Racism?: Asian community upset with 'yellow' train line

Los Angeles Times

The "yellow" train line in Atlanta is now going to be called the "gold" line after members of the local Asian community complained that it wasracially insensitive.

The Metro Atlanta RegionalTransit Authority, known as MARTA, announced the change Thursday. MARTArecently renamed its train lines with colors — yellow, red, blue andgreen.

The yellow line went to Doraville in thenortheast suburbs, an area that has a large Asian population. [...]

Rav Moshe Feinstein: Prohibition of social dating

Igros Moshe(E.H. 4:60): Concerning the issue of a young man who is not ready to get married and has no interest in getting married and he is interested in having social dates with young women who also are not ready to get married and have no interest in getting married. They say that since they are careful to avoid the prohibition of yichud (seclusion) there is no prohibition in dating. Even though they know that this is not nice but they say they are not interested in issues of piety and extra measures of modesty and they don’t want to listen to lectures of mussar and rebuke. However they say that they will stop if they hear from me that this is prohibited according to the halacha. Therefore I am forced to respond immediately because this applies to a current activity… There is also a severe prohibition from the Torah in close friendships between a young man and woman. That is even if they avoid hugging and kissing as well as touching and yichud. The problem is that he talks with her for extended times in expressing love and he gets pleasure from this and stares at her. Even according to the Ramban who disagrees with the Rambam and holds this is only a rabbinic prohibition nevertheless agrees that this is a severe prohibition since it has an asmachta from a verse and that it is punished with rabbinic flogging. It is clear that dating is done because of love of women and not because of ordinary friendship since he clearly prefers being with a woman then with male friends. Why is he interested in this woman when it doesn’t give him greater respect or a good name? It is obviously because of love of a woman because she is a woman. In addition even though she is unmarried, she is a nidah which is prohibited with the punishment of kares…

Rav Sternbuch:Preparing for Final Tests before Moshiach

Ex-Marrano Rabbi appointed emissary to Spanish Bnei Anusim community

JPOST

For the first time since the expulsion of Spain’s Jews in 1492, a descendant of Marrano Jewry who immigrated to Israel and received rabbinic ordination will return to Spain to serve as a rabbi.

Rabbi Nissan Ben-Avraham, a resident of Shiloh and father of 12, has been appointed a new emissary to the Marrano (or Bnei Anusim) community of Spain.[...]

Should one's child marry a ger?

Guest post: DK

I write this with a great deal of trepidation.  G-d Forbid that I should cause any more pain to any ger tzedek.

Some personal background.  I am an MO BT, not especially learned, with sons and daughters. 

1.  I have a general concern about any son or daughter marrying a ger tzedek.  What if the ger tzedek decides, two or five or ten years later, not to be Jewish anymore?  What happens to the children?  I realize that a similar issue could arise in the case of a BT or FFB who "falls Off The Derech".

2.  These days, there are people in apparent positions of authority in Klal Yisrael who claim they have the power to retroactively revoke conversions.  As those reading this post who are learned know better than I do, the consequences of such a revocation, particularly in the case of a female ger tzedek whose daughters have already married at the time the revocation occurs, can cause tragedies.  Until this issue is resolved, I would discourage a son from marrying any convert, no matter how much of a bat Yisrael she has become.  The issue is different for a daughter, as her children are Jews according to halacha regardless of who she marries.

[3. There is a also an extra requirement of loving a ger and not distressing a ger - in addition to that which applies to a Jew from birth. This however is a two edge sword. That means that if your husband or wife is a ger and things go well that you get extra reward for loving and not upsetttng them. But if you have on occasion a disagreement then you get punished more. In fact these additional mitzvos were given because a ger is psychologically more apt to be hurt so you also have to treat the spouse with much greater care. This itself can be be  the basis of fights since the attitude of I deserve to treated nicer than you are treating me - is amplified through the additional mitzvos of the Torah. DT ]

In sum, marrying a ger is not the same as marrying someone of a different race or different social class.

Internet bringing about social change

CNN

We witness today, at the beginning of the second decade of the 21st century, one of the most astonishing phenomena of the digital era: the consolidation of the social network, and even more, the empowerment of the worldwide youth thanks to these tools.

All of us certainly have a profile on Facebook or Twitter, and for sure we have seen dozens of videos on YouTube. Some of you only see on these tools the possibility to be connected with your relatives and your closest friends, exchange pictures and publish information about your activities.

But this is only the surface, the tip of the iceberg. What many people ignore is what is emerging underneath. These social media networks, whether we like it or not, are reshaping the way people communicate. [...]

UK Jews divided on response to government defining Jewishness

JPost

LONDON - To fight or not to fight?

That question has bitterly divided the Jewish community in Britain following the Supreme Court ruling a month-and-a-half ago striking down a Jewish school’s policy of limiting admission to the children of Jewish mothers.

The ruling, which said that state-funded Jewish schools may not award places on the basis of whether a student’s parent is Jewish because it contravenes Britain’s Race Relations Act, went beyond forcing an expansion of admissions criteria to children whose Jewish identity is a matter of dispute between Orthodox and non-Orthodox Jews.[...]

Monsey Rabbonim continue Tropper investigation

Five Towns Jewish Times

Further evidence was introduced, reviewed, and discussed today in a meeting of Monsey Rabbonim, Roshei Yeshiva, and Askanim regarding the scandal surrounding Leib Tropper, the former head of the Eternal Jewish Family and Yeshiva Kol Yaakov. Tropper had ostensibly resigned last week, but it has been further reported that he continues to run and tend to the functions of the Yeshiva in an unchanged manner. Apparently, the inquiry has now widened to other areas as well. The meeting on Tuesday afternoon included some of the leading Rabbinic figures in Monsey and was chaired by one of the most senior Roshei Yeshiva in Monsey, HaGaon HaRav Moshe Green Shlita, Rosh Yeshiva of Yeshiva D’Monsey.

Abuse - Coerced pregnancy

Newsweek

About a decade ago, Elizabeth Miller remembers seeing a certain teenage girl at a hospital clinic for adolescents in Boston. The patient thought she might be pregnant and asked for a test. When it came out negative, Miller started asking the standard questions, inquiring as to whether her patient wanted to be pregnant (she didn't) and whether she was using contraceptives (she wasn't). So Miller explained all of the birth-control options and, as she describes it, "sent her on her merry way with a brown bag of condoms." It was, by most measures, a pretty routine appointment.

Except that, two weeks later, the same patient was back at the hospital, in the emergency room after her partner pushed her down the stairs. "That was the wake-up call where I started thinking there might be a relationship between the two situations," says Miller, now an assistant professor of pediatrics at University of California, Davis. "She was coming in for a pregnancy test, not wanting to be pregnant, and not wanting to use birth control. And now I'm wondering what's going on for her, knowing she was in a physically and sexually violent relationship. I started wondering whether I needed to be asking her about why [she isn't using birth control] at that visit." [...]

Partial Excerpt from Abuse Book - Dr. Baruch Shulem

From Professional Clinician to Obligated Jew

Why?

This book is a partial fulfillment of a religious, emotional, and professional obligation that was forced upon me years ago by my clients who suffered from child abuse. I can’t remember one of them ever saying to me “you have to …” but their pain and questions were enough of a reprimand that I took upon myself to do more than just “talk.”

This book is more than ‘just about talk therapy and helping individuals;’ it is about advocacy, namely the pursuit of influencing outcomes that directly affect people’s lives. My clients were challenging my deeply held beliefs in Torah and Torah communities. Both in their eyes and in my own mind, I became the representative of the Orthodox Jewish community that had not adequately answered their cry for help. They were not only abused, but also abandoned by the community that makes up a significant part of the Orthodox ‘self. It is as if there is – beyond the pain of abuse – a psychological punishment of “Karet".

No secular therapist could understand this unique facet of the Jewish self: how the individual is indivisible from his or her community. The secular therapist would counsel the individual to be strong, independent, overcome, forget and maybe even forgive. But for us ‘Karet’ is too meaningful and too overwhelming to “go on with life.” There is no life after “Karet”, be it just psychological or heaven forbid otherwise.

This kind of ‘Karet’ inadvertently begins long before the abuse. It begins with the absence of a vocabulary of abuse. The source of this lacuna seems to be the belief that the Torah community and the Torah personality do not do these ‘things'.

They – the other groups be they religious, ethnic, or national - might do it, so why “open your mouth to the devil?” If you don’t talk about ‘it’ it doesn’t exist. Why voluntarily bring even the subject into our homes or schools? This approach is grounded also in a unique religious perspective, that in reality speech and actions are indivisible. In other words, talking facilitates doing. [this is page 1 of 10 page essay]

Women's conference for kosher internet use

YNET

Anglo-Israeli religious women to hold a one-day conference in Jerusalem on February 17 to discuss how Torah-observant people, organizations can use cutting-edge online technologies as tool to build their businesses [...]

Marketing Child & Spouse Abuse Book

I need some basic information in order to finalize the book.

 The size of the market. So I am setting up a widget to register how many of my readers are interested in purchasing the book.

1) I would like to know what to charge. Since as of today I have received $280 worth of contributions I estimate I will need to charge $45 for the book to possibly break even. But I would like to know how many people would buy it if it were $30 versus $45.

Thus there is a poll on the right side. Please check the highest price you would realistically pay for it. Price includes shipping and taxes.

2) A number of experts have told me that I need to keep the book to about 650 pages. That would mean that I would omit the Hebrew references and just include the English translation. Do you view that the Hebrew sources are indespensible and must be included with the book?

3) How many people are willing to order before it is published?

R' Dovid Bar-Chaim: Rabbinic Paralysis

During a student's first years in yeshiva he learns to think creatively and ask probing questions. However, when he embarks on his rabbinical studies, the rules change. Suddenly all that is a thing of the past. Now he is taught not to think, for his opinion is not important; he is now taught that he must simply accept. This approach, a far cry from the methodology of the Talmud, produces "rabbis" incapable of analyzing primary sources and reaching an independent conclusion. One tragic example is child abuse within the observant community.

Download Part 1


Download Part 2

Anonymous posts automatically deleted

Please take the time to give a name other than anonymous to your posts. It just causes confusion. I am returning to reinforcing my policy of automatically rejecting anonymous posts