Miri Cypers

So, Mary, can you, introduce yourself and tell me a little bit about what you do at ADL and your role?

Sure. Um, so nice to talk to you today. I'm Mary Cyphers, and I am the regional director for the ADL in the Pacific Northwest. We serve the broader region, but I'm based in Seattle, and I've held this position for four years. Um, I really have the privilege of working at a storied organization that's been on the ground in the Seattle area for over 75 years, fighting anti-Semitism and hate and ensuring the fair and just treatment of all people. That has been ADL's mission since our founding in 1913, in a really important aspect of the work that we continue to push and to do today.

Great. Thank you. And it looks here like some of this has changed with the COVID in recent years as anti-Semitism and the COVID pandemic have affected life for everybody. Can you tell me a little bit about how you have dealt with that at ADL?

Yeah, I would say we're in a climate right now with a lot of challenges. I think layered on, COVID has just been a climate of rising antisemitism and hate and extremism over the past couple of years. So it's really been a time where we at ADL are on high alert, fighting hate in our communities, speaking out, really making efforts to scale our programs. And on top of that, with COVID, really grappling with how can we be a vibrant, community based organization that is serving people, that is doing the important work that we do in communities but is still reaching people. And COVID has been a huge challenge for us, but also a blessing because I think its pushed us to make our work more virtual, more accessible and more equitable. So I think there are some silver linings to the pandemic, but it certainly has been a few years of immense challenges as we've navigated a world, in which our climate seems to be much more desensitized to the issues of anti-Semitism and hate, and layered upon that, a pandemic that has really severed a lot of ties with people in their community and I think exacerbated a lot of polarization and misinformation and disconnection that people have with one another.

Can you tell me about some of the ways that you've fought the rising antisemitism in recent years?

ADL has always had this theory of change that has been rooted in the idea that is really powerful. That's embedded in our mission, that none of us is free until all of us are free. We fight anti-Semitism and hate, and we work for the just treatment of all. So I think that important through line is something that has really carried with us, especially today, as we've seen not only the Jewish community but other marginalized communities experience discrimination in different forms of injustice. And I think ADL's approach is really powerful, because our belief is that there's no silver bullet to the issue of hate. There is no one solution that's going to solve this age-old problem. You need an all-society, holistic approach that's going to tackle these kinds of issues. So the day-to-day work that we do at both the national level and on the ground here in the Pacific Northwest and in other regional offices, is that comprehensive and integrated approach. It's educating the next generation around addressing bias and anti-Semitism, working hand in hand with school communities in K through 12 schools to create places of belonging for all students. We're incredibly proud that we've scaled our No Place for Hate initiative over the past few years to now reach 45,000 students, mostly across Washington and Oregon in K through 12 schools, in addition to droves of more educators than ever before. We are also dedicated to tracking and collecting data and speaking out about the rise of hate and extremism. And that kind of data really is able to inform our approaches and enable us to shine a bright light on the kind of trends and activities that we're seeing. So every day, we will be tracking extremist and hate-based activity in our different communities. Working hand in hand with community partners and law enforcement in the media and the public to really talk to people about what we're seeing and what kind of challenges are arising. We have another bucket that's focused specifically on advocacy, where we are on the ground working in local, state, federal, and even in the courts to advance civil rights policies, whether it's amicus briefs or pushing for stronger laws in various legislatures. That is a really crucial piece of the puzzle. And then the final one in the final bucket that we do here in the Pacific Northwest and across the country is, we actually intake reports about hate when different communities experience antisemitism or racism, or xenophobia. And we have staff here that intakes that data, that works with individuals and communities impacted by hate, to offer our resources and our expertise, and our advocacy. And we track all of that and compile it, and share it with the public. So a lot of our work is proactive around educating and advocating, and a lot of it is about tracking up and shining a light on what's actually happening on the ground.

Wow. That's amazing. So, going through those four main areas, it sounds like. Let's start with the outreach to students. I have to imagine that's changed a lot with the COVID pandemic, trying to reach students where they are. Have you had any challenges with that?

Our work has changed so much around education. I think even before the pandemic, we recognized that if we want to be an organization that is truly reaching more students and scaling the work to make the kind of societal impact that we need to make to fight back against hate and push it to the fringes and create more of a climate of inclusion and respect and belonging for everybody. We recognize that we really had to work hard to think about digitizing, doing more self-paced online learning for students, and thinking about how to make our work more accessible. So these were all strategies and conversations we were already pursuing. But COVID accelerated everything. And I think in a lot of powerful ways, we were able to bring all of our programs virtual, which isn't to say we don't still do them in person, especially as the pandemic improves, but by doing it virtually, we were able to reach so many more students and educators. We did find one of the biggest challenges with COVID was just the huge burnout that students were feeling with so many online classes and some of the earlier pandemic times. So we definitely tried to adapt as much as we could to make our work engaging and sometimes shorter. Um, to think more about how to adapt to the needs of students and make it as relevant and thought-provoking as possible. But I think what we also found was that even though it might have been harder to reach students at certain points in the pandemic, especially with the racial justice protests that were happening around the deaths of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor, and so many others. Educators were really the ones stepping up. And even though they had so many burdens and still do in terms of the tremendous challenges they're facing, I think they were feeling a huge sense of responsibility for how to talk about these big social justice and equity issues in their classroom and with the students that they're serving. So I think that was an avenue where we really found a huge appetite for reaching educators specifically, as opposed to only K through 12 students. So I think we've experienced a lot of different, um, waves and trends in different adaptations for how we deliver our work. And I think right now we're in an interesting place where we've really built out our menu more. We can do hybrid where we are virtual and our facilitators are co-facilitating, and students are educators are in person. We can do totally virtual, and we can do totally in person. So I think COVID has really accelerated a lot of the accessibility that's been really powerful for the ADL to reach more people. And it's also had us diversify the ways that we're reaching more audiences of students.

Apologies, I was on mute. With the digital learning. I'm curious if that has changed at all with your relationship with national ADL chapters or other regional directors? Have you shared the programming or hosted national events that you normally couldn't? I'm curious to learn more about that.

One of the things that ADL did really early on in the pandemic was seize on this idea that you can fight hate from home, that you don't have to be in your office or in your community or out and about to really be able to educate yourself and reflect on the issues of the day and be able to have the tools to be a good advocate. So I think a really powerful program that did originate early on from the ADL was the Fighting Hate from Home series, which is an ongoing series that gives people across the country who want to plug in and learn about the most interesting and compelling issues of the day, to have that kind of outlet. I think what we found here regionally is, there was a tremendous amount of interest, a surge, a wave of people in the beginning who really wanted to learn from ADL, Pacific Northwest, about what were the most compelling and interesting civil rights and anti-hate issues of the day. And we brought in experts from across the region to talk about the history of racism and to do interactive trainings around addressing bias and having courageous conversations. But I think what we really found is that as people became a lot more acclimated to the pandemic and being at home and just facing, you know, a lot of burdens and challenges with everything that we have on our plates, the virtual interest waned. So what we did was we tried to really challenge ourselves to think about how we are best communicating with our audiences, how we can have people take information on the go, and what kind of tone we want to set for our community. So, something that we came up with, with a lot of community and staff input, was actually starting a podcast called Pacific Northwest Coffee and Conversation. And I think because the work of ADL can be really heavy and hard, we tried to focus on the uplifting stories of leaders in the Pacific Northwest who are fighting for social justice and equity in their communities, and fighting hate. And it gave us a real opportunity to shine a light on some leaders who are really well known, who work at big companies like Microsoft or who are incredible, business owners, but also people that maybe are doing the day to day work that are less known, who are real jewels in their community, you know, pushing for change in education or, doing a variety of things, that are super admirable. So I think the ability for us to be adaptable and flexible has been really helpful, and to be able to understand of the needs of our community and have a pulse on what people want has been great, and the ability to have flexible content that people can take on the go that inspires them and that teaches them and that uplifts them, I think has been something really powerful that we've been able to take with us as a pandemic lesson moving forward.

You mentioned fighting hate from home. I'm curious to learn more. Have you found, as you track hate, have you found hate and other violent crimes of that nature? Um, moving into the digital world more than previously, or any other trends in that vein?

Absolutely. So I would say I think the ADL is really uniquely positioned as an organization that's been both fighting for civil rights for over a century and fighting hate, to be a unique organization that understands the balance of free speech, but also the migration of hate to online and how it impacts marginalized communities. And several years ago, under the leadership of our new CEO, who's been there for about five years now, Jonathan Greenblatt, we as an organization identified that hate is happening on the ground and it's happening online. And the way that it happens isn't always randomized. It's really targeting people because of their identities, because they're members of marginalized communities. And antisemitism and hate are actually flourishing in online spaces in ways that we've never really seen before. So I think we've absolutely been at the forefront of both calling out the need to have an all-society approach to hate in real life and also hate on the ground. Um, and sorry, and also hate online. So the way that we've been doing that work is through a multidisciplinary center called our center for Technology and Society that's based in Silicon Valley, and they're an amazing partner to us in the regional offices for really articulating a vision of how we hold companies accountable, but also work with them proactively to ensure that they don't allow anti-Semitic and hate speech on their platforms. We've also done really incredible research and product design to actually be able to monitor and somehow quantify how much hate actually exists on different platforms and different social media companies. And I think here in the regions, one of the really incredible areas where we've found a lot of success is that there's a lot of interest, by lawmakers, in policies that actually address online hate, in impacting marginalized communities. So we've been able here in Washington State to pass an anti-swatting law. We've been working on an anti-doxing law that we're continuing to push in Washington. We've also been able to pass a bill that strengthens our online hate and harassment law. In Oregon, we've also been making a lot of strides on an anti-doxing law. So I think there's a real interest not only from the public but by lawmakers to think about how hate crime laws, might need a revamp, given what is happening in our online world. So I think we both see it as a place of tremendous challenge, but also opportunities to think about how we can make online spaces more inclusive.

That's. Yeah. Can you tell me more about the specific work that ADL has done in advocating for these laws?

Yeah, we have several big strategic plans that we've put out, protect and repair. Um, all of these are really, um, frameworks that we've put forth that relate to different policies that we can be passing both at the federal and state levels around addressing online hate and harassment. So, as I was mentioning before, here in the Pacific Northwest, we've been pursuing a suite of different laws that we can be pushing forth in different state legislatures to basically protect more people from online hate and harassment. I think the first step of all of this work is a better education of the public and elected officials about what's actually happening online. And being able to quantify and talk about that data has really been powerful. And what we've actually been doing at ADL is serving, on an annual basis, the public to learn more about what the online experience for the average American. And if you're Asian or if you're Jewish or if you're Muslim or Black or LGBTQ, is that experience different? If you're part of a protected class? And what we're seeing time and time again is that huge droves of American society are impacted by hate speech and bullying and harassment online, but especially if you're part of those marginalized groups, those kinds of rates and experiences are even stronger. So I think the first step is public education and education about our lawmakers, about where, uh, what is the American experience? What are some of the laws that need to be improved? And secondly, you know, I think we've actually put forth some really strong policy proposals about what states can actually do to ensure that we have a victim-centered approach and more people are protected from doxing, from swatting. Um, you know, from all sorts of different kinds of actions that happen in the online world that have on-the-ground consequences. So I actually think we have so much important work to do to continue to make headway in different states and to hopefully make progress on the national level as well.

Yeah, that sounds like a very difficult task to educate as well as advocate, and really bridge that divide.

Um, yeah. And it's a lot of work. I think you're, um, you're working on issues that I think people know exist intrinsically in society, but I think you're putting a name to it and you're putting data to it, and you're really calling out a problem that's really massive and that's growing. I mean, it's also taken a lot of coalition work for us to be able to identify communities that have been impacted by online hate. To build the coalitions needed to create the energy and activism to move bills forward and to do that multi-year work that it really takes to make a bill into a law, especially in the state legislature. So there's, again, a lot of opportunity. But, you know, it is really hard work in addition to all the other things that we do.

Yeah. Have you noticed any trends, as you work across the Pacific Northwest, you're working across state boundaries. Any trends here between states and versus other regions as you talk to some of your peers in other states and areas?

Yeah, I would say one of the hard things about serving the greater Pacific Northwest is that it's just such a big geography. And when you're talking about Seattle or Portland or more denser urban areas versus, um, you know, more rural areas. The divides are really different in demographics and in, um, you know, political affiliations and all of those things. So, you know, I feel fortunate, though, because I think it's a constant learning curve for our staff to be constantly learning from the regions that we serve about the different issues, challenges, and also different cultural pieces that make, um, certain states or areas unique. But I think what we generally see is that, unfortunately, every single community in the country is impacted by prejudice or bigotry at some point in time. And these kinds of things aren't unique. What we've seen a lot of trends that I've noticed over the past couple of years that I've been with the ADL, a few of them are that schools are microcosms for society at large. So when you see hate and extremism becoming more normalized, they become more normalized in school, and we see a lot more acts of bias and xenophobia and anti-Semitism and racism in K through 12 environments. I also just think on a more macro picture, both nationally and in all of the different states we work in, we see that hate and extremism are growing, and that people who are affiliated with hate groups or who have hateful ideologies are a lot more emboldened than they were a couple of years ago, back when they were lurking in private chat rooms and in online spaces. And we've seen people really come out in public and kind of push the lines of what's acceptable, be able to use hateful language and engage in hateful activity in a much more, um, a much more out there kind of way. Um, some examples are that, you know, years ago, you would have never seen, um, a white supremacist group actively recruiting on college campuses by putting propaganda out or putting propaganda near schools or in communities. I mean, that would have really been relegated to much more private and closed-off spaces. But we've really seen the normalization and skyrocketing of hate and bigotry in the kind of data in the activity that we're seeing. And I think another trend that we also see is that if you don't properly train law enforcement, if you don't speak out and educate the public, and if you don't have strong laws that really capture what's happening, underreporting is also going to be a huge issue. That's going to be a big challenge in understanding the actual issue that's unfolding on the ground. So I would say those are some, I think, common challenges that we see regardless of the communities that we serve. And I would gesture to say those kinds of trends really exist across the country, and not only here in the Pacific Northwest.

Yeah, this sounds like very difficult problems to deal with. I'm impressed with the work you're doing. How do you think about outreach differently? As you said, you can fight hate from home, but how are you thinking about educating, the citizens of the Pacific Northwest when they're, by and large, more and more locked in their homes as that's changing. We're obviously um, COVID is hopefully going away. Um, and that's changing again to the flip side is we're coming out of the home. Um, has that impacted your outreach plans?

Well, I think one of the challenges that the past few years have really reinforced for me is that we need to dedicate just as many resources and attention to the work of schools as we do to the community at large, and it can't be an either-or approach. It has to be both and, and it's amazing to do the work in schools because you are shaping the views of young people for generations to come, and imbuing them with the kind of foundational ideas around understanding their identity and the building blocks of bias and how to be, um, better champions for one another in the wider sense. But I feel like it also, um, you know, with the polarization that we're all experiencing with the world, in the disconnect that we were already having, that the pandemic just aggravated. I think it also reinforced for us that we at the ADL are not only an organization that calls out hate, and that educates. I mean, we can be a convener of community conversations and relationship building, and allyship work that I think is really, really crucial coming out of the pandemic. So we're excited to have been working on a couple of new efforts over the past year. Um, one demographic group that's unfortunately been really adversely impacted by COVID and xenophobia is the Asian American and Pacific Islander community, specifically the East Asian community that's been targeted. And we've been working on launching, um, a pilot initiative in Seattle around bridging divides between the Asian and Jewish communities and thinking more about learning about shared history and identity, and culture, and what allyship looks like in challenging times. So I do think I really want to push our organization to be one that really dreams big about how we can be part of the social fabric of our different communities. That encourages connection and community building, because I do think ultimately that does lead to a community that's healthier and that's safer and that's more inclusive for all people.

That makes sense. And sorry, I'm looking at my notes here. At the beginning of this discussion, you laid out four main buckets of work that you've expanded on. The last one was tracking hate locally. I'm curious how that differs and how you think about that in the Pacific Northwest. Um, as you said, there's a diverse geographical as well as, um, I guess, uh, diverse socio-political and, um, ways of thinking across the Pacific Northwest. So, do you think about tracking hate differently in different areas? Um, and how do you know what kind of different trends you might observe?

Well, basically, the way that we work at the ADL in terms of intaking reports of hate is that we actively track it as a staff, um, as experts on certain issues, whether it's extremism or antisemitism, through news reports and through law enforcement contexts, etc. but we also are an organization that really relies on our community to report directly to us what they're seeing, whether it's leaders who are contacted by their constituents, who pass on information to us or community members themselves that call or email or use our reporting form to tell us what's happening in their schools and their workplaces and their communities. And we have a variety of ways that we show up and we support and we counsel people, basically to be able to navigate challenging conversations around anti-Semitism and different forms of discrimination. But I think one major takeaway that I have from that kind of work is that the work only happens if people know about your organization and know about the resources you have. And a lot of times, it can be hard when you see numbers going up around hate-based activities and anti-Semitic incidents that happen because it shows a dark underbelly of society that's unfolding, unfortunately, in our communities. What I also think it reflects is that people feel more comfortable and safe and empowered to report what's actually happening to organizations, and they think it's important, and they feel like they have a voice in a role in what's happening. So, um, I also think it shows that organizations like the ADL are showing up, and people know what we do, and we know they know how to reach us. So I think the trend sometimes can be challenging because a lot of times we see an uptick in hate, and we're quick to judge it. Um, and it's, it's, I think it's a little more complicated than that. On the one hand, it shows an uptick in hate, which is an unfortunate reality that we're grappling with. But on the other hand, I think it shows something that's probably, um, been manifesting for a long time, that people are more willing to address and call out. So I do think, you know, we recognize that we have a lot of work to do with different stakeholders in the states we work in to create better structures and systems for reporting. Um, one example is we've been really proud to work in Oregon with the Department of Justice there, and the Attorney General's office to pass this incredible comprehensive law and to actually have a hate crimes hotline in the state that people can call, they don't have to report directly to law enforcement, but they can get resources and get guidance about how to move forward. And Oregon has seen a skyrocketing data kind of collection of hate-based incidents that have been happening based on the fact that they have more resources and they have a better system. So I think, you know, all of the numbers can be kind of complicated, but we at the ADL do really pride ourselves on being an organization that not only calls out the problem, but actually tackles the problem by supporting people who experience anti-Semitism and hate. And we also have a lot of credibility because of the fact that we've been tracking anti-Semitic incidents since 1979, so we can really understand what's unfolding in our communities. And and, you know, the more that we are out there and the more that we have a presence, I think the more that we learn and we can better understand what's actually unfolding.

Mhm. I also want to touch on the fact that you are operating in the midst of a pandemic, and I'd be curious to hear more about how you have managed the office and work with your peers. Um, and making sure that you can outreach, um, into all the diverse and big geographic area that is Pacific Northwest.

Say that again.

Um, so basically, yeah, just getting to the crux of it is how the ADL workplace changed throughout the COVID pandemic?

Well, I think we've really prioritized the health and safety of our employees over all else. And that has been so important in just ensuring the well-being of our team and the people behind the work. The last two years have been so incredibly taxing for us as staff, as leaders, and as people who are just experiencing a surge in hate. And, you know, for those of us who are part of marginalized communities, the work is just is just really heavy and hard. So I do think we've done a really good job of prioritizing the safety of our teams and being able to be virtual and really just giving people the kind of flexibility and care that they need to be with their families and to have flexibility in their workplaces. But I think we're also emerging from the pandemic with renewed energy, with the sense that we've learned a lot. We've experimented with a lot, of programs that we've run that are virtual or hybrid or podcast work or education programs and schools. I mean, we've learned so much about how we can be better and deliver more and create more access for so many different communities. And I think we're also doubled down on the fact that we need to be in person. We need to be an organization that builds community, that has in-person conversations and trainings and programs, and education. So I think we're really excited to do both, to continue reaching as many people as possible with a lot of the strategies that we have, but to also ensure our staff is out there and talking and connecting and building a presence and sense of community for us, whether we're in Seattle or Portland or Anchorage or Boise. There is so much work to do, and we've been fortunate to recruit, um, not only incredible teammates to work professionally for the ADL, but board members who are located in different states and different pods, um, where we have two or more in different communities throughout the region, who are our ambassadors and, um, you know, leaders on the ground. So we've tried to really think about how we can have more talent across the region, um, to help us innovate and strategize and represent us. And one of the things that we've been really excited to do, um, as we're re-emerging from Covid, is to enliven a young leadership program that we've been running. We've traditionally worked a lot in the K through 12 space, but we actually have a great program that we've run for a smaller cohort of young professionals in their 20s and 30s, and we've reinvested a lot of energy in thinking about how we can diversify this group. How can we grow it? How can we expose them to really important contemporary civil rights and social justice issues, and create more of a leadership bench so we can have more board members and leaders in communities who are well-versed in the issues of the ADL and who can speak out about these kinds of issues? So we've, um, taken COVID's opportunity to kind of launch in Portland virtually, and now we're all in person. So we're in Seattle and Portland with a cohort of 26 leaders. So we're excited about that.

Yeah. That's amazing. Um, and lastly, I want to ask about any other, um, anecdotes or or concluding thoughts or things that I have not asked that you want to talk about. Um, as we finish up the interview.

Um, I don't think so.

Okay, great. Um. Oh, and one thing I realized I should have asked at the beginning. Um, but maybe we can cut up the interview a bit. Can you tell me about what the ADL in the Pacific Northwest does? Um, the geographic region encompasses. And overall, for those not familiar with what the ADL is.

Yeah. So the ADL is a national organization that works at higher levels and on the ground, and even globally since 1913. So we're over a century old, and our mission has always been to stop the defamation of the Jewish people and to ensure fair and just treatment of all. And this mission is really driven by the notion that the Jewish community and all communities in the United States are integrally connected, and the fate of one is deeply tied to the fate of all. Um, when we have an inclusive society that's welcoming of our Jewish community, we know that that has ripple effects for all communities. So that beautiful vision and mission, and those values still really hold today. And I think the beauty of EDL is that it's a national organization with a local presence, doing local work on the ground to make an impact. And here in the Pacific Northwest, we have been around for over 75 years. We serve a broad geographic region of Alaska, Idaho, Montana, Oregon, and Washington from our base in Seattle. We have programs and efforts and work and board members in Alaska and Idaho and Oregon, and Washington, and partners in Montana. So we feel privileged to be able to work in a beautiful, diverse and incredible region that has so much history and culture and so many incredible, diverse communities and partners, and a lot of work to do to make our communities even better. So that's a little bit about the history of the ADL and the work that we do here in the Pacific Northwest.

All right. Great. Thank you so much.

Yeah. My pleasure.

Um, yeah, this has been interesting. Um. Oh, I hid my video. Okay. Um, yeah. Thank you so much. Um, yeah, I think this will be great for the. I was checking the email. Um. At one point during our conversation.

Yeah. What does it say? Remind me.

Um. Let's find some time in the spring. Um, well, it sounds like we will also talk again in the fall to see if there have been any updates or changes to the programming that the ADL does. Okay. Um, and then during the annual meeting on November 16th, we hope that you, being you, um, you can come on live with me and Lisa to answer a few questions. The annual meeting is virtual and starts at 7 p.m., and we can talk about more of the details as we get closer. Um, it did sound like we. Yeah. The idea here was, I guess Sarah had said you are the expert on your story and the work of ADL. Um, so if you have any topics for me to ask you, that would be great. Um, but I think we covered a lot of ground there, so. Okay, that worked out just fine. Um, yeah. Thank you so much. This has been interesting.

My absolute pleasure. And yeah, if you think of anything else, just always circle back and I'll. I guess I'll talk to you in a few months.

Okay. Um. And. Yeah, that program is for people in their 20s to 30s. Sounds interesting.

Yeah, I might hit you up for it. We just started the new year, but it's basically like it will reset in 2023. Um, but I can drop a link into the chat if you want. Sure. Okay. It's great. I'm like, super blown away. We have a really, really interesting group of people this year. Yeah. Let me just grab it from our website, which is admittedly horrible. Um, okay.