Wicked Goodness

...And other relevant lessons I picked up while watching "Wicked." (Spoiler Alert if you have not seen it yet.)

Lesson 1: Wicked is as fabulous as you have heard and is not to be missed. Yes, I took my children to see it on a Sunday night, and no, I am not sorry.

Lesson 2: Stephen Schwartz’s smash musical is full to the brim of moments that speak directly to the Jewish experience. These glimmers take on new significance, however, in this moment in history.

If you are unfamiliar with the story, the theme of scapegoating those who are different or outcasts weaves throughout several plotlines. You have the persecution of animals by the Wizard and his government, the attempt to silence dissenters and those who are a different species, and the eventual caging of animals and removal of their voices. Professor Dillamond - a literal goat to make sure you don’t miss the point - embodies the scapegoating of talking animals for all of the problems Oz faces.

You also have the persecution and scapegoating of Elphaba when she refuses to play along with the Wizard’s charade and allow herself to be used for her magical powers. She is the epitome of the outsider, different from her peers in appearance and ability. She is more naturally talented and powerful than the average Ozian, and she is both resented and feared for her abilities, promise, and differences. She is ridiculed, treated as an outcast, and eventually she is forced to embrace that role in society as the only means of maintaining her moral courage and upholding her deeply held beliefs. From now on, I may refer to her as Alpha-Bat - the First Daughter who stands rooted in her beliefs and apart from the world.

Lesson 3: By far the most powerful message conveyed in the story and relevant to our topsy-turvy times is the warping of the concept of goodness. This movie should be required homework for every mixed up student screaming on the streets in unshakable, blind faith that they stand on the side of good.

Good is defined and redefined repeatedly in nearly every scene and every song. Elphaba is promised success, accolades, and long hoped-for acceptance if she “makes good.” All elements attractive, visually appealing, and popular - the Glinda Effect, let’s call it - are reflexively categorized and overtly named “good.”

But as we all know, 99 percent of Ozians are blindly and misguidedly following a charlatan who has successfully manipulated a propaganda machine to define what constitutes “good” in the Land of Oz. And we also know it is far from good.

As the movie progressed, the students of Schiz and the angry munchkins began to look increasingly like Pro-Hamas encampers blindly absorbing the National SJP propaganda fed to them by an international network of fraudsters who seek not to better their lives but rather to use them to gain control and power. The Wizard started to look and sound like increasingly like an agent of Hamas blown in on a paraglider from Gaza instead of a hot air balloon from Omaha.

Ultimate evil is represented by the one who stands apart, the one who refuses to bend to the irrational, the false, the manipulative, and the cruel. For this fatal error, the Wizard and his network of minions name Elphaba “wicked” and establish the beautiful, light Glinda in a stunningly genious PR juxtaposition. All they need do is declare Elphaba wicked, and she is automatically Public Enemy #1. The power of brainwashing means no one questions this declaration even thought the Wizard and Professor Morrible fawned over her ten minutes before this announcement.

And Elphaba? In my eyes, she transformed into the handful of Jewish students who stood steady in the face of unremitting, moronic hate. She represented the new generation of thick-skinned youth who, even as they were ejected from their progressive circles, unfriended, harassed, threatened, refused access, and even forced to flee campuses as Elphaba flees the Emerald City on the back of a broom, spat back at those who rejected them based on ignorance and a mindless, follower mentality, “I don’t want it, I can’t want it anymore.”

Goodness is found within and is not an externally bestowed title.

The warped redefinition of what constitutes good has resulted in well-meaning, poorly educated people screaming proudly in the streets in favor of an Intifada - global violence and death. It has resulted in people stauchly waving Hizballah and Hamas flags while firmly believing they hold the moral high ground. It has led students blessed with coveted opportunities to study at the most respected universities to denigrate and defile their own halls of learning in both word and deed. It has resulted in otherwise moral individuals turning on their Jewish friends who refuse to play along with the Wizard’s charade.

Our youth learned this the hard way in the past year. They learned that standing tall as you watch people desert your side and refuse to listen to facts and reason is a form of goodness with self-contained rewards but few external accolades. They walked away from popularity contests requiring them to reject their own identities. In so doing, they found themselves madly tarred genocidal baby killers who did not deserve to live. They summoned the inner strength and resources to turn on their heels and walk away from the path of least resistance taken by the JVPers and pro-divestment Jewish crowd who signed away their souls to sit in unkosher sukkahs painted with performative slogans.

Our Alpha-Bnot may as well have painted their faces green, donned pointed caps, and flown home on a broomstick, too.

And I am so very, deeply proud of every single one of them for their wicked-cool moral stand.