Washington College Magazine
Jack Gilden '87 is president of a Baltimore advertising agency and a columnist for The Jewish Times.
The Mighty Crack Of The Pen
By Karen Gaspers
Jack Gilden '87 likes to think of writing as "antler cracking." He credits the idea to an old Washington College roommate, a hunter who kept a pair of deer antlers, tied together with rope, in the house where they lived. The roommate explained to Gilden that deer are like people—if they hear a commotion, if they think a fight is occurring, they want to see what's happening.
So to draw deer to them, hunters crack antlers together.
That's what Gilden hopes he does with his writing. He's been writing a column called "The Aggravator" for the Baltimore Jewish Times newspaper for the past two years. In it, he ranges from personal takes on fatherhood to musings on sports to calling out anti-Semitism. Gilden draws his crowd by sprinkling his column with humor. "When humor is effective, it's so much more memorable than regular writing," he says. "I don't want to be didactic and hit people over the head. I want to charm them, make them laugh."
Humor is particularly evident in his pieces on fatherhood. On coming to terms with becoming a father, he aptly notes that a baby shower is "merely the first sign that for the next 20 years your house will be filled with crap — lots and lots of blinking, singing, plastic crap." But once his son is born, they begin to bond: "Before long, his ears unfurled in a pattern distinctive to Gilden men and African elephants. That endeared him to me."
While entertainment is high on Gilden's list, he wants to make a point through his humor, and sometimes force his readers to reconsider their opinions. One subject of particular interest to Gilden these days is anti-Semitism. Writing for a Jewish newspaper, he strongly believes his readers need to address the issue. "In the world I grew up in, I considered anti-Semitism an anachronism. But I think that in this world today it's really come raging back."
What Gilden finds most interesting is that he sees anti-Semitic sentiments coming from the left side of the political spectrum, yet most of his column's readers identify with the ideology of the left, putting them in an awkward position.
It's a concept he's struggled with personally. After graduation, Gilden became interested in the 20th century literary giant H.L. Mencken. Reading his works made Mencken a hero to Gilden, yet at the same time he discovered Mencken's writings, the controversy surrounding Mencken's anti-Semitism came to light. For Gilden, the writer became both heroic and repulsive.
Gilden voiced this tenion in a thoughtful column on the legacy of Mencken, which received a 2007 first place Simon Rockower award from the American Jewish Press Association. In the article, Gilden considers how to reconcile the man's brilliant writings with his failings as a man, particularly his failure to condemn Hitler and the Nazi's treatment of Jews in the run-up to World War II.
In addition to his column, Gilden has been in the marketing and communications industry for close to 20 years, the past 11 as head of his own advertising agency, Gilden Integrated, in Baltimore. He's also written op-ed pieces and articles for The Baltimore Sun and Chesapeake Life magazine.
"I think the world is crying out for different points of view," Gilden says. "So I think if you are willing to step up to the plate, and willing to bring that kind of scrutiny on yourself, you should do it."
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