Thursday, December 20, 2012

Weberman case & abuse:Yiddish letter (RaP's translation)

This is an important guest post by RaP providing a translation of Yiddish letter posted on Daas Torah about Weberman case.


Click for original Yiddish letter
Translation of Yiddish Letter About Weberman Case

11 comments :

  1. Thank you, RaP, for the translation.

    It breaks my heart that Y.U.'s public statement sounds so different:

    <<

    Yeshiva University continues to examine with concern the allegations of past abuse recently reported in the media. A subcommittee of the Board of Trustees is working with the law firm of Sullivan & Cromwell as outside counsel, who is assisting us in investigating the allegations and consulting with nationally recognized specialists in this area to review our policies and procedures.

    ...

    >>

    [http://blogs.yu.edu/news/2012/12/13/statement-from-president-joel/]

    I understand that the author of the Yiddish letter is probably not an institutional leader, and that an American university can't operate without lawyers and insurance companies and a P.R. department. But something essential is missing when all we hear in public is a statement that might as well have come from the managements of IBM or the United Way or Princeton.

    I think this could be why the MTA allegations are now showing up -- 30+ years later -- in the Forward.

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  2. Thanks for the translation RAP.I spent three hours on this letter breaking my teeth and getting nowhere.Very awful and tragic.@Daas Torah-As a clinician.Why do you think the MTA allegation did take 30 years+?The people making the allegations are very prominent.From a psychological standpoint why wait that long?

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  3. Another thing.The victims in the MTA situation have resources and they believed their kids.Why could they not sue YU?Why couldn't they call the cops?Why did they have to go to the Forward?The parents were not weak defenseless children by a long shot.Then when they kids grew up they had the available means of ending the situation.People who went to YU might regret having attended that institution which has now been sullied with stains that I doubt will come off.Also,it seems obvious to me with criminality in general that when these people get away with stuff they will keep repeating their evil because they see there are no consequences.

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  4. Thomson-Reuters 19 Dec 12: "Insurers seek to avoid coverage in prep school sex abuse lawsuit"
    http://newsandinsight.thomsonreuters.com/Legal/News/2012/12_-_December/Insurers_seek_to_avoid_coverage_in_prep_school_sex_abuse_lawsuit/

    <<

    Two insurers are seeking a court order relieving them from paying the legal costs of a Brooklyn prep school accused in a civil lawsuit of covering up allegations of child sex abuse.

    ...

    The insurers also said that the alleged policies excluded coverage for "bodily injury" that was "expected or intended." According to the allegations in the abuse lawsuit, Poly Prep officials had received complaints about Foglietta as early as the 1960s.

    ...

    Insurers also tried to disclaim coverage stemming from the sex abuse case against Jerry Sandusky, a former assistant football coach at Penn State who was convicted of molesting young boys and sentenced to 30-60 years. The insurers for Sandusky and Penn State both filed lawsuits seeking to disclaim coverage in connection with the alleged abuse. The suits are pending in Pennsylvania state and federal courts.

    >>

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  5. The author of this letter claims that it is obvious that the accused person is innocent. How does he know that? He begins his letter with a statement that everyone in the community is broken because of a great injustice to an innocent man. Well, I am not broken. The letter concludes that since we don't really know too much about these things, let us ignore them and let the real experts take care of them. The only real experts I know of in certain communities are the people who terrorize anyone who wants to go to the police to save children. Any community that has for decades protected child molesters and allowed the destruction of many children certain does not have experts who protect children. They have experts who protect child molesters. This letter is a crime of its own, to protect the destroyers of our children and elevate the belief that the destroyers of our children are innocent and the real evil people are Dovid Eidensohn and such ilk. There are a lot of problems with the present Torah world, but someone writing a letter like this with no shame is exhibit number one.

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    Replies
    1. I think you are misreading it. He starts asking the questions that the average Satmar chasid is asking. But it is clear at the end after he explains the nature of abuse that he is defending the actions of Weberman's accuser against the common street wisdom in Williamsburg

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    2. I read the beginning and the end, that's all, and you are right. Sorry. I goofed. But, I wonder if anyone else instead of reading a very long letter read the beginning and the end. They would goof just like me. But that is my problem. I would just suggest to the writer of such a letter that there are people like me in the world and they should surely know how to anticipate that.
      Again, my apologies, the letter was not bad at all.It may have been too sophisticated for me!

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    3. You need to reread the letter, it is evident that he feels the accused is QUITE GUILTY.

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  6. I find it curious and disturbing that most of the comments focus on YU. the story at YU is horrendous and the institutional response is callous. But this letter is about the hasidish world and Weberman. This is an incredible letter. I nicely condenses and represents a lot of wisdom in these matters with a voice directed straight at the hasidic Every-man and Woman. Of course the fact that it is written in Yiddish makes it more potent for most people in Satmar whose Yiddish is their first language. It would be hard for me to imagine a much better letter aimed at the rankw and file. Kudos to the anonymous author and to the translater.

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    Replies
    1. Yerachmiel, I have seen the same thing in many other blogs. The first comment latches onto one line of the article or even some other topic and then all the comments that follow continue on the new thread while the old thread gets forgotten. It is not always done deliberately to avoid discussing the real subject. That's life in the blogosphere.

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  7. Great letter, in regards to the how well he explains some points of molestation to the lay-man in Williamsbug.
    I think the writer simply felt the need to claim he isn't taking any sides in Weberman's case, in order to get by the average person in Williamsburg's defenses, so that they can listen to him with more of an open mind, and maybe take some of the content in.
    job well done!!
    Boy do I look forward to a time when articles like these will appear in "the Yid" and the "Neis Barich"! (rather then somplace online, where most Williamburgers do not get to see it.)

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