THE ROADMAP OUT. A JEWISH PERSPECTIVE

People often ask what can I do to help end systemic racism and injustices. There are many layers to this, but Kass delves into why mindfully supporting Black-owned businesses is one important step in the path to real progress. He uses the backdrop of the Jewish experience coming to America and how they used support for their businesses to move up the American ladder. ​

NBA players decided to cancel games and refuse to play in the wake of racial strife and more police killing of unarmed Black men and women. Author Jeffrey Kass explores why we should support these players and their standing up for their brothers and sisters. Why in this country we want to support and encourage peaceful and verbal protest and change. We can’t take away voice and then simultaneously expect people not to try other methods of change. Thank you LeBron James, Kyrie Irving and company for standing up for Black and Brown people. ​

At some point, the word conservative got twisted. I grew up thinking it meant an approach that was careful. Not too risky. Cautious. Not loosey goosey. Thoughtful. My best friend’s dad was a conservative and he also was a conservationist. An environmentalist. He wanted to play it safe with our planet and not just hope the scientists were wrong.

​Nowadays, though, conservative seems to have lost its meaning. It especially reared its ugly face during COVID-19 where many conservatives were outraged over having to wear mask. This essay undresses conservatism with the hope of returning to its roots. ​

Social justice warriors may be well-intended but sometimes the words chosen to advance the cause of justice end up having opposite consequences.

​This essay explores why words matter. When we call something genocide or apartheid, what does that mean? When we use words like diversity and inclusion, what does that mean? Our word choices impact how fast we will heal so many of our world’s problems. ​

At one point, the U.S. contemplated sending in federal troops to stop violence in our most dangerous cities. South side of Chicago one of them. But what policymakers don’t understand is that our problems with crime will never be solved with more military style weapons and more police. It’s time to think long term. Mass investment in education, in training and other programs that uplift instead of jail people is our only path forward. ​

​Conspiracy theories have always been around, but they seem to have increased each year since the Internet. The Jews did it, or the Jews are controlling the world ones seem to have spread like wildfire. Jeffrey Kass uses the backdrop of these absurd theories to remind people that the negative acts of individuals, from any ethnic or ethno-religious group, shouldn’t be used as a reflection of the whole. Enough of the Jewish Rothschild Family already.

​Democrats and Racism

The town hall aired on Wednesday, June 3 on 9Listens. You can watch it again on the video player attached to this story.

Author: Allison Sylte
Published: 6:59 PM MDT June 2, 2020
Updated: 8:41 PM MDT June 3, 2020

DENVER — The “9LISTENS: Racism and the Road to Change” town hall brought together multiple different voices who discussed race in Colorado, the death of George Floyd and where we go from here.

Those voices ranged from Elisabeth Epps of the Colorado Freedom Fund, who has marched alongside protesters in downtown Denver, to Denver Police Chief Paul Pazen, who heads an institution many demonstrated against and Jeffrey Kass, a thought-Leader On Race, Society, and Culture as well as an Award-Winning Author.

Editor’s Note: This Law Week feature focuses on the creative writing of attorney Jeffrey Kass. Read Kass’ essay “Twenty-Four Inches” here.

Jeffrey Kass works at Lewis Brisbois Bisgaard & Smith as an intellectual property attorney, spending his time between the Denver and St. Louis offices. As a writer, though, he can typically be found around Aviano Coffee in Cherry Creek where he devotes his mornings to putting his personal stories into creative stories and essays.

Now, he’s up front about his views but he keeps them con ned to his stories. His world view comes out in the situations he chooses to write about and how he chooses to write about them.

One story, for example, details his journey across the border from Israel to Jordan — if only for a day — while keeping that monologue running about religious and ethnic tensions between the countries.

His stories developed into his branded style after a failed engagement. He said he realized he was with an emotionally cold person who didn’t understand his “love language” — he began wondering why he would choose someone like that and wondered what that said about him. From there, he began confronting his own past in a new way. As he describes it, “we’re all just repeating our comfortability from childhood.”

In his stories, he regularly revisits the things that affected him, and he says they can get crass or offensive. But that doesn’t mean they cross any lines that might harm his image as a trustworthy attorney.

“These stories will offend, they will engage, they will make you think, but they’re not so offensive that you don’t want me as your lawyer,” he said.

In fact, he thinks his straight-for- ward demeanor helps him with clients. Close clients whom he’s worked with for a long time likely wouldn’t be surprised by anything that comes out in his writing. He said he believes clients want to know they’re working with a real person.

His creative writing might have bled into his legal writing once or twice as well. He said his writing has loosened up.

To read this story and other complete articles featured in the April 15, 2019 print edition of Law Week Colorado, copies are available for purchase online.