R' Horowitz: Why abuse victims protest

Rabbi Yakov Horowitz    About five years ago, as awareness in our community about the matter of child abuse began to rise, many of the long-suffering victims began to hope against hope that things would finally change. People would finally "get it" they believed, and they would once again feel welcome and nurtured instead of being treated as pariahs who ruined the sterling reputations of their abusers. Who knows, they might even get their Level 2 security back again. 

Then they pick up a charedi publication one weekend and see a picture of a group of distinguished rabbis visiting a monster in a Virginia jail cell, who was serving a 31-year prison sentence for raping his daughter in three continents over a period of many years. More than 10 survivors contacted me as soon as that picture ran in the paper. "How could they do that to us?" they asked me. "Don't they know that supporting the perpetrator they are stabbing us in the heart?" they cried. Well, they are. They really are. 

And what in the world should survivors in our community think when they see a huge fundraiser for someone accused of molesting a child? Many of them viewed the very public nature of this effort as clear warning of what is in store for anyone who might dare report a predator to the authorities.

For many of the survivors, though, the final straw was the Internet Asifa. Why were they so upset? Let me count the ways for them. 

To begin with, the kids in the street know the truth -- that the Internet is a firecracker compared to the atom bomb of abuse as far as going off the derech is concerned. Just ask any of them -- or any of the adults in our community who work with the at-risk teen population, what the main reason is for children leaving Yiddishkeit.

Moreover, many of these kids credit the connectivity of the Internet for finally raising awareness of abuse in our community, and as we all know, there is more than a kernel of truth there. "Why are the people running the Asifa blaming the Internet for causing children to go off the derech and saying nothing about the matter of child safety?" they wonder. 

Bottom line, there are hundreds and hundreds of abuse victims and survivors who were once part of our kehilos. Some left completely while others exist on the fringes – misunderstood, marginalized, and hurting.

Final Notification to Stan

If you don't want your posts censored - please learn to spell the names of others - especially rabbis - even if you disagree violently with them!

 

Ditto for the issue of cutesy insults and ad hominem arguments. I am interested in comments that cogently provide information and criticism.

Baby allegedly stolen & sold to prominent family

BHOL פרשת אימוץ של תינוק המוחזק בידי משפחה הנחשבת מהיותר מכובדות בעולם החרדי, הפך נושא לדיון נוקב בקרב בתי הדין של פוסקי הדור.

הטענה היא, כי האימוץ נעשה תוך כדי מרמה ושלא בהתאם לחוק. גדולי הפוסקים סבורים שאין
למחזיקים שום מעמד הלכתי בהחזקתם. נוסף על כך זומנו המאמצים לדין תורה בכמה בתי דין, אך לא הופיעו

בעקבות כך, נתקבל היתר לפנות לערכאות, דבר שנמצא בהליכי הכנה.

לפי חוות דעת של משפטנים בכירים ומומחים בתחום, יש חשש כי נעברו עבירות על חוקים בינלאומיים שקשורים לאימוץ, ויתכן שגופים משטרתיים בינלאומיים יגלו עניין בפרשה

DA wants Rabbis to be mandated reporters

NYTimes   The Brooklyn district attorney, Charles J. Hynes, said Wednesday that he would push for state legislation to add rabbis and other religious leaders to the list of professionals required to report allegations of sexual abuse to law enforcement authorities.

The move comes as Mr. Hynes, the city’s longest-serving district attorney, has come under intense scrutiny for his handling of sexual abuse cases in the politically powerful ultra-Orthodox Jewish community. A recent article in The New York Times showed that Mr. Hynes did not object when Agudath Israel of America, an organization representing various Hasidic and other ultra-Orthodox factions, told him last summer that it was instructing adherent Jews to get permission from a rabbi before reporting allegations of sexual abuse to the authorities. 

Aguda forced to eat its words "No conflict with mandatory reporting"

Forward     An Orthodox parent whose child tells him he’s been sexually abused may not take that child’s claim to the police without first getting religious sanction from a specially trained rabbi, the head of America’s leading ultra-Orthodox umbrella group has told the Forward.

But one year after acknowledging that no such registry of trained rabbis exists, Rabbi David Zwiebel said that his group has now dropped the idea of developing one.

One of the main reasons, said Zwiebel, was a warning from Brooklyn District Attorney Charles Hynes — issued only a few days earlier — that rabbis who prevent families from going to police could be arrested.

“If they [rabbis] don’t give the right advice, they can be in trouble,” said Zwiebel. “Why would you want to create some sort of a list that would make them more vulnerable?”

Zwiebel, who is the executive vice president of Agudath Israel of America, said that despite the absence of such a registry, his group would staunchly resist increased public pressure to lift its requirement that parents obtain rabbinic permission.

“We’re not going to compromise our essence and our integrity because we are nervous about a relationship that may be damaged with a government leader,” he said.

Aguna: Wife of R' Yosef Dov Meyerson

A chassidic woman talks about sex

XOJane     4. We have been happily shagging for millennia. Jews never had the concept of "original sin."

Judaism is the original sex-positive culture. What? You heard me right. Y'all need "sex-positive Third wave feminism" to help you feel like having sex is OK. Jews bypassed the whole Christian idea that all sex, even in marriage, is a sin. And Protestant asceticism just never happened for us.

G-d likes it when a married Jewish couple has sex. Jews never got a message that sex is dirty. We think sex is good. It is so good that having it is actually a commandment. No, we cannot shag "anything that moves." No, we can't sleep around or have sex outside of marriage. But once you're married, sex is totally cool and awesome and G-d likes it.

I don't know who made up the dumb story about having sex through a sheet, but let's bury that old chestnut now. Having sex through a sheet is actually prohibited by Torah and we are commanded explicitly by G-d to get totally naked to shag. Just in case you're wondering.
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See Rabbi E Fink's critique

Sabo gets 20 years for molesting kids

NY Daily News    Judge Vincent DelGuidice sentenced Michael Sabo on Monday to 20 years to life for sexually abusing two young children and said, "There should be peace in your heart that this person will never ever be able to harm another child."

A BROOKLYN JUDGE urged members of the tightly guarded Orthodox Jewish community to report sex abuse as he sentenced a man who preyed on their children to 20 years to life in prison.

“There is a duty for all adults to protect our children,” Brooklyn Supreme Court Justice Vincent Del Giudice said Monday. “And the only way they can be protected is if they cooperate with law enforcement.”

The warning came at the sentencing of Michael Sabo, 38, who confessed to sexually abusing two young children. Sabo’s case exemplified the difficulties prosecutors face in getting abuse victims in the close-knit Jewish community to come forward.

Sabo’s crimes came to light after a rabbi was presented with an incriminating photo of a tied-up boy. It took two years to track down the boy’s family, who then contacted prosecutors.[...]