H EADLINES
LGBTQ Orgs Partner for Chanukah Celebration
L OCA L
SOPHIE PANZER | JE STAFF
TWO LGBTQ
Jewish organizations partnered this
Chanukah to create an event
focusing on light, leadership
and love in their communities
aft er a year full of darkness.

Philadelphia’s Tribe 12 and
JQT Vancouver celebrated
the Festival of Lights with
“Hanukkah Hotties,” a virtual
celebration with guests who are
“lighting up their respective parts
of the world by queering Jewish
space and Jewifying queer space,”
according to the organizers.

Each night featured candle
lighting prayers and interviews
with LGBTQ Jewish community
leaders and artists in the United
States, Canada and Germany.

Canadian Indigenous Jewish
photographer Kali Spitzer
was scheduled to kick off the
celebrations for the fi rst night
with an interview about how her
heritage and identity impacts her
artwork, but she had to cancel
due to a death in her family. Host
Carmel Tanaka, founder and
executive director of JQT, shared
a poem from “In Honor of our
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6 DECEMBER 17, 2020
Grandmothers,” a collaboration
of Indigenous and Jewish poets,
to honor Spitzer’s loss.

Davinica Nemtzow, diver-
sity, equity and inclusion
associate at Tribe 12, fi lled in for
a discussion with Tanaka about
the importance of Chanukah
traditions and the strong bonds
shared by international queer
Jewish communities.

“Th at’s been one of the silver
linings of COVID, being able
to connect with other organi-
zations and people who are
doing similar work, and being
able to join forces and support
one another,” Tanaka said.

Night two featured New
York-based performance
artist Stuart B. Meyers, who is
touring “Th e Shabbos Queen,”
his Shabbat-based performance
focusing on self-love and love
of community. Meyers, who
grew up in South Jersey, stars
as the character of Yenta.

He talked with Tanaka about
his relationship with spirituality,
his visit to the mindfulness-ori-
ented Romemu Yeshiva and his
study of the Kabbalah, especially
his work studying healing
through dreams.

“Reading dreams is reading
Torah” he said.

Nemtzow made another
appearance on night three,
along with Galia Godel,
LGBTQ Initiative program
manager for Jewish Family and
Children’s Service, to talk about
their recent wins working with
the LGBTQ Jewish community
in Philadelphia.

Godel, who works as a
Jewish educator, a sex educator
and leader of J.Proud, said she
was happy to see so many of
the organizations she works
with taking initiative to make
their spaces more welcoming.

“One of the real wins, for
Greater Philly and for me,
is that I have to do so little
convincing,” she said. “It is
so much more frequent that a
rabbi or synagogue president
will reach out to me and say,
‘Hey, we’re enthusiastic about
doing this, we just don’t know
what the right next step is.’”
Nemtzow talked about how
momentous it felt to be able to
bring her vision of commu-
nity building to others. She
said she was especially excited
about providing a safe, inclu-
sive alternative to LGBTQ
spaces like nightclubs, which
can be heavily sexualized and
oriented around substance use.

Tribe12 Assistant Director
and matchmaker Danielle Selber
joined Chicago-based LGBTQ
matchmaker Kara Laricks on
Clockwise from left: Carmel Tanaka, Davinica Nemtzow and Galia Godel
Courtesy of Tribe 12
night four for a conversation
about their methods for arranging
matches for queer Jewish singles,
using Tanaka as a model.

“I like to ask everybody some
very basic — or for some people
they’re basic — questions about
gender identity and how you
date and what you’re looking
for,” Selber said. “But one of
the questions I ask that kind of
gives everyone pause is ‘Do you
experience sexual attraction?
And if so, to whom?’”
Laricks talked about the
importance of discussing non-ne-
gotiable priorities early on in the
dating process, whether it’s a cat
allergy or dietary preferences.

“Th is is the beauty of match-
making, being able to have
these conversations and learn
the nuances,” she said.

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Selber also noted that
interest in matchmaking has
exploded during the pandemic,
since people can’t meet in
person and realize they need
support in their dating lives.

Arya Marvazy, managing
director of JQ International in
Los Angeles, joined to light the
fi ft h candle. David Studniberg,
founding member of Keshet
Germany and curator of Jewish
Museum Berlin, and non-bi-
nary Russian-Jewish poet
Angelica Poversky lit the sixth.

Nate Looney, manager of racial
justice initiatives at Avodah,
joined for the seventh and tarot
reader Azra Silverstein joined
for the eighth. ●
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