An Open Letter to the Davis City Council June 1, 2025
As a long-time Davis resident, I write to suggest that the Davis City Council censure its Human Relations Commission, which is doing more harm than good in advancing its stated goals to “promote mutual respect, understanding, justice, and advancing the human rights of all people.”
Davis’s Human Relations Commission employs an approach that is nonsensical and self-sabotaging. Rather than “promote mutual respect, understanding, justice and human rights,” the Commission plays favorites, picks fights, and sows division.
Case in point: its recent “MAPA” report and recommendations. MAPA stands for “Muslims, Arabs, Palestinians and Allies.” The Human Relations Commission assigned three commission members to seek out how these politically interconnected people are “feeling” living here in Davis. This report, which lacks a clear methodology for data collection, is primarily characterized through anonymous quotes. Despite the fact that “MAPA respondents or interviewees often started by saying everything is pretty good and they are grateful to be in Davis,” the report highlights alleged “harassment, intimidation and silencing” by “nationalist and supremacist Jews” who “weaponize anti-Semitism.” The report sounds this alarm to make highly politicized recommendations—treating MAPA with kid gloves, and Jews guilty as charged—with an eye to influencing the City, DJUSD and UC Davis.
The problem with this approach is that it fans the flames of tension among the so-called MAPA community and Davis’s Jews; a majority of the latter are Zionist in that they support the right of Jews to live in their ancient home in the land of Israel. Many Jews in the Davis community (myself included) recognize themselves in the MAPA report, which unfairly accuses them of harassment and Islamophobic behavior.
In my case, I was called out as a “counter protester” at the Commission’s April 2 meeting by UCD professor Stacy Fahrenthold. I had attended the March 11 Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) protest on campus to document the event. I quietly took photographs and recorded UC Davis students explicitly calling for “resistance against Zionism by any means necessary… this means supporting armed resistance” and shouting slogans like “intifada revolution,” “smash the Zionist settler state,” “from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” and “Palestine is ours alone.” Unlike the SJP protesters, I did not chant for the destruction of my enemies or ethnic cleansing. I did not hold signs with slogans of hate. I did not wear clothing that would suggest any cause or identity whatsoever. I did not conceal my identity with full face covering.
Embedded within the MAPA report: if I silently document an event that advocates violence against me, that makes me an Islamophobic harasser.
I support free speech. But pro-Palestinian rhetoric that endorses violence against “Zionists” crosses a line, as we have seen in recent weeks with the cold-blooded murder of two Israeli embassy employees in Washington, D.C. and the firebombing of a peaceful pro- Israel gathering in Boulder, Colorado. Is Davis next?
The Davis Human Relations Commission has shown itself to demonstrate the very qualities that it purports to be fighting against. It favors some groups at the expense of others. It endorses untruths. It provides a forum for people to denigrate each other.
I write this as a short-timer. After 25 years in this town, I will be moving to be closer to family on the east coast. My departure has been made easier by the toxic environment that has permeated Davis since Hamas’s brutal attack of October 7, 2023. The City Council itself shares responsibility for allowing this milieu when it takes sides on political issues, including those geographically distant from its area of jurisdiction. The City Council should stay focused on making Davis a great place to live for “all people.” Censuring the Davis Human Relations Commission and rejecting its damaging MAPA report would be an excellent, common-sense first step.
Respectfully, Shula Glazerman
“The City Council itself shares responsibility for allowing this milieu when it takes sides on political issues, including those geographically distant from its area of jurisdiction. The City Council should stay focused on making Davis a great place to live for “all people.” Censuring the Davis Human Relations Commission and rejecting its damaging MAPA report would be an excellent, common-sense first step.”
Well said, I completely agree. Sorry that you are leaving…
From article: “The Davis Human Relations Commission has shown itself to demonstrate the very qualities that it purports to be fighting against. It favors some groups at the expense of others. It endorses untruths. It provides a forum for people to denigrate each other.”
This was a predictable result of this type of commission, due to the interests (bias) of the people it generally attracts.
To some degree, this type of thing is also happening within most environmental organizations, some school districts, the ACLU, etc. (In other words, increasingly-drifting from their actual missions into social justice. And when taken to an extreme, it actually results in positions that are directly opposed to their original missions.)
It is interesting to see how some people view the world (e.g., oppressors vs. oppressed).
In any case, didn’t something like this happen previously – which resulted in disbanding a similar commission?
Meanwhile, “boring” issues such as decisions to increase employee compensation when the city is facing a deficit don’t attract the same level of attention.
SG say: “Unlike the SJP protesters, I did not chant for the destruction of my enemies or ethnic cleansing. I did not hold signs with slogans of hate. I did not wear clothing that would suggest any cause or identity whatsoever. I did not conceal my identity with full face covering. Embedded within the MAPA report: if I silently document an event that advocates violence against me, that makes me an Islamophobic harasser. I support free speech. But pro-Palestinian rhetoric that endorses violence against “Zionists” crosses a line”
I couldn’t have said it better :-|
May you find a town that focuses on filling potholes, not on international affairs . . .
. . . of which it is not equipped to handle without making things worse :-|