Once there was a tree...and she loved a little boy.
Published October 30, 2023 · 21:02 · 128,991 views
About This Video
The video was supposed to be a motorcycle diary for Patreon. The fuel pump broke. And then October 7th happened, and then something else happened. Van opens with a declaration: he is not officially a Jew, but his spirit is a Jewish spirit. Irish blood, Jewish heart. His storytelling gift comes from his Irish heritage. What he connects you to is his Jewish soul, built by the Jews who saved and nurtured him throughout his life.
He has been listening to podcasts and accounts of the October 7th attacks, seeing the footage of antisemitic rallies on college campuses. At a very young age, he was warned these things would come again. Thomas Sowell says hostility toward Jews is beyond all proportion to any other group, that the reason is because Jews succeed in a way that threatens the egos of others. Twenty-one minutes, and the title references The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein. The video is Van at his most personally exposed, naming what he owes and to whom.
Transcript
this week's video was supposed to be for patreon and it was supposed to be a motorcycle diary but couple of things happened
first was my fuel pump I think broke and the second of course was this now I am not a Jew officially but my
spirit the spirit in the spirited man is a Jewish Spirit if you connect with me connect with this channel connect with
my point of view what I'm connecting you with the chord I'm connecting you with is probably Irish my story telling gift
probably comes from my Irish heritage but what I'm connecting you to is my Jewish Soul Irish blood Jewish
heart this I'm made of and my soul was built by the Jews who saved and nurtured me throughout my life I came up with the idea for this
episode last February over the past two weeks or so I've been listening to a lot of podcasts and accounts of the October 7th
terrorist attacks on Israel I've seen the footage of the anti-semitic chants and rallies from around the world
especially on college campuses at a very young age I was warned that these things would one day come again I see the explicit
anti-Semitism and I and others who know Jews or are Jews we're astonished by anti-Semitism because it makes no sense
in the face of the contributions Jews have made to our civilization and in the face of the consequences that we know
Jew hating leads to it makes no sense that kids in Australia and England and in the United States are rallying
against Jews so why why do people hate Jews Thomas Soul says that hostility towards Jews is beyond all proportion to
any other group that he can think of Soul says the reason for the hatred is because because Jews succeed in a way
that is a threat to the egos of other people historically immigrant Jews wherever they've gone started out with
nothing and arose to tremendous success weak unsuccessful people see that rise and they hate the successful
Jews for it because it's easier than hating themselves who especially in this country are the actual ones responsible
for their own lack of success Soul said that an official of a Jewish organization once asked him what
Jewish people could do to minimize the hostility they face and soul said [Music] fail I have a little boy who uh thank
God will never never get polio polio infantile paralysis that's what they used to call it when polio was
around and you were a little kid you'd leave school for your summer vacation and when you came back to school some of
your friends or you would be crippled for Life leg braces wheelchair and a Jew named Jonas sulk invented a vaccine
so that none of us nor our children will ever get polio there are almost no cases of polio globally now and when Jonas
sulk was asked who owns the polio vaccine patent Su said well the people I would say there is no patent could you
patent the sun sulk didn't patent the polio vaccine that's a the polio vaccine is an absolute good 22% of the winners of the Nobel Prize
have at least one Jewish parent hardly anyone is Jewish there's 14 million Jews in the world. 2% of the
global population that's 1 in 500 humans is Jewish and Jews don't live in that many different places most people don't
know any Jews which probably makes it easier to hate them well I know Jews but I was not born to Jews I'm not
Catholic but I was born to Irish Catholics in Maine in the mid '70s I doubt they knew any Jews things went
sideways in Maine my mother divorced my biological father moved me to Connecticut met a Jew named Barry niist
thatat they got got married and Barry neistat adopted me and became my father that's where my name comes from I've
never met a stranger with the same last name as me the Russians killed all the niist stats in the pagram of the of the
19th century though I have heard that there are some niist stats that live in in Brooklyn I've just never met
them I am Barry neistat's eldest son he raised me and he saved my life this life this beautiful life the life that over a half
a million of you connect to in one way or another when I break my life down into three phases or eras so far my youth my
education my career it was an individual Jew who opened the door and guided me through the Wonders and miracles I experienced
therein within each era of my life a failan of Jews has supported me encouraged me helped me along loved
me um I I wrote down I had to write down some of the names so that I could remember them um and these are only the ones I
remember um the nice stats of course Copelands rutberg linders riches godders fishkins zelkin Freemans Mrs plotnik my
fifth grade teacher taught me the importance of writing volunteered for the Israeli Army she's an American
volunteered for the Israeli Army halfway through my my school year when I was in fifth grade the kers boms the saxs
family the Hawgs Lilian Vernon the pools the GS the Rudin the D Woodies the safties the lenos calans Schulman bishes
Hons gon weisses there was nothing special about me a Gentile boy with Gentile blood but there was certainly something
special about them them Jews my father was 27 when he adopted me he has no relationship with my mother
now but he continues to have a strong one with me down the street from my Jewish grandparents lived a boy my age Named
Sam and I thought Sam was the bees knes he got a pair of V sunglasses 85 bucks a pair when he was 13 he had a Swiss army
knife with his name on it that he got in Switzerland he had his own laser sailboat that we could sail across the
Long Island Sound to New York by ourselves when we were 14 and I wanted to be just like him his mother had
converted to Judaism and his father was the son of German Holocaust Survivors Sam's parents gave me books taught me
the value of Education the value of reading and it was his mother who bought me a video camera when I was broke right
after September 11th 2001 it was a Jewish lady Nancy who hired me for my first professional writing job taught me how to be a
professional and a Jew named Tom Sachs hired me took me under his wing taught me how to be an artist how to make
things from scratch and sell them Elliot I'm keeping him why do I make videos what's the fundamental biographical reason I make
these videos I think the visceral embodied experience that drove me to this medium was seeing each T in the
theater when I was six the movie had such an effect on me that I broke out in hives all over my body while I was
watching it and hives is kind of like a poison ivy rash um they went away in the in my sleep that night I was six and I
learned that ET had been directed by a man named step Spielberg Spielberg was not only the first director I had ever
heard of Spielberg the name Spielberg introduced me to the concept of a director there is a person who makes
movies this person is called a director and the director step Spielberg makes the best movies they were all Giants the
Spielberg movies when I was a kid Jaws Close Encounters ET Raiders of the Lost Arc they'd come out and be the biggest
movies of the year the biggest movies of all time ET was the highest grossing movie of all time until Jurassic Park
came out in 1993 Spielberg made Jurassic Park of course it was the biggest movie ever but in that same year in 1993 I was 18
Spielberg made his most important film Schindler's List I don't think Schindler's List is Spielberg's best movie I think Empire of
the Sun is Spielberg's best movie starring a young man by the name of Christian Bale Empire of the Sun is my
Spielberg number one but there is no doubt that Schindler's List is Spielberg's most important movie Spielberg made Schindler's List at the
height of his power 1993 he knew that whatever holocaust movie he made would be the most important movie he would ever make and
he knew he could tell tell any story he could choose any hero from the Holocaust and to me it is a massive stroke of
Genius that he chose for his holocaust movie his most important movie the height of his power and for his hero he
chooses to tell the story of a Nazi Oscar Schindler was a Nazi Schindler's List is 30 years old of course you've heard of it maybe you
haven't seen it so here's the story based on real events Oscar Schindler was a real guy he was a Czechoslovakian of
German descent an industrialist who sells War supplies to the Nazis he's more opportunistic than ideological so
he becomes a Nazi supports the Nazis because it's good for business he uses Jewish slaves as workers he pays the
Jews salaries to the Nazis and the Nazis I'm pretty sure just pocketed the money the Jewish slaves are pulled from the
Warsaw Poland Jewish ghetto the factory it was a an enamel factory making pots and pans and whatnot for the war was in
Warsaw Schindler Witnesses the liquidation of the Warsaw Ghetto by the Nazis liquidation being a nice word for
Massacre 2 Jews murdered at gunpoint 2,000 Jews the 2,000 surviving Jews shipped to a Nazi concentration death camp Schindler sees
this massacre he has an a moral Awakening realizes how very very wrong this whole thing is and sacrifices his
fortune so that he can buy as many Jewish workers as he can the idea being that if the Jews are working for him
they won't be taken to the death camps and and murdered and the list Schindler's List is the list of Shindler
Jews the Jews who worked in his factories if you're on the list it meant you worked for Schindler you worked for the German war effort and
that you wouldn't be shipped to awit 1,98 Jews were on the list and they survived why choose a Nazi as the hero for what
will be the most important holocaust movie ever made the holocaust movie that more people than any other holocaust
movie will see why Schindler a greedy Nazi why is he the hero why did Spielberg do that I I think it's a a stroke of of
genius and I I think it's sort of a form of forgiveness for human fallibility not forgiveness for the Holocaust
understand a forgiveness for our humanness that leads us to making mistakes and a testament to our ability
to awaken spiritually and choose the right path it's a story about the possibility of the Redemption of
sins Redemption maybe we've looked the other way maybe we've taken the wrong side for whatever reason what matters is that we do the
right thing in the end at the very end of the movie we see some of the actors walking arm inarm with the actual surviving schindlers
Jews that each actor portrayed in the movie they Place stones on Schindler's grave which is an old Jewish tradition
you put a stone on the grave of a Jew a momento that says this grave has been visited by the living we learn that Schindler was
buried in Jerusalem and that he was named a righteous Gentile I saw that sequence when I was 18 and I immediately and still I
immediately thought and I still think that a righteous Gentile was the greatest possible thing that a gentile
like me could ever be it's an aspiration and I think Spielberg chose Schindler because like Schindler almost
all of us humans are not Jews and perhaps the film is meant to encourage our bravery and virtue when the time comes for us to help Jews when
their exist is again threatened there is a deep quality I've seen in the Jews that I have known and which I know
now uh which I consider possibly their most admirable quality and a quality that I wish I had more of maybe the word for it is
forbearance but it's this quality of giving the extreme benefit of the doubt a willingness to swallow Pride or ego a
sort of like soft sess or Mercy that only the strongest Among Us can possess it's like a deep no strings attached
generosity of spirit I've been to Passover saders of Jewish families who have had multi-generational divorces divorced
grandparents remarried divorced parents remarried all of them at the Seder all of the exes and the new spouses all together to
celebrate Passover over no hard feelings for the family for the kids for the love of the kids Judaism doesn't require Jews
to believe in God did you know that Jews don't have to believe in God Judaism simply requires Jews to act as if there
is a God Jews don't believe that only Jews go to heaven if you're good you go to heaven there's a story from the
Hebrew Bible that very beautifully exemplifies this generosity of spirit that I'm talking about this story is a big part of my
conscience the story is called the Judgment of Solomon and Solomon was a Jew the king of Israel back in the old
school Israel A very wise King so two mothers come to Solomon to settle a dispute there's a dead baby and aive
baby and both of the mothers claim to be the mother of the surviving baby neither mother will back down so they go to wise
King Solomon to settle the dispute and King Solomon says I'll cut the baby in half and each of you can have half of the
corps one of the mothers says fine I'm good with that that's fair but the other mother says no do not cut the baby in
half let her have it let the mother who is willing to let the baby die who's willing to let the baby be cut in half
let her have it but let the baby live to which wise King Solomon says then you the mother who is willing to give up the baby so that it
might live you are the true mother and you get to keep the baby now to me particularly the righteous mother captures the essence of
my experience with the Jewish Spirit a Divine Mercy Divine Justice and a relinquishment of ego in the Name of
Love in the coming weeks months years maybe God forbid for the rest of our lives we're going to be hearing brutal
stories and seeing brutal images coming out of the war in Israel there will likely be a lot of finger pointing and
judgment about Israel and her actions but there are two things we must remember before we pass judgment upon
her first Israel is our is our is the West's best friend in the region and second Israel is not Goliath that star on the Israeli flag is called the Star of David the same David who slew Goliath thank you Jews
People Referenced
Steven Spielberg, Tom Sachs, Jonas Salk, Thomas Sowell, Albert Einstein, Shel Silverstein
Books Mentioned
- The Giving Tree
Films & Media Referenced
- Steven Spielberg — referenced as example of Jewish cultural contribution
- Steven Spielberg — referenced as example of Jewish cultural contribution