Shatzi Weisberger

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Shatzi Weisberger
Death educator
  • activist
  • nurse
    • Organizations
    Spouse
    Gene Weisberger
    ​
    ​
    (m. 1951; sep. 1969)​
    Children2
    RelativesSamuel Gompers (great-grandfather)

    Joyce "Shatzi" Weisberger (

    death educator, activist, and nurse in New York City. Weisberger turned to death education in her later life after a 47-year career as a nurse, during which she also became associated with various activist groups and movements. Her involvement in activism spanned the civil rights movement, the anti-nuclear movement, ACT UP, opposition to police brutality in the United States including through Black Lives Matter, and anti-Zionism as a member of Jewish Voice for Peace
    .

    Born in 1930 to a lesbian mother and a homophobic father, Weisberger grew up in Brooklyn and was not close with either of her parents. She was married for 18 years and adopted two children, but broke off the marriage after reading

    political lesbian
    .

    As a nurse, Weisberger focused on

    New York Times reporter to cover the end of her life. Weisberger died of pancreatic cancer
    on December 1, 2022.

    Early life

    Shatzi Weisberger was born Joyce Schatzberg

    grand marshal of a pride parade;[4] Weisberger grew up in a small apartment with her and her mother's female partner,[5] though she was not aware of their relationship at the time.[5][6] Weisberger did not have a close relationship with either of her parents,[6] and was once kidnapped by her father after her mother came out as a lesbian; she spent time in the foster care system as a result of her father's homophobia.[1] She attended summer camp as a child.[7]

    Weisberger's

    great-grandfather was Samuel Gompers, a founder of the American Federation of Labor.[2][8] Her mother and grandparents often spoke about Gompers while she was growing up; she often wrote about him for school assignments.[2]

    Weisberger was married to a man named Gene Weisberger for 18 years,[1] and they had a son and a daughter,[9] adopted from Greece and California respectively;[1] she left the unhappy[1] marriage after reading The Feminine Mystique. She later realized she was a lesbian.[6] Weisberger became estranged from her children.[9]

    Career

    Weisberger worked as a nurse for 47 years, focusing on obstetrics and end-of-life care.[10] Her nursing career saw the peak of deaths caused by HIV/AIDS in New York in the 1980s, and she worked as a home care nurse for those dying of the disease.[5]

    In the 2010s, Weisberger sought out education about

    death cafés, which transitioned online at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.[5] Weisberger is associated with the positive death movement[11] as opposed to palliative care.[10]

    Activism

    Weisberger was a

    political lesbian for a period of time,[10] a member of ACT UP,[6] and a part of the public opposition to nuclear technology[10] as a member of Dykes Opposed to Nuclear Technology.[5] One of her earliest acts of activism took place at a die-in in New York City, where she cried because she felt that she was "in the right place doing the right things with the right people".[10] She was jailed as a result of her actions against nuclear weapons.[2] In addition, Weisberger was an organizer with the Independence Party of New York City (which broke away from the Independence Party of New York) for 25 years.[2]

    Cartoon drawing of Shatzi Weisberger wearing a keffiyeh. She is holding a rainbow pride flag and a sign that reads "This 91 years old Jew says Zionism is genocide".
    Cartoon portrait by Carlos Latuff, depicting Weisberger holding a protest sign

    Weisberger was present at numerous protests and demonstrations in New York, leading

    The Advocate to describe her as "a fixture".[10] She was active in protests against police brutality in the United States,[10] supported abolition of the police and of prisons,[12] and was associated with anti-Zionism.[3] At one Black Lives Matter protest in June 2020, which occurred on her 90th birthday, she was dubbed "the people's bubbie" (a Yiddish term for a grandmother);[3] she wrote a column in HuffPost stating that she wanted the police to be abolished for her 90th birthday,[8][13] stating that the "only way all people will ever be able to live and die as they wish is if we pursue abolition".[14] She broke curfew to attend another Black Lives Matter protest.[5][12] Her protest signs, such as one reading Jewish dyke standing with Palestinian queers, became well-known.[14]

    In 2021, Weisberger cited her age as a positive contributor to her activism, explaining that her presence "brings attention to the issues that matter" and expressing an intent to participate in "as many demonstrations as I possibly can".[3]

    Views on Zionism

    For some time I thought Israel could reform itself. But I don't believe that at all anymore. I realised that I can't be a Zionist. No way. It is such an injustice, such cruelty, such distortion.

    Weisberger, as quoted in Middle East Eye[3]

    Weisberger grew up as a

    Shatila massacre.[15]

    As she became associated with the

    Jewish lesbians, arguing in a 1986 issue of WomaNews that "Jewish women in particular need to educate ourselves about the history of Zionism."[4]

    Weisberger was a member of Jewish Voice for Peace and associated with its New York City chapter for the last six years of her life,[4] and told Middle East Eye in 2021 that being part of a community of Jewish anti-Zionists made it "much easier to protest against Zionism than it was before".[3]

    Later life and death

    In her later life Weisberger was diagnosed with

    marijuana every night.[6]

    In 2018, Weisberger held a "FUN-eral" for herself in the common room of an Upper West Side apartment building. Guests decorated a cardboard coffin, ate and sang, and Weisberger spoke about death and dying.[11] Wearing a colorful floral blouse for the occasion, she said that she wanted to experience her own death and "to share the experience with anybody who’s interested".[9] She told John Leland of The New York Times that she had worried she might die before hosting the funeral.[16]

    Weisberger experienced symptoms of a heart attack in 2020 during the

    COVID-19 lockdown in New York. Rather than going to a hospital, she stayed home and recovered there.[17]

    In April 2022, Weisberger told the LGBTQ&A podcast[18] that she hoped to have time to experience the dying process in her own home; items in her house were tagged with the name of the person to whom she wanted to bequeath them. She expressed a desire for people to say their goodbyes and pick up their bequeath items before she died, and did not wish to be drugged. She planned to be buried in a forest in Upstate New York.[10] She had additionally preselected a funeral director and a shroud.[9]

    After being diagnosed with untreatable pancreatic cancer in October 2022, Weisberger called Leland the following month, inviting him to report on the end of her life (and asking him to bring her a cannabis edible). On November 18, she told Leland that she was getting her wish of experiencing the process of dying, and that while she was in extreme pain and unable to sleep she was "experiencing the best time of [her] life".[9]

    In preparation for her death, Weisberger contacted her estranged son. She attempted to do the same with her daughter, who was unwilling to reconnect. Despite difficulty caused by a labor shortage and high costs, she secured in-home hospice care with the aid of friends and a GoFundMe created by Jewish Voice for Peace.[9] By November 21, she was in the company of friends and hospice care, and on that day two film crews came to her apartment; Vogue was working on a profile of her. Despite her wishes not to be drugged before her death, she wore a fentanyl patch to reduce pain, and had a morphine elixir, but had not yet used it.[9]

    Weisberger had a "pain emergency" on November 25 and increased her dosage of pain medication. On November 30, she postponed an interview with Vogue and did not see visitors, increasing her medication again. She died at 12:40 a.m. on December 1.

    feminist, who became a beloved symbol of intersectional solidarity for queer rights, Black Lives Matter, and pro-Palestinian demonstrations in New York City".[15] The publication quoted a post on Twitter by Egyptian activist and academic Alia ElKattan, who wrote that she had encountered Weisberger at a Palestine-related event the week before her death.[15] Weisberger's body was oiled and bathed by a group of her close friends, and she was buried in Rosendale, New York on December 2.[9]

    References

    1. ^ a b c d e f Saper, Jay (December 15, 2022). "Shatzi Weisberger, the People's Bubbie, Dies at 92". Autostraddle. Retrieved January 5, 2023.
    2. ^ a b c d e f Elana Stein and Shatzi Weisberger (May 14, 2020). JVP-NYC in conversation with death educator Shatzi Weisberger (Videotape). Jewish Voice for Peace. Retrieved December 5, 2022 – via YouTube.
    3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Essa, Azad (May 28, 2021). "Meet the 90-year-old Jewish American woman protesting for Palestine". Middle East Eye. Retrieved April 29, 2022.
    4. ^ a b c d Reiff, Ben (January 5, 2023). "'Love in organizing': A tribute to a queer Jew for Palestine". +972 Magazine. Retrieved January 5, 2023.
    5. ^ a b c d e f g h Leah, Anna (June 17, 2020). "This 90-year-old New York activist fought racist housing practices, was a nurse during the AIDS epidemic, and is now protesting for Black Lives Matter". Business Insider. Retrieved April 29, 2022.
    6. ^ a b c d e f g "Glorious Broad #15: Shatzi Weisberger". Glorious Broads. August 20, 2020. Retrieved April 29, 2022.
    7. ^ I am Shatzi. And this is what I stand for (Videotape). DOROT. August 10, 2016. Retrieved December 5, 2022 – via YouTube.
    8. ^ a b Weisberger, Shatzi (June 23, 2020). "All I Want For My 90th Birthday Is To Abolish The Police And Build Our Dream World". HuffPost. Retrieved December 7, 2022.
    9. ^
      ISSN 0362-4331
      . Retrieved December 9, 2022.
    10. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Masters, Jeffrey (April 28, 2022). "Shatzi Weisberger: Meet The 91-Year-Old Death Educator". The Advocate. Retrieved April 29, 2022.
    11. ^
      ISSN 0362-4331
      . Retrieved April 29, 2022.
    12. ^ a b Fahey, Maryjane (August 28, 2020). "3 Activists Over 65 Weigh In, and Act Out, on Black Lives Matter". Next Avenue. Retrieved April 29, 2022.
    13. ^ a b Skinner, Paige (December 1, 2022). "Shatzi Weisberger, Who Was Beloved As The People's Bubbie, Has Died at Age 92". BuzzFeed News. Retrieved December 2, 2022.
    14. ^ a b c d Riedel, Samantha (December 2, 2022). "Shatzi Weisberger, Activist Legend Known as the People's Bubbie, Has Died at 92". Them. Retrieved December 3, 2022.
    15. ^ a b c d Essa, Azad (December 2, 2022). "Tributes pour in for Jewish American anti-Zionist activist Shatzi Weisberger". Middle East Eye. Retrieved December 3, 2022.
    16. ISSN 0362-4331
      . Retrieved April 29, 2022.
    17. ISSN 0362-4331
      . Retrieved April 29, 2022.
    18. ^ "LGBTQ&A: Shatzi Weisberger: Remembering The People's Bubbie (1930–2022) on Apple Podcasts". Apple Podcasts. Retrieved December 4, 2022.
    19. ^ @jvpny (December 1, 2022). "With full and heavy hearts, we want to share with you all that Shatzi Weisberger, the Peoples Bubbie, 92-year-old antizionist Jew, lesbian, abolitionist, nurse, and lifelong organizer died last night. Shatzi was in her own home when she died, exactly according to her wishes..." – via Instagram.
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