Tuesday, December 20, 2022

Mistaken premise used to attack Chareidi leaders

 There are two frequent commentators who focus on attacking the chareidim . The latest is based on their observation that there has been widespread condemnation of the violent protests which caused serious harm to a chareidi mother of 10. Since this doesn't happen after every act of fanaticism - that is proof that all other acts of violence are acceptable to Chareidi leadership


That is simply wrong. I once asked Rav Sternbuch why he hadn't condemned an attack on a young woman in which acid was thrown at her. He replied that this was being done to get attention so it was counter productive to respond every time they do something outrageous

I once dealt with a young man who was frequently threatening suicide.  I asked his father how he dealt with it. He said, "Last night he told me he was going to kill himself. I told him that I just had a hard day at the office and could he pleased do it some other day He agreed to postpone it." 

In other words giving attention to an immature person often increases the inappropriate behavior. The absence of comment can not be taken as approval

11 comments:

  1. Mistaken premise in this post is that I am claiming that hareidi leaders are always to blame. They are not. In fact, they have themselves been attacked by despicable fanatics.
    But the phenomenon of fanaticism is a two edged sword, and if it is cultured by gedolim, they must also consider what it might lead to.
    I speak about rav Goren, but many years ago, one of his own supporters was critical of his statement that giv8ng back land to the Palestinians was yehareg vlo yaavor. The fear being that the settlers might take it too literally.

    Also, I don't understand the quote given from Rav Sternbuch. Did the perpetrator hive his reasons? Perhaps they see a lack of condemnation as a quiet nod to such actions?

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  2. Nope. This would work if there was no pattern but there is.
    Attack on stores in Geulah? Crickets. Attack on Chilonim or their neighbourhoods? Well we can't condemn everything, you know. Attack on other Chareidim directly? OMG! This was awful!

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  3. Another way of looking at this is that the Netziv 's description of sinnas chinnam and how it destroyed the temple, was a deeper insight than other gedolim had or have. I know there's a post where the CC disagreed with this, i hope it's not heretical to say the Netziv was right. Because he was.

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  4. It's a selective leadership. When they say what people want to hear, then the people follow.

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  5. Selective reading leads always results in what you were looking to prove

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  6. First of all, you should be nicer. We're your biggest followers. Without our comments, most of your threads would have 0.
    Second of all, you can't have it both ways. Chareidim can't parade around and proudly announce "We follow our Gedolim!" and then say "Well the leadership has nothing to do with this" when bad things happen. These hooligans identify as Chareidim. Frankly, they'd look at you as a fake Chareidi. So they must be following the Gedolim because that's what Chareidim do!

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  7. Are you responding - don't criticize me because I am an important commentator?

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  8. No, although that's a good point.
    Recently you've increased your non-sequitor answers. We write something and you respond to points we didn't make.

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  9. Sorry but this excuse doesn't fly. There needs to be real hadracha and often there isn't. This is especially so when impressionable minds are fed gross caricatures of tziyonim, goyim and others not from their tzibur. The hadracha is not necessary for the perpertrators but for the rest of the oilam hatorah. Claiming that everybody knows what is truly right and correct etc doesn't work anymore.

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  10. By this logic we should all be quiet about Kanye, Fuentes and Trump. Somethings need to be opposed even if it gives publicity to rabble rousers. "Az mir tuht vei shreit min" doesn't only apply to kevarim and books.

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  11. The comparison to a father with a suicidal child misses the mark. The father has no obligation to a tzibur only to his son. Gedolim need to lead the tzibur and give hadracha

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