"There is a legitimate point to be made that these buses are pre-designated as "Mehadrin," or gender-separated, and that it's not like this is happening on every bus."
~~~No, it's not a legitimate point. Egged has the contract to provide PUBLIC transport to ALL the public. I pay my fare, I sit where I want. And in any case, it's not MY problem, sitting next to a man, it's HIS problem if he's haredi, and he can get up and move elsewhere. If the haredim want segregated buses, let them hire a private bus firm.
My mistake; I was under the impression that the Mehadrin buses were semi-private entities created to cater specifically to the Haredi community; i.e., operate as "Haredi buses." Egged should not be able to operate as both a public service and a private organization with its own miniature codes of conduct varying from bus to bus. (Though I have to say that unfortunately, I see no way to force Egged to make this decision on their own, as it's against their economic interests.)
Antigonos also added that in practice, Mehadrin buses are not so much divided in "two" as they are into, say, quarters- three for the men, one for the women. Cute. What a nice way to put the "we do TOO value women" slogan I've heard from Orthodox acquaintances into practice.
I also can't help but think of a comment I read on a Jewish blog this week (unfortunately I can't recall which one) from a Haredi man in NY who said, something to the effect of, "I feel bad that I don't care enough about these sorts of issues- but if I get a seat on the train, I'm whipping out my New York Times or falling asleep, and I'm oblivious to whoever's sitting next to me." Interestingly, he added, "but I understand why they can/should be more strict in Israel."
Sultan Knish and my old friend Sam added their respective shekels as well, noting that the reason the public policing keeps going on is because no one is willing to rein the Haredim in, and because Olmert is too busy kissing their kaftaned tucheses to care much about the rule of law (and the recent departure of his coalition by Yisrael Beiteinu will probably make him even more desperate to keep them happy). Sam goes so far as to compare it to desegregation. It's a sorry fact, but from where I'm sitting the truth seems to be that the bizarre super-frum mentality presently at work among the Haredi majority is more hostile to THEIR OWN WOMEN- mothers, sisters, and daughters, than American whites' views of blacks were in the 19th and 20th centuries. The ironic thing is that this view isn't just, to my liberal elitist values, a tad, shall we say, odd, it's also what science-fiction nerds like to call a RETCON, or a false or "invented" history. Just check out Harry Maryles, far from a liberal heretic like myself. First Harry opines about the Hasidic custom (particularly prevalent among the Ger sect in Israel) of wives walking MULTIPLE STEPS behind their husbands for modesty purposes. What say thee, Harry?
"I’m sorry this is not normal."
Hmmm.
There's more.
Whether it is the manner of dress of Yeshiva students, or the color, size and style of their Kipot, or whether it is in the total rejection of mixed seating as the norm for events such as weddings, bar Mitzvos, or banquets, this chumraization [increased strictures] has cast a pall on those of us who were brought up in a world where even the Gedolei HaDor [Great Rabbis of the Generation] went to mixed seating events and sat with their wives. The Talmidim [students] of today have become Kanaim (zealots) for their mentors in certain areas of Judaism. In past generations that was not the case. One of my Rebbeim at HTC, HaGoan R. Mordechai Rogov, ZTL, said that in Lithuania they did not consider such things important. I recently saw some archival footage of Yeshiva student of pre-war Ponovezh. The students were all wearing light colored suits and hats, and they were all clean shaven with no Peyos (Side curls). Can you imagine walking into Lakewood today and seeing even one student wearing a light colored suit?
Case in point: an old picture of a student most people only know as an ancient beard-man. Still more from Harry:
This phenomenon is part of the over-all ‘move to the right’, that has been taking place over the last 60 years. After the holocaust when Chasidim immigrated to the United States in huge numbers, they brought all their Chumros with them. Chumros not practiced in the United States and not common in the Lithuanian Yeshivos of Europe. That is how the slide to the right began. Many Kulos that were standard practice even pre holocaust were abandoned in the US when the Chasidim who never used these Kulos immigrated and widely practiced them. The Yeshiva world saw it and copied it.
There are two very clear instances of this.
In one area it was actually a Tikun. It restored a Halacha that was all but abandoned even in pre-holocaust Lithuania: that of married woman covering their hair. Chasidim never abandoned that Halacha. When the rabbinic leaders of the Yeshiva world saw that, they were somehow able to convince their wives to cover their hair too. And they made sure this Halacha was instilled into their students. Since that time hair covering has come back with a vengeance. Where it was virtually unknown in the United States pre-holocaust, the vast majority of observant women today cover their hair. The younger they are, the more likely they are to do so even among the modern orthodox.
The other area which is not a Halachic requirement is in the area of separate seating of the sexes. The biggest Lithuanian type Gedolim of the last century sat with their wives at at weddings. There are photos that prove that. And they proudly introduced their wives to everyone. This was not only the case here it was the case in Europe.
When asked about it by a Talmid who back in the late sixties was faced with pressure to have separate seating at his wedding: Rav Mordechai Rogov told him, “In Der Lita, Zennen Mir Nit Given Makpid”. In Lithuania weddings had mixed seating.
But, when the Lithuanian Torah world saw that all the Chasidic wedding had separate seating, they instituted it for themselves. Telshe banquets in Chicago started out with mixed seating. After a few years of observing the Chasidic world, they made a conscious decision to not be out-Frummed by the Chasidim.
Now they actually bully people into having separate seating at weddings. Case in point: Back in the early nineties the daughter of a close friend of mine got engaged to a Telzer. My friend intended to have mixed seating at his daughter’s wedding. When Telshe found out about it, one of the Roshei Yeshiva paid a visit to my friend. And he used extreme pressure on him to have separate seating. ‘How would it look’ he said, ‘if one of their Bachurim had a mixed seating wedding?!’
...It’s about image. It’s about ‘Frumkeit. Who can look ‘Frummer’ …who can sound ‘Frummer’…and who can act Frummer.
Indeed. And what's particularly sad is that this group-think mentality is superficial, stupid, and, to my understanding, rather incongruous with a lot of the message we're supposed to get from most of Jewish history. Not only has there historically been quite a bit of diversity in customs and practices among Jews, a major component of Judaism has always been that there is legitimacy and dignity in not mindlessly following group trends, be they harmless (designer jeans) or more problematic (Crusades). If our predecessors had been as easily coerced by peer pressure as today's Haredim seem to be, the world, both Jewish and otherwise, would have been all the poorer for it.
And to conclude, an old Jonathan Rosenblum post on the subject which refreshingly throws some cold water on the Haredi hotheads who beat a grandmother for the sake of their "modesty." (Did they wear gloves?)
If BaGaTz [The Israeli Supreme Court] eventually bans Mehadrin public buses, those who were so insistent that Mrs. Shear vacate her seat will have made a significant contribution to the final decision. Certainly they have already helped make Torah Judaism appear as something ugly and fanatical in the eyes of hundreds of thousands around the world.
...There is a growing tendency in our community to attempt to impose our halachic standards, even chumrot, whenever we have a momentary majority, such as on the early morning bus to the Kotel. Even leaving aside the consequences of such a strategy on the attitude of traditional and secular Jews towards the chareidi community and Torah itself, I fear it is a dangerous approach.Democracy may not be the Torah’s ideal form of government, but in recent history it has generally proven to be the best protector of the rights of Jews and of our ability to flourish as Torah Jews. Therefore Torah Jews have an interest in playing by the rules of a democratic society. If we want the majority of Israeli society to respect the rights of the chareidi minority, then we have to also respect the rights of the majority.
To argue that the rules of the game followed by Torah Jews in America do not apply to the chareidi community in Israel is, in my mind, a perverse form of Zionism.
Adopting violence as a tool would be a disastrous mistake, even from the most narrow and short-range perspective. As Yossi Sarid and other secular politicians have been only too happy to remind us over the years, at the end of the day, the secular public is much larger and has lots more guns.
Separate seating on buses may be a very positive thing. And if it is important enough to the chareidi community, then the community will support our own separate bus lines (though hopefully not by throwing stones at competing public lines, as has happened in Ramat Beit Shemesh).
But separate seating is not the only Torah value at stake. Yereim v’shleimim [pious folks, I think] in New York regularly ride the New York City subways, on which the crowding is far greater than anything experienced on Egged buses in Jerusalem. And the late posek hador, Rabbi Moshe Feinstein, zt”l, long-ago ruled that it is permitted to ride New York City subways.
Damn straight. Suck it up, guys, or get your own damn bus lines. Hell, the way Olmert is headed, you'll probably be able to make him pay for it.
2 comments:
"legion commenter of the Jblogosphere,"
~~~Gee whiz, I might have to add that to my signature :-)
"It's a sorry fact, but from where I'm sitting the truth seems to be that the bizarre super-frum mentality presently at work among the Haredi majority is more hostile to THEIR OWN WOMEN- mothers, sisters, and daughters, than American whites' views of blacks were in the 19th and 20th centuries."
~~~I'm a certified nurse midwife, and I did my original nurse's training at Beth Israel Hospital in NY, which was shomer kashrut and geared for the frum public, and have now been living in Jerusalem for 30 years. Never, never, in NY did I have to contend with the absolutely unbeliveable level of sexual obsession that Jerusalem's haredi public has. And it has definitely gotten worse since I made aliyah. Married female teachers in State Religious--NOT haredi--schools now must wear hats with scarves underneath which cover every strand of hair, sleeves to the wrist and floorlength skirts or heavy stockings even in the hottest weather. Haredi women refuse to be examined by male doctors, even when it is obvious that they are in serious danger (I had a patient the other day who refused to undergo an essential ultrasound exam unless I could guarantee her a female TECHNICIAN would do it)
When I lived on Kibbutz Lavi, a religious kibbutz, I was intrigued to find that most of the older women only covered their hair in shul. "My mother, z"l," I was told, "only wore a hat on Shabbat, when she attended Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch's synagogue in Germany, and what was good enough for my mother is good enough for me". But I also noticed that the daughters of most of these women were wearing tichels or caps everyday.
The misogyny and Talibanization of the haredi public--and by extension, now the national religious public, who are trying hard to show that they are "just" as religious as the "real Jews"--is one of Israel's major types of polarization of society, and is much to be deplored. Being "more Jewish than thou" has developed into a major kind of competition--since barely 30% of haredi men work, they've got to find SOMETHING to fill their time besides shmoozing and benchwarming and intimidating women is easy. But I think it's happening in the US too--I remember a letter to the editor of the Jewish Observer a decade ago, when a father wrote that he felt it inappropriate for a man to attend the graduation of his daughter from a Bet Yaakov high school, lest he be "affected" by the girls' voices.
It is just shameful behavior and embarrassing.
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