Fandom, antisemitism, and watching The Pitt as a Jew
I could probably write endlessly on this subject, and insofar as Jewishness is a major theme in my fan fiction, I basically do, but now that Season 2 is behind us, I wanted to share some thoughts.
I watched The Pitt months after the last episode of Season 1 aired. I binged Season 1 over a single weekend in late June 2025 after seeing lots of buzz about the show and remembering fondly how much I had enjoyed seeing Noah Wyle make his debut on E.R. when I was in college. I wrote my first Pitt fan fiction a couple weeks later.
The Pitt knocked me sideways. I was immediately engrossed in the story, and found myself relating to Dr. Robby in a way that I never had to any other character on TV. I saw Robby, a non-observant but still very Jewish Gen Xer navigating the world and felt thoroughly seen in a way I never had before. To see a Jewish character my age portrayed in such a nuanced and emotionally real way was literally life-changing.
The Pitt got me thinking about who I am as a person, and how much of who I am is a grounded in my identity as a Jew. About six months after the show aired, the same week Season 2 debuted, I attended synagogue for the first time in nearly 25 years. In the months that followed, I joined a shul, and I'm regularly attending Shabbat services again. (Fun fact: the prayers, the melodies, and the little traditions immediately come back to me, because they were woven so snugly into me in the first twenty-something years of my life that they'll always be a part of me. My liturgical Hebrew is a little rusty, but I can absolutely sing along in shul and can recite most of the major prayers with little prompting, even after a quarter century.)
I was absolutely amazed to read Noah Wyle talk about how working on The Pitt and playing Dr. Robby has helped him reconnect with his own Jewishness. I can't tell you how many times I've rewatched the scenes in episode 2.3 with Yana and Dr. Robby. (At least six or seven times. So, so good.)
When people in fandom use Robby's Jewishness or Noah's Jewish heritage as a fulcrum for criticizing the show or its show runners, it feels personal. It hurts. Some days more than others. Even when I try to curate that kind of shite out of my feed through the liberal use of the block button. Fandom can be a rough space for a Jew.
But you know what? The show and its fandom have reminded me how many kind and wonderful people there are out there. I've had lots of non-Jewish fans reach out to me and express support or curiosity about Jewish themes in the show (and my Pitt fan fiction) that is so genuine and so beautiful, it gives me so much hope that the light will overcome the darkness we see around us.
If you are a non-Jewish fan of the show and want to chat about the Jewish threads that are woven into its narrative, feel free to reach out to me or one of my fellow "Red Sea pedestrians" (as one of my friends describes herself). A lot of us love nothing more than to talk about our culture and history. We want to be better understood by members of society writ large, and are all too happy to chat about our traditions. (Beware of the old adage about two Jews having three opinions. We are an interesting and opinionated bunch. That part of the stereotype is accurate af.)
And if you see antisemitism in fandom (and there's a lot of it in certain spaces), please, please consider calling it out. The hateful stuff you see spewed in online fan spaces hurts real people.
Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk :)
ellievsbear
jbbartram-illu
janainaart
kaledo-art
romaincrisis
areudirty
