in May, when there was that uptick of, you know, the the
same rhetoric and the same conversation of everything that
we've heard for the past two years, it called me to step up
to my higher self. And I think that comes with a
responsibility where I had to be OK losing everything.
I had to be OK being being annexed from the modelling world
and the entertainment world. And I have to be OK with it.
I had to be OK with friends being taken away from me because
my path in a place that got me out of South Africa was over.
It was over because it was time to move forward.
And when I say calls to my higher self, my mission was far
greater than what I thought it was going to be.
And I think for all of us that have been very vocal and just as
Jews, as a community, as one body, as much as we're so many
tribes, as one body, it truly activated us or for me
personally, activated me in a way where I had to come into
mission above self. I had enough time being about
self. Now it was time to come to my
higher self because I'd called for more because it was no
longer just about me. It was no longer just about me
being an American, me being in the New York, me being a South
African. It called me for far more
because everything that the world could look at me and say
is wrong with me is exactly what's right.
And the change that needs to happen not just within our
community, but throughout the world.
So when I hear people talk about how they're in desperate need of
equality because there's such massive inequality and racial
and systemic racism in America, I'm like, OK, but where's the
change coming in that with the LGBTQ plus community?
Where's the change coming in that because equality was
granted, was given, It's there because two men can walk into a
restaurant and hold hands. Let's be real, it, it might not
be in in Minnesota somewhere, but living in New York, even
even, you know, with the, with the Stonewall rights and
everything else, the arc happened.
So this is where we are. Where's the change where we as
as people and as individuals realize that moving forward, the
only way that we're going to shift and move away from every
single historic benchmark that we're so stuck on is by being
exactly the change that we want to see in the world.
And I'm not just seeing that as a cliche because people throw it
out there all the time. Be the change you want to see in
the world. OK?
Thank you so much for the banner.
Have merch. Did the merch help?
Did anything help? Course correct where we're
going? Because I definitely think we're
at such an A very incredibly important time.
The clock is ticking and you either go right or left.
You either say yes or no, heed the call.
And that's where I am right now. We're in very desperate need of
changing the narrative moving forward.
We can't do and say the same things again.
We have our tribal customs, we have ritual, we have history,
but who are we where people look back 100 years from now and say
this generation actually did something different, as opposed
to not just saying never again as now?
OK, how's that helping? You bring up something that's
really the crux of the issue in the Jewish world today, which is
we cannot cohesively communicate to the world who we are.
We can't agree on it as a community, and thus we don't
have a clear message to the world.
In fact, we are infighting so much amongst ourselves that you
know, there goes Mamdani finding a bunch of Jews who can support
his worldview, right? Because at this point you can
find a Jew who believes anything really.
So it's a really hard thing to reckon with because what once
made our community so beautiful? It was this like diversity of
opinion, diversity of thought. But they're at this point, I
really do believe that there needs to be something stronger
than just all of us saying we're Jewish that unites us and what
that what it means to be Jewish. Saying we're all Jewish is not
enough of a common denominator anymore, no.
Absolutely not. It's not enough of a common
denominator. But also we've had this
conversation before. I said it's not just the panels,
it's not just the the leaders that are out there.
The fact that I think a Mizrahi community has to start an
organization specifically to speak form, you know, the
Mizrahi Sephardium have to start their own.
And if you but the fact that that already has to happen with
such a small percentage of people in the world is beyond
baffling to me. It is so baffling.
Even the LGBTQ plus kept adding letters, even them as a
community, they just added more letters.
And but they keep amplifying one another and who they are
underneath this queer umbrella. And we're like, that's
beautiful. We'll support you instead of
taking little things by looking around and this this
conversation that people that don't like us have been having
for so long, especially in the West.
And it's not trickled into to the East, which the the Arabs
have started and, you know, fueled those flames years ago,
long before a white person even came and colonized any country
in Africa. Was that why white people are
Jews? Jews are white.
So it's this ASCII normative thing where when you meet a
black person that's half Ashkenazi or half Safari, right
within our own community, people go.
So the, the American community, a friend of mine said this to me
is very different because they're very tribal, extremely
tribal to, to a point where I've been invited to places where,
and I feel it and I'll talk about it openly where I'm made
to feel as though I should be very happy to have been invited.
I, I should be grateful that I got invited.
And I think, but I'm a Jew and you invited other content
creators and I'm a content creator and I'm an activist and
I'm, but you know, I always joke that I could have had cold
chicken at home. It probably would have tasted
better. But you need a black person or
so many black people sitting in the room.
So the optics of how the world goes, oh see, they are diverse.
Has it worked so far? No, it hasn't worked because
then I'm still going to sit in the back and then have someone
that doesn't look like me, someone that looks like the rest
of the room go and you know who's who sat on stage and said
blacks don't know Jews. And there were about 6 black
people in the conference room and he was dead ass.
Blacks don't know Jews. And I went Huh?
I do know who you're talking about.
Or it was actually what it was, was black people don't know what
Jewish names sound like. That's what that person said
that. And I'm like, oh really?
And that's news to me that I. Was like I'm I was the only
person that did not have a typical typical Jewish name.
I was the only, everybody else had Hebrew names.
And do you see what I mean? It's it's not, it's not adding
up. And but then if you keep saying
the same thing over and over again and you're speaking in an
echo chamber, of course everybody's going to go.
Yeah, that's so true. No, it's not.
Look around what? We're so used to speaking to
ourselves in a way where we make ourselves feel better.
We're so used to championing and, and rewarding every single
minority ally that comes in and says I like you or hey, I, I
love the Jews. You know, I, I like a certain
type of food or whatever. And we're like, don't worry
about it. Come spend a day or a whole
weekend in my house and and I will come for Shabbat.
Come for whatever. Are you willing to actually even
invite another Jew that doesn't look like you to Shabbat, but
you'll invite somebody that doesn't look like you who's not
a Jew to your table for a sacred meal?
Do people understand what's going?
It's a sacred meal, but you're so much more comfortable
inviting an outsider into a sacred space, which is your
sanctuary, which is your home to break bread with than another
Jew. And it's not a racial thing.
That's the thing. It's not a racial thing.
And, and the beauty of being in Israel is it's it's not a racial
thing here. Like if, if, if people wanted to
talk about or use that term outside, it was like, well, how
the Safarian feel about the Mizrahi, how they feel about the
Ashkenazi, how they feel about the betas.
Yeah, that's not racism. Because if you put all of them
together, you could you could play.
We are the world in the back. So we ourselves are not using
the time that we have right now wisely because we're on the
defense all the time. And most of the time it's it's
echoed and it's directed in the wrong direction because it's
towards our own as opposed to the people that actually don't
want us here. And then the only thing that
brings us together is a massive tragedy or oh, we, we have so
much security for when we go to. There's certain things that do
bring us together, but it's not really from joy because we have
this deep sense of generational trauma.
And I think so much, so much damage that the body just reacts
and has a very visceral reaction to everything that's negative.
And that's how we come together. But what, what, what whatever
happened to rebranding Jewish Joy?
Maybe that's what people rebrand Jewish Joy.
Actually. I want to add something that I
heard recently that I think it's kind of related to what you're
saying. Like this notion that we are
more open to an A questionable ally supposedly.
Like this is the cautionary tale of Azalea Banks, right?
Azalea Banks posted three things about, you know, liking Israel
or Jews. Suddenly she was flying on an
all expenses paid trip and staying with like Israeli
millionaires or whatever. And then it took her like a
week, and suddenly she tweeted anti-Semitic stuff.
And the whole community was like, you took crumbs, Right.
So this is what you're raising here.
And the notion that we're more, we're more gracious to these
allies that we don't even know do they stand with us or against
us than we are to Jews in our own community is really like a
gross thing. And the Superior Journal had a
whole. Yeah, The Superior Journal had a
whole issue that they titled Money where they posted a
different essays around money. And one of the sociologists that
wrote for them talked about how within the American Jewish
community, money is really at the center of how the community
interacts with each other. And how the community members
who feel ostracized, it's often correlated with the fact that
they simply can't afford to participate in the type of
Jewish life you refer to as being grateful for being in the
room. Right.
Even though you were always qualified to be in the room just
by the sheer notion that you're Jewish and how the whole Jewish
communal experience is really a money thing.
It's a matter of money and being able to participate.
It's a pay to play game. And how in Israeli life that
just fundamentally does not exist because by surely living
in Israel, you're already playing the game.
And that's something I really think we have to reckon with.
And it really bothers me that this is the case.
And when I think about being from the former Soviet Union, I,
I don't talk about this very often, but I have to say that
growing up in the suburbs of Minneapolis, because I was a
Jewish refugee from Ukraine and for the first few years of my
life, my family was on food stamps and lived in Section 8
housing. I didn't have any Jewish friends
because the Jewish kids were not poor.
So I couldn't relate to them. I, I was only friends with kids
that also, you know, lived in the Section 8 building or also
came from poor backgrounds. And it only changed once my mom
became a doctor and we started seeing, you know, money, more
money come into the family that I could participate in Jewish
communal life, go to sleep away camp.
And even then, like every camp I went to was on scholarship, and
none of the kids knew that at that camp.
But I always knew that I was different because I I stood out
from those kids. So what you're talking about is
near and dear to my heart. And it's just amplified now
through the paradigm of galas and events.
And I too feel that I walk into a room where I believed I was
qualified. And everyone around me is acting
like, well, what are you doing here?
How come you're here? And that really is something we
have to reckon with in Jewish life.
I want to pick your brain on kind of the flip side of it all
together. A year ago or so, I had a guest
on my show, Hannah Simpson, who is a trans Jewish woman.
And at that time, she talked about her fear of the Trump
administration and the, the concern that she has about the
reality for trans individuals once this right wing
administration takes effect. You, on the other hand, have a
completely different vantage point on that as a trans woman.
And I, I want to know how you reconcile that.
I, I want to get your honest take.
Like, does it concern you? If it doesn't concern you, why?
And I think our listener also has those questions that they
don't really have anyone to ask. For me, what concerns me as our
own community, not being able to put certain fears and, and
emotions above being able to sit across from what you consider to
be the evil that wants your demise and having a
conversation. Because to me that already tells
me that you don't want a solution.
If we, if I think back to all the BLM riots and everything
else, OK, what happened there was there was a lot going on.
There was a lot of looting. There was a lot of, there was a
lot going on. But at the end of the day, what
was the resolve besides or something that is more race?
It's going to be very different because we're we're a lesser
like you will, we're more of a minority than than the black
community. But there's a conversation that
I have all the time with people that live in fear.
Being trans is already scary, OK, You're scared you're going
to be killed. I'm already black and trans.
I'm scared that I'm going to be killed.
I'm already black, trans, Zionist Ajuva.
There's so many things. I could be killed at any moment,
but I could also choke on a pickle.
And I'm not saying it sarcastically in any way, but
we're so focused on coming together, having a call for
action to stand and yell. So we all feel better because we
all feel that we see each other. And that's something that I
don't feed into. So my thing was, well, what
would you think the solution would be?
Are you willing to put together something and go to the trumpet?
Are you willing to do that? And the answer is always, well,
they won't listen. Have you actually tried, have
you actually stood across from a Republican or somebody that you
consider to be a conservative and had a conversation with
them? Because you can't expect
somebody that's on the other side of the island on the
political spectrum, who's on the so far away from everything that
you consider to be who you are as a person.
What what democracy is, what liberty is, what equal rights is
and everything that you want to hold for yourself.
And then say, I will not have a conversation with them because I
consider them to be a fascist or I consider them to be a this
when they haven't even gotten to know you.
And it's a blanket statement that both parties use against
one another. You can't be around somebody
that's a Democrat or a liberal because they're crazy and
they've got blue hair and they're like this and da, da,
da, da. And then the other side is, Oh
my gosh, they're, they're insane.
I'm a self hating trans person. I, I'm a self hating black
person. I'm a, you know, I'm a Coon.
Then I get called, I get called the worst things when people
realize that I might have different leanings than they do.
But what they also forget is the fact that I come from a
different country, a different continent, a different reality
than what they do. So I have what I think I'm the
one that's privileged because in terms of education, I've seen
what it's like to not be. And there's something innately
like set from, from from a very young age, almost from birth.
I think with with with the American Society is that it's
either going to be race or whatever kind of minority that
you are. And that's where you hold.
And that's why I think white men and white people have been
demonized for so long, because to be able to have to go and to
apologize to somebody because of what they look like or what
their gender is, whatever, is preposterous to me.
If you want to know something about myself and how I feel
about XYZ, ask me that. Oh, just by the way, since you
happen to be blah, blah, blah, what do you think about XYZ?
Let's have a conversation. We've also lost out on being
able to have conversations like that.
The amount of times that I disagree, not just with this
president or, or the administration is crazy.
Multiple times on a daily basis. But I'm willing to have
dialogue. I'm willing to digest my
emotions, but I'm also willing to look at things where it has
nothing to do with my emotions. And I can look at certain things
in terms of policy. So, so many people that have a
lot of negative things to also say about him or his
administration, whatever. He bought us time as well.
So if you could at least be a one issue person, is it more
important for you as a Jew to be free as a Jew or as a trans
person? For me, it's to be free as a
Jew. Because if I can be free as a
Jew, it means that I'm alive, then I'm able to live as myself.
Because ultimately you can take everything away.
The Jewish part stays. Even as a convert.
Once you're at the mikvah, sorry, no takes these backsies.
Welcome home. Time to get on with it.
And a lot of the trans community and people that I do have
conversations like that. And in the queer community or
the LGBTQ community, however people identify themselves, it
always brings up so much anger that I think it clouds anything
that they're actually able to see because I'm then seen as the
pariah. But if we're the same and we
only have one different thing right or left, how are we
helping? Again, going back to what I said
earlier, move things forward. The writing was amazing in the
80s and the 60s and what amazing.
I love people that can still live in in Hippieville in their
heads and think that something like that is going to change
people's minds. We've reached a point in this
world where if people really want, and we see it happening
right now with this massive rise in violence as people are
craving a civil war, that's the most disgusting thing.
We've reached a point where for something to change, people want
for there to be such insanely crazy civil discourse that
there's violence. So to any other trans person, my
number one thing would be can we have a conversation?
And if you can't have a conversation and if you're going
to get rid of anyone that that thinks differently than you,
like we saw happen, especially since 2020, I really then
myself, but also don't have the energy to be around you because
trust me, there's nothing serious about you.
It's a you're having an emotional thing.
It's like gas. It'll pass, let it pass.
And then let's talk logically. Well, we just talked about the
importance of having dialogue and the importance of reckoning
with things that you might be uncomfortable with.
This ties also to your activism work where you're kind of a
contrarian sometimes, especially to the non Jewish world.
I guess in the through the paradigm of October 7th, is
there anything that you've changed your mind about on the
state of the world, how you feel, anything you believe
differently than you did before? I definitely believe that I see
and experience the world a lot differently.
I have much more clarity and I thought I had clarity before.
No, I have clarity right now because I also isolate myself
from people, situations, gatherings, conversations,
anything that doesn't align. I don't do it anymore.
And I think even with, with, with activism or that the whole
influencer thing, when in the beginning I, I genuinely used to
believe people when they were like, your voice is so important
and blah, blah, blah, blah. And we'd love for you to come to
this event and we'd love for you to do this.
And I think amazing, I'm not the first and I'm not the last.
The, the, the unfortunate thing I think for a lot of people is
that I don't like being tokenized when you can't look me
in the eye and tell me that you're tokenizing me.
So I never thought that it was me being in a bubble.
I just always thought that people had far more integrity to
not lie to my face. And I'm talking legacy
organizations, I'm talking individuals.
I'm talking one person will get an honorarium, but you won't get
an honorarium. Because again, I should feel so
happy and so lucky to have been here and have been invited to
have cold chicken. So now the flip side of this is
the reaction to what I'm saying will then be received as either
I'm jealous of those certain people or those people that I'm
referring to have been in the activism world far longer.
And then which is again, it's more lies.
So I'm no longer accepting of people's lies.
And when I say this, I mean, even on a daily basis, if you
say or do something, I'm really very cautious of believing
people. And the unfortunate thing is
that it's within our own community.
I didn't think that it would happen within our own community.
And when I specifically say our own community, I mean in the
diaspora, because in Israel, my, my reality is completely
different, very different. There's such a directness and
there's such a genuine honesty. And the, the best thing about
Israel is that energy is currency.
You can have as much money as you want.
You can have as much power as you want, but energy is
currency. And if you are on this and, and,
and you reside in this incredible magnetic field of I
think that the strongest frequency on the face of this
earth is in this country. So at some point you have to
either lean in or tap out. And I leaned all the way in.
Yeah. But one of the things I want to
push back on that I think is important is sometimes you have
to teach people. Sometimes you have to bring them
along for the ride, Whether it's your friends who don't
understand, like sometimes you have to help them understand, or
whether it's legacy organizations that don't want to
pay you. And you're like, you know, it's
offensive to have me do all these things when you don't want
to pay me. Sometimes you just have to smile
and be like, thank you so much for your offer.
I wish I could accept it, but I can't and here's why.
And that learning moment, that or the teaching moment is really
important because it sets them up forever.
Whereas if you leave them, and I'm not saying you do this, but
if you leave somebody in the dark, they may never learn.
So you've taken that moment away from them.
I think that's good. What you're saying, and I'm
going to push right back on it, is that I've been trying to
bring people along with me from being a child, starting with my
own parents. And if I think if I can step
away from them and let them be who they are and, and love them
from a distance, that's what I do.
Because that's what that's what works for me on a daily basis.
Because I'm not hung up energetically on having to
educate people and bring it with them.
I'm not saying anything new that any other minority Jew has not
said or try to do when it comes to legacy organizations that
that the danger of what's going to happen is the revolt to that
is that when all minorities then come together, make sure that
they have the financial backing that they do to literally do
whatever that they want to do, Then when a legacy organization
says, would you like to? And then it's well, I know
somebody that I was talking to earlier who is, is at a point
where you, they're either going to give them the fee or they're
not. And whenever what they are
setting up foundation wise for themselves, it'll be seen as
well. This used to be your fee or this
used to be. But that point in time, you can
no longer offend somebody like that because they have something
that that's their own. So what's happened in the Jewish
community right now in the conversations that are happening
is that people are no longer going to be asking for a seat at
the table. They're building their own.
And it's then further going to ostracize those legacy
organizations and all of those people that haven't been getting
it. This whole it's going to
ostracize them. So it's only going to be further
dangerous. So there's only so much a person
can can speak and share and attend every single conference
about what do we do in the 10 years of it, what do we do?
This has been happening for ages.
There's a summit about something all the time with the same
topic, but moving forward, numbers wise, there's a very
small, small, small percentage of people that actually come
with a change that had been made.
Because then otherwise we were having tea sandwiches for six
hours, drawing pictures, doing scorecards.
They take in the information for data.
OK, so now you're filing things. I don't think Greta Thunberg's
going to be very happy about the waste of paper and trees.
But now you're just filing things.
But moving forward you'll bring in one or two minorities and
it's like great, we fill out the DEI list, but then everybody as
a collective, as all tribes, as a community, as one body, as
those she believe that they are of the land of Israel.
But even don't like don't reside here having made Alia will say,
well, we as Jews need to be part of the diversity, equality and
inclusion. No, because we can't get it
within our own community, so we can't tell other people that it
needs to be this way. Just like charity starts at
home, Tikkun Alam starts at home, educating starts at home,
all of these things start at home and within our own selves.
But we have not been listening for so long that some people are
going to come along and not ever want to have these conversations
again. They're never going to want to
come to another event again because they'll be to having
their own events and dealing with their own sub communities.
That's it. I think where we net out is the
teaching moment is helpful for those who want to be taught, for
those who will be resistant to understanding.
It's a dead end, which is what you're saying.
So yeah, I like, I like how we netted out on that.
Tell me, what do you think your message to the Jewish people is?
Acceptance and pride, 2 words that I think we talk about a lot
but don't really embody because we've forgotten what it's like
to be Jews. The world will never like us.
OK Kumbaya, they won't. So we need to love ourselves
more. We need to be more Jewish, we
need to be more all up in each others faces.
I think assimilation was was was something that's happened for so
long. And in terms of becoming a
Band-Aid just to exist. But with everything that we're
going through and we've been going through for such a long
period of time in this escalation between World War 2
and where we are right now, especially after October 7th and
every single atrocious thing that happened since then and the
conversations that are happening, the world woe and has
turned their backs on the Jews. That's just it.
Pardon me. The world's turned their backs
on the Jews. So you need two things.
You have to accept the fact that you're a Jew.
You have to accept it. And you want to talk about
acceptance. Hi, I've got a whole list.
I have to accept this and this and this.
Great. Just, you know, people, people
in therapy where your therapist is like, you have to take the
good with the ugly. Why can't we do the same thing
with our Judaism? It's not even about being
religious. There's a very deep, deep, deep
meaning of what it is to be a Jew that so many people run away
from as though it's, it's, it's, it's a mark or something that
could be wiped off or taken away.
And that's so painful for somebody that came from the
outside coming in. So I say this as somebody that
did convert. I hate having to like announce
that as well all the time, because all I ever get asked is
like, well, how are you here? Are you Ethiopian?
Because like and again, not intentional.
Because then I think we can find pride.
We can find pride because then we, once you remember who you
are, you gravitate towards who your people are and that
strengthens the core. So then you're not having kids
that are being raised right now being scared of of who they are
even at home. Bellamy, thank you so much for
the conversation today. It gives me a lot to think
about. Tell me, how can people connect
with you and learn more about your work?
I am always yelling at people on socials.
So Bellamy Bellucci on Instagram and what's that?
The ticky talkie? And yeah, just my name, Bellamy
Bellucci. And I've also got my e-mail in,
in my Instagram. So if anybody wants to have more
of an in depth conversation, I think that's the best way
because like I said, I'm, I'm isolating.
I think just because it's, it's, it's important for me to kind of
just keep my energy level balanced because it could be
wackadoodle between living online and living as a Jew in
2025. It could be wild.
But yeah, reach out. I'm there.
I do read messages. Don't be creepy, just just lots
of love. Lots of like genuine love.
Actually, lots of genuine love. That's it.
Is there anywhere where people can donate to support your
documentary? I think that would be probably
because I haven't done, I haven't done crowdfunding yet.
So if they if they go to my Instagram and e-mail me from
there, we can have a one-on-one conversation.
And I would love that because I want to finish it because it's
my whole life story and all the rubbish.
And I think I'm such a salad that it just tells the story of
who the Jewish people are. And it's tells a story about
resilience, which is who we all are actually.
But if you put all of those things in one person, then the
whole world is lying because then somebody like me wouldn't
exist. Voila.
And I have one final question for you.
It's one that I ask every guest. Who would you like to nominate
for people? Do you want to know?
I thought I already did nominate somebody.
Oh, that's a tough one. I'm going to say the person that
I, that I nominate and Fleur Hassan.
Fleur Hassan, I think she's, she's such an incredible voice,
such a powerful woman, does so much for, for the Jewish people
and, and Israel, not just in Israel, but internationally is
an incredible mentor, especially I think for, for young Jewish
women and, and girls growing up to have somebody that has been
in politics, former mayor of Jerusalem and, and just, and in
terms of diplomacy and knowing how to communicate with people
and being part of the Abraham Accords, she's an incredible
source of knowledge. She speaks multiple languages
and she just knows how to get things done.
I'm all about women that can get things done.
Thank you so much, this is a fantastic nomination.
I can't wait to speak with her. I need to prepare my hero and
scumbag when I do so. Absolutely, but lucky for me I
have many heroes and unfortunately even more scumbags
to list so. Scumbags.
Lots to discuss. Thank you so much, Melanie.
Thank you. If you've enjoyed this podcast,
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