Before I continue writing about my son’s experiences in the IDF, I wanted to publicize an issue that I think many Anglos aren’t aware of it because, again, I never saw it covered in any media and socially, Anglos who join the IDF tend to go into combat and other essential units.

Whether you encounter this particular mentality within Israeli society depends on what circles you’re in and whether you yourself possess a mentality that allows you to recognize the dynamic when you see it.
 
So this is what it is:
 
Many (probably even most) Israelis are brought up with the idea that IDF service IN AND OF ITSELF is an all-important & VITAL contribution.

Yes: Vital. Absolutely Essential!
 
It does not matter whether you only served 3 days a week or every other week (AKA shavua-shavua, which for guys equals 1.5 years of service, not 3).
 
It does not matter the sheer uselessness of your role. (Some army duties are made up out of thin air simply to fulfill the demand.)
 
It doesn’t matter if you served as, say, a jeep mechanic (which you chose, not out of Zionist idealism, but in order to get a head start on the vocation you’re aiming for after your reluctant army service ends), and while yes, of course an army needs expert jeep mechanics, they don’t need SO MANY.

In other words, the actual job is important but you personally are expendable. The IDF has a surplus of jeep mechanics. Yet despite that, you have made an all-important contribution to your country and shared the burden -  unlike those parasitic yeshivah bums. [sarc]
 
It doesn’t matter if you are recruited into a role which you PHYSICALLY CANNOT perform, such as an 18-year-old Moroccan pixie from Dimona assigned to the fire brigade when she lacks the upper body strength to manage the high-powered fire hose.

And because even 2 girls together are not strong enough to handle the hose, they need a male colleague to join them in order for the girls to simply pass the test.

How on earth is this kind of assignment remotely rational or productive?

(Just for knowing, fire fighters serve in the IAF [Israeli Air Force] as part of the on-call emergency team at the runway for incoming fighter jets. Part of the fire-training is sawing through the window of the cockpit of a burning plane to extract the pilot. This needs to be done carefully so as not to decapitate the pilot in the process. Do I really need to explain that most teenage girls not only lack the basic physical strength for such maneuvers, but lack even the potential of gaining the necessary muscle unless they take steroids? I guess I do, because the army has girls serving in the IAF fire brigade! Someone should really tell the fellows in the top-brass…)

It doesn’t matter if you spent a massive part of your “army” service noshing on American candy bars while watching American sitcoms in an air-conditioned room on an IDF base (which does nothing to protect us from our enemies, unless of course, ISIS savages faint at the smell of chocolate-peanut breath and the sound of scripted punchlines).
 
The fact that you are officially enlisted in the IDF means that you are paying your dues to society.

That’s right. That’s how many see it.
 
It doesn’t matter WHAT you do in the army, nor how useless or useful your particular role is in the army.
 
Just the barebones fact that you are enlisted awards you with social credit.
 
To be clear: I’m NOT talking about combat and essential military non-combat duties.
 
I appreciate combat soldiers and all the non-combat yet essential military personnel working for our national security.

Just for knowing, when I pass through a checkpoint, whether at a mall or the Kotel or anywhere else, I tell the soldier or security guard, "Hashem yishmor otcha, tizkeh l'mitzvot - May Hashem protect you & and may you continue to merit doing mitzvot."

So while I write against the forced draft for females & yeshivah bachurs, it's not from a lack of appreciation for what effective IDF positions do.

I fully realize that many soldiers (and police & security guards for that matter) are prepared to suffer trauma, injury, and even death (chas v'shalom) so that I and everyone else in the country can live here.

However, hungover kvetchy moppers are not anywhere in the same league—which Israelis acknowledge. But what many Israelis don’t acknowledge is that the hungover kvetchy moppers and the pixie fire girls DON’T CONTRIBUTE AT ALL IN ANY WAY. Their service was meaningless. It was nothing.
 
Many Israelis cannot emotionally face this fact.

Furthermore, this is the attitude expressed by many Israelis:

“Paying your debt to society.”

I’m not saying that Israelis use this exact term. But many express that attitude when talking about their army service.
 
That’s how many Israelis see their army service.

And again, they see army service this way even if they did nothing useful for 2 or 3 years. They paid their debt to society. They shared their part of the burden.
 
If you’re American, you’re probably familiar with that phrase being utilized to describe the purpose of prison (which is also an absurd concept. How does sitting in a cell pay any kind of debt to society?).
 
In contrast to what you generally see on English-language Jewish media, which focuses on combat soldiers (who are of course going to be more enthusiastic and idealistic about their service), the non-essential jobnik Israelis actively pursue the least demanding & fulfilling roles in the army.

They don’t want to be there and focus on getting through the army in the least demanding way possible.

Also, because I initially started out in Israel among the dati-leumi crowd, which tends to be more idealistic and patriotic, I rarely encountered the other Israelis who think army service is just something of a drag that you need to get through in order to earn basic worth as a citizen—AND feel superior to non-serving charedim….EVEN IF YOU AREN’T JEWISH and the despised charedim are fully shomer Torah & mitzvot.
 
And this is a HUGE thing that needs attention.
 
Because of this mentality (“Army service over all”), this means that a non-Jewish Ukranian thug officially enlisted in the IDF (even if he does nothing) has social worth while someone on the level of Rav Kanievsky is considered a parasite, chas v’shalom.

The same is true of the daughter of a Jewish father and the non-Jewish woman he brought over from Russia or Thailand or England.

Her army service grants her social & cultural superiority over a non-serving Torah Jew.
 
That’s right—in Eretz Yisrael, where Jews & Torah are more important than anything else.
 
To repeat: A non-Jew of Jew-hating lineage (i.e., many Ukrainians) can acquire cultural & social superiority over fully shomer Torah & mitzvot Jews (including tzaddikim) simply by waving the magic wand of army “service.”
 
Do you think that’s a coincidence of propaganda?

​I don’t. Definitely not.
 
Let’s go on.

The thing is, if you bring up to your average Israeli any kind of judgment with regard to army service (“But why is a girl who sits in her office all day watching pirated movies on her cell phone and doing literally nothing else for her entire service—except showing the base an American movie one night—considered as having shared the burden? Why is her army “service” so important?”), they either get stunned speechless or angry.
 
(This is why I never bring this up to non-charedi Israelis. Actually, that's not completely true. I did bring it up twice as you'll soon see. Once, very carefully; and another time, quite by accident, which I kind of regretted later.)

Disturbingly, many Israelis never considered the VALUE of their service.

Why should meaningfulness or military usefulness be important to a tiny nation surrounded by some of the most vicious & savage terrorists on the planet?
 
Are we living in the Middle East or in Candy Land?

Quite frankly, some of us are concerned about massive armies of bloodthirsty Jew-haters on every border—and the fifth column WITHIN our borders.

​Can't we focus on that?
 
Yet certain types of Israelis never consider the concept of military usefulness. (That’s scary because it’s such an obvious lack of logic that the only reason for this can be brainwashing and propaganda.)
 
And they can get angry because they don’t appreciate the idea that all their “suffering” (i.e., undergoing basic training for nothing, then carrying out boring & meaningless roles) was for naught.

Or because something on which they hang their “rights” as a citizen is actually meaningless in the scheme of things—if you look at the whole situation from a purely rational point of view.

Especially with non-Jewish Russian soldiers or the non-Jewish children of Israeli intermarriage, they get their socially inferred "superiority" over fully Torah Jews simply because of their army enlistment. Ta-dah!
 
The dati-leumi are more aware of this contradiction, partly because their girls tend to do sherut leumi rather than the army, and so they’re already aware of the reasons why not EVERYONE needs to be in the army.

Yet in my early years in Eretz Yisrael, I only occasionally ran into this attitude of reluctant service.

It generally came from secular girls who complained about how meaningless & frustrating their service felt, stupid regulations and capricious commanding officers, and in the case of guard duty—fear of having to actually use their weapon and training.
 
As the wife (who is now fully frum and a really lovely person) of my husband’s brother told me, “When I was out there guarding the base, I was so scared! I kept hoping that nothing would ever happen because despite my training, I really didn’t feel up to actually fighting. I decided to myself that if worse came to worse, I would just let the male soldiers handle it.”

She looked at me. “I really don’t think that girls are cut out for this kind of thing. Do you?”
 
Obviously, she couldn’t say that during her service because a guard cannot have a preset plan to duck out during an attack.

(And it actually happened at one base, when a male soldier turned tail under a surprise attack, which led to several deaths on base.)

​But my sister-in-law was genuinely frightened at the prospect of a machine gun battle. She’s a quiet, gentle, lovely soul and not cut out for gun battles. And that was her enforced, reluctant, share-the-burden service to her country (which again, wasn't real service; she didn't do anything).
 
Another secular Israel girl told me, “We carried Uzis—with no bullets! The boys got M-16s with ammunition, but the girls got empty Uzis that we HAD to carry around all the time! What for? It was so stupid!”
 
(FYI: My son claims this is no longer true, that there is no longer a gender split over who gets the Uzis and who gets the M-16s, and also girl-soldiers no longer go about with empty rifles.)
 
But later, as a young married woman accompanying my husband in kiruv, I was exposed to the completely brainwashed Israelis, as you’ll see from the following examples...

Here’s an example of just how deep this irrational mentality goes:
 
During our early years of marriage, my husband (who learned in kollel full-time) worked part-time alongside secular mildly Leftist Israeli university students who all wore long hair pulled back in ponytails.

​During free moments, these young men enjoyed interacting with my husband via chatting or short ‘n’ friendly religious debates.
 
Accompanying my husband, I mostly just listened.
 
Yet curious to the extent of the insistence on the overriding importance of army service for all no matter what, I ended up asking one of the guys about his thoughts on the issue while my husband was nearby.
 
This university student was a particularly nice and intelligent guy.
 
First, I acknowledged the importance of combat soldiers and any other role necessary for security—whether it was the cook who fed the soldiers or the guy sitting behind a computer in Intelligence.
 
Soldiers need to eat. And technology plays a huge role in security these days.
 
I also emphasized that I was not looking to argue or criticize, but simply wanted to understand out of genuine curiosity.
 
Then I presented him with a theoretical (yet actual) situation in which an Israeli serves a non-essential army position, then immediately leaves the country to settle in Europe or North America, and never contributes in any way to the State of Israel.
 
Then I contrasted that to a guy (frum, of course) who never serves in the IDF, but pays taxes, gets married and raises a family in Israel (contributing to the population). As a consumer and a citizen, he contributes naturally to the Israeli economy and society in a positive way. He gives tzedakah to help his fellow poor.
 
Then I asked the big questions:
​

• Who really made a contribution to Israeli society, to Medinat Yisrael? ​
• And is it okay that the second guy never served in the army?

 
To his credit, the university student spent several moments giving the questions serious thought.
 
He even paused in his pondering to reassure me that he definitely understood where I was coming from and that he understood and even appreciated the point (which, because of all the propaganda—my word, not his—he’d never considered).
 
Then he continued to mull it over.

​Interestingly, his facial expressions and the way he made fists showed that he was actually wrestling with the question.
 
But finally, he shook his head and said, “I see what you’re saying—I definitely understand and think you have a point, but”—he grimaced and shook his head—“but I just”—he shook his head again and knocked his fists against the desk. “I just think that”—he took a deep breath—“at least the first guy did army service. At least he did that.”
 
“Even though he ultimately contributed nothing to the country?” I said.
 
He winced and held up his hands, shaking his head, “I know…I understand the point—and it’s a good question! But I just can’t—” His hands fell with a smack on the desktop and he looked me in the eye. “At least he did his army service.”
 
“So he contributed more than the other guy who didn’t do the army?” I said.
 
“Yeah,” he nodded. “Yeah. That’s right.”
 
I thanked him very nicely and told him how much I appreciated his time & honesty, then turned back to where my husband was talking to someone else.

​I was sad because the university student was a nice and intelligent person and he was willing to listen to an opposing idea. And he DID get it, but simply could not overcome his programming.
 
But it taught me a big lesson.

​The dedication to the idea of "army service for all" is deep-seated to the point of irrationality. 

​Later, I read an article regarding a male Israeli singer who objected to a young female singer winning an award for her music.
 
“She never served in the IDF!” he protested. “How can we grant an award to someone who doesn’t even fulfill the basic obligation of every Israeli citizen?”
 
The article grew even more ridiculous and perplexing as it revealed that his oh-so heilige army service consisted of the army choir. And that would have been her army service, too.
 
If you haven’t seen the girls of the IDF choir, this oh-so vital military service consists of them singing while swinging their hips and ponytails and wearing an IDF uniform shirt that’s unbuttoned too low. (Actually, I think their performances are even more daring and competitive now.)
 
And then of course, religious male soldiers are raked across the coals because they don’t want to watch their sisters objectifying themselves. Such fanatics!
 
Anyway, this male singer was outraged that she hadn’t served in this all-important military position—how disloyal and unpatriotic, shirking her military duty when EVERYONE ELSE serves their time! How dare she receive an award!
 
Anyway…

What clinched it for me was a run-in with a young Israeli baalat teshuvah-in-progress, whom I met at a Shabbaton where my husband was working.
 
This young woman became convinced of the truth of Torah and took upon herself Torah and mitzvot, plus attended classes and read books—but she was agonizingly conflicted.
 
She approached me, then started asking me about some standard issues that people have when making the BT transition. And she was asking in an increasingly angsty manner.
 
And I empathized with her, having gone through it myself. So I just calmly answered her issues as best I could.
 
But she grew increasingly overwrought and I thought that maybe I wasn’t expressing myself coherently enough (Hebrew being my second language and all), so I pleasantly suggested that she ask the people whose classes she attended back home. They’d heard these questions repeatedly and have no problem discussing these issues.
 
“I did ask them!” she insisted. “But I just…”
 
And then she kept expressing her conflict over it all.
 
That’s when I understood she was in the very normal transition stage of teshuvah.

This stage pops up again and again throughout life each time you need to cross another bridge in your lifelong journey of continuous self-transformation.
 
(I always really hate this stage because it feels like a hermit crab without its shell, but it’s a normal & necessary part of the teshuvah process. Please see What's Stopping You from Making Real Change? for more.)
 
Basically, her head is in one place (what the rabbis explained to her) while her heart is in another place (what she still feels is correct).
 
In other words: inner conflict. Yuck.
 
So I realized I couldn’t help her more than her rabbis and rebbetzins already were. You can’t hand people their Yiddishkeit, hashkafah, and emuna on a silver platter.

​After all is said & done, we all have to work for it and that’s just the reality of the process.
 
So I just remained sympathetic, but didn’t say much because transition is a really angsty place to be, and empathy and patience is often the only way to respond. Ultimately, they need to work through it themselves somehow.
 
But she pressed on, this time about army service.
 
“Everyone in my family goes into the armored corps!” she said. “My parents, my uncles, my siblings, my cousins—everyone! It’s our family tradition! Yet I’m the only who’s not. And they keep asking me, they keep pressuring me about it—‘You need to participate too! You also need to give to your country! Why can’t you keep Shabbat & kosher in the armored corps?' ”
 
Now, this is very normal albeit distressing. Israeli baalei teshuvah who still live at home can go through heck with their families.

​I learned of this distressing dynamic when I encountered the Neve girls in the Israeli section. I noticed that many of them looked stoic and even miserable, but I didn’t understand why. They seemed very committed to Yiddishkeit, so why were they so unhappy?
 
Then one day, when a friend & I expressed our friendly envy of the Israeli girls who already knew Hebrew (obviously) and therefore, had a much easier time learning Chumash and the like, one Israeli girl suddenly blurted out with great bitterness, “Well, you Americans are so lucky! You don’t know what it’s like for us. We’re here in Neve for the week and get all this inspiration and support, but every Shabbat, we have to go back to our families and deal with keeping Shabbos & kashrut in a secular home, plus being argued with and attacked for all our frumkeit and new hashkafot! But YOU never have to deal with THAT on a regular basis! You're spoiled!”
 
And she was right.

We Anglos have the opportunity to ensconce ourselves within a BT seminary or yeshivah without being forced into the old environment every week, not to mention the unwanted confrontations with disapproving family members and “friends.”
 
These young Israeli baalei teshuvah can have a very, very hard time.
 
So it apparently was with this the young woman I encountered at the Shabbaton.
 
And as I tried gently answering her, she kept cutting me off, repeating the same questions, and getting more overwrought.
 
But one thing didn’t make sense to me at that time.
 
Why was it so important for her, as a girl, to go into the armored corps with the tanks and all that?

Why was that such an issue? (Remember, at that time, I still hadn’t realized how deep the propaganda went in the minds of secular Israelis.)
 
So I said, “Wait a minute. I don’t understand something. You’re saying how important to your family it is for you to join the tankistim, but why?”
 
And her eyes popped wide open, her mouth shut, and she straightened up. And she didn’t say a word.
 
Because she didn’t respond, I thought maybe I hadn't been clear, so I decided to ask in another way: “I mean, girls don’t actually go in the tanks, right?”
 
A laugh burst out of her. “Oh no, not at all!” she said. “Of course girls don’t go out to battle!” She kept laughing and rolling her eyes.
 
“Okay,” I said, pleasantly. “So what would you be doing there?”
 
She gave a short incredulous laugh. “I would be serving!”
 
“Okay,” I said. “But doing what?”

I honestly wanted to know.

Because she and her family were obviously so overwrought about her not enlisting in the armored corps, I was trying to figure out WHY her enlistment was of such vital importance to them. I felt I was missing some vital piece of information.
 
Now she started stammering and just kept repeating how everyone in her family served in the armored corps and that this was just what her family did and she was letting everyone down by not serving.
 
And I was becoming increasingly bewildered. So I kept probing for the reason why her service was so essential.

​I mean, what was she, as a girl, going to be doing for the armored corps that was so vital to the military capabilities of the IDF?
 
She frowned and wrinkled her nose at me and gave me a crooked smile. “Well, I don’t KNOW,” she said, “because I haven’t actually enlisted, so I don’t KNOW what they would assign me.”
 
Wanting to be helpful, I prompted her: “Well, what did your sisters and female cousins do in the armored corps?”
 
She started stammering out answers again, like all sorts of stam busywork that her female relatives carried out.
 
“But what did that DO for the military effort?” I said. “I mean, how did that help the armored corps exactly?”
 
Finally, she pulled up and stared out me with a slightly opened mouth and wide eyes.
 
I realized I’d crossed some kind of line, but wasn’t sure what.
 
“I honestly wish to understand,” I tried to explain. “That’s why I keep asking. I’m honestly trying to understand why a girl serving in the armored corps is so important.”
 
Then she stared at me one moment more, turned around, and left.
 
And she avoided me for the rest of Shabbat.
 
I felt really bad at the time because I felt like I’d pushed her over some kind of edge. I’d engaged in a confrontation without even realizing it. And I wasn’t looking to break or crush anyone.

I tried to make it up to her by being really nice and non-threatening during the rest of Shabbat, but every time I approached her, her eyes widened and she took off.

Oh dear.
 
But that & the discussion with the thoughtful university Leftist clinched it for me: There is a cult-like mentality regarding IDF service that overrides all reason and logic.

To further hammer home this point, Ynet military correspondent Yossi Yehoshua has publicly stated on Galei Tzahal (Army Radio) that there is currently a surplus of IDF soldiers and that in only 2 more years, that surplus will reach 17,000. (Please see We Don’t Need More Charedi Soldiers for more.)
 
So why all the pressure?
 
Ironically, despite this secular Israeli mentality of “Army Service Over All,” many of those same people don’t care much whether charedim serve.

Because they wish they didn’t have to serve, many of these same people aren’t so upset by charedim avoiding the draft. It makes sense to them. So it depends who. Some resent the seeming unfairness, others are apathetic.

It's a contradiction, no?

Why is there such a contradiction? It's because much of the outrage, resentment, and self-righteousness isn't really real. It's media-created.
 
You have certain Jewish media & politicians whipping people into a frenzy about an issue that, on their own, many actually don’t care much about.
 
Why?
 
There clearly is some kind of an agenda at work here.
 
Why else is such propaganda and brainwashing needed? To what means?
 
The reason why it’s important to know that this mentality exists is because when you read a newspaper article written in self-righteous indignation or when you encounter a fellow Jew condemning charedi avoidance of army service & glorifying female participation ("We don't care about decapitating pilots in burning jets! More grrrl power!"), it’s important to realize the basis for much of this resentment and the feelings of victimhood.

Like, who is really victimized by a yeshivah bachur learning Gemara in yeshivah rather than watching American sitcoms as a "soldier" on an army base?

Some Jewish media sets out to convince people that because charedim do not face an all-out mandatory draft, then non-charedim are being victimized by this fact.
 
(BTW, there are 3000 charedim serving in the IDF right this moment—mostly in combat units.)
 
To sum up:

The self-righteousness, resentment, and feelings of victimhood are mostly not based on logic or reason, but simply a result of media incitement & propaganda INTENDED to whip people’s emotions into the above-mentioned states.  

For more stand-alone posts in this series (for which I haven't yet figured out a title), please see:
Sharing What Burden Exactly? The Unspoken Elephant in the Room

​I’ve been preparing a very long post about my son’s eye-opening experiences in the IDF, but there’s so much to write, it’s overwhelming. So instead, I’ll just present it in gulps as series.
 
(Also, if you don’t like or get tongue-in-cheek humor, you may not like this post.)

​And just in case anyone is wondering:

Because there are 3 participants (the speaker, the listener, and the subject) in a discussion of another person, I got my son’s permission to write about him (although my perceptions of his experience don’t necessarily reflect his perceptions of his experience).

​I feel positively about my son and he feels positively about himself, but as stated, there is one more participant in the discussion and that is YOU, the listener/reader.

Needless to say, no matter how positively I write about my son, someone somewhere can read into it lots of negativity. And is this okay?
 
So I asked a lashon hara expert.
 
So the lashon hara rav said that it is permitted for a number of reasons, one of which is because I’m anonymous. And he said that the 1 or 2 people who know us already know about my son, so it’s not a big deal for them to know more details. 

Finally, again, this post reflects my perceptions of events. My son might have different conclusions about the same event.

Part of the reason why I feel my son’s experiences add to the discussion about the IDF and Israeli society is because he ended up in a non-combat position.

​(He tried very, very hard to get into a combat unit and is actually well-suited to combat, but he was blocked for reasons I’ll explain in another post.)
 
Because I initially came to Israel as dati-leumi and frequently hung out with young Israelis who were after army service (mostly paratroopers and armored corps for boys or sherut leumi for girls), I thought I knew a lot about it from the inside.

I originally looked down on those “parasitical” charedim for not sharing the burden of military service.

​Later, I also heard the charedi side of things, found it compelling, and that’s the community I ultimately settled in.
 
So I felt well-informed, both philosophically and socially.
 
Yet my son’s experiences opened my eyes to so much, some of which I’ll share with you here.

Why do you, most likely an Anglo, need to hear about the non-combat part of the IDF—which is the majority of the IDF?
 
Nearly everything you read in English is about some kind of combat soldier, whether it’s Nachal Charedi or the son of Americans in Golani or Givati, etc.

Seriously.

Every English-language Jewish media outlet (including blogs), whether online or print, whether secular or dati or charedi, only talk about combat soldiers and units.
 
So if that’s all you hear about (and that’s most of what I ever hear about), then you’re automatically getting a skewed view of what’s really going on.
 
For example, as of 2014, the IDF consisted of 176,500 soldiers. Miluim (a reserve unit consisting of male citizens who serve a month of military service each year until middle age) comprise 445,000.
 
Of these, combat soldiers make up 26-30,000.
 
I appreciate these combat soldiers.
 
But what’s everyone else doing?
 
Well, there are certainly non-combat positions essential to national security, like Intelligence, watching security cameras, standing guard, and so on.
 
I appreciate them a lot. Probably you do too.
 
Do you think that’s what the other thousands of soldiers are doing? Essential security tasks?
 
No way.
 
But certain politicians and media must push this idea that every IDF job is essential.
 
And they go to bizarre extremes. 

For example, the IDF choir and dance troupe are considered military service.
 
I’m not joking.
 
Yes, everyone goes through a few weeks of basic training, regardless of what job they’re later assigned. But that doesn’t make them quality soldiers. It doesn’t even mean they are fit for guard duty (even if that’s what a recruit ends up doing).
 
So a girl who enlists to the IDF choir, which once entailed things like unbuttoning her shirt too low and swinging her ponytail and her hips around as she sings, is considered to have “carried” her “fair share of the burden” regarding military service. 
 
This is despite the fact that her performances did NOT make the country safer in any way whatsoever, and if you look at it from a spiritual point of view, her performances actually WEAKEN the Israeli military and increase strict judgment over the Land and the Am in general because as has been pointed out for millennia, Hashem hates pritzut and breaches in tsniut.

Furthermore, some people harshly condemn religious soldiers who choose not to watch their holy sisters objectify themselves in such a manner by quietly leaving & avoiding the whole spectacle.
 
But even non-religious Jews should be able to recognize the utter uselessness of a choir or dance troupe as MILITARY service.

Yet several years ago, when Israel wanted to give a singing award to one of its female pop artists, an older male singer objected because she hadn’t served in the army (meaning in the IDF choir), and therefore had not carried her "share of the military burden," and thus should be disqualified.
 
You have to wonder why some people (often secular Leftists) froth so intensely over the enforcement of even the most meaningless “military” service.
 
Because it is completely irrational to believe that a teenage female singer benefits the security of a country surrounded by some of the most vicious terror groups in the world, it seems there might be some kind of agenda at play here.

​Here are some more examples of useless "military" service:

At a base hosting 300 servicepeople, one girl was in charge of Culture & Recreation.

She sat in her office all the livelong day watching movies and texting on her cell phone while dressed in official IDF uniform.

Only once, during the 6 months my son was there, did she fulfill her duty: She showed them an American movie.
 
Yet in Israeli society and according to some of the more befuddled leaders, this is considered military service and she is commended for upholding her “share of the burden.”

​Culturally, she is considered a worthier citizen than, say, a chareidi woman who is gainfully employed, contributes to increasing the Jewish population on Eretz Hakodesh, and actively participates in the Israeli economy as a consumer. Not to mention all the mitzvot our frum heroine does, which increases merits & sweetens din over the entire Jewish people.

Another IDF serviceman sat in his office all day in some kind of human resources position. Apparently, if one of servicepeople had a problem with something, they could turn to him.

How often do you think a group of only 300 people who went home every week or two needed his services?

Right. Hardly ever.

​Two young men tasked with mopping the outside of the base 3 days a week regularly showed up hungover and spent Day 1 of their heilige military service complaining about how hungover they were.

​They apparently needed to rest more on Day 2. Day 3 saw a cursory cleaning before they went back home. Sometimes, they didn’t even show up on Day 1, serving their oh-so essential military duty only 2 days a week.
 
Yet again, there are many Israelis who consider this “military service” and credit this pair with “sharing the burden,” elevating them to a status far above that of a charedi father who learns Gemara, invests in an apartment in Eretz Yisrael, and contributes in so many ways to Israeli society and the economy.
 
Look, if you consider a few hours of hungover kvetching and half-hearted mopping to be a far more significant contribution to Israeli society (and security!) than shteiging away in front of a Gemara all day, then I’m not sure you & I can have much of a conversation about this.
 
But you probably don’t exalt hungover kvetching & half-hearted mopping because if you did, you would probably avoid reading this kind of blog. Baruch Hashem for that!

Then there was the guy in charge of the on-base store. That was his entire service.
 
Now, we know that soldiers need to replenish supplies.

Even though the non-combat types, like on this base only stay for a week or 2 at a time, people still run out of stuff and need replenishment.

Part of the job was making sure the store was well-stocked with popular American candy bars and candy-covered chocolates.
 
Perhaps there is some deep military secret behind ensuring that every IDF recruit receives his full ration of chalav akum American junkfood that, by the time it gets to the Israel, tastes like its wrapper.

Do I dare question whether this constitutes “sharing the burden”?
 
(No, I didn’t eat it; I’m a chalav-Yisrael-only type of gal. But I’ve eaten American candy bars in Israel before. Let me leave it like this: Just stick with Taami (yum!) and all those guys.)

Then my son came home enthusing about the popular American TV show Friends. I’d heard of it but never seen it (thank God).

​Yet how did my son know about it?
 
Why, he and his fellow Israeli Supermen spent entire days in air-conditioned rooms watching American TV shows on a giant LD screen.
 
You see, dear reader, there exists the unconscionable scandal of yeshivah students who are studiously avoiding the military draft by parasitically shteiging away with Rav Assi and Rebbi Meir, while our boys sit in IDF uniform watching depraved American sitcoms and eating Reese’s Pieces!
 
How long will Israeli society tolerate this vile injustice?

Oh, wait! They’re NOT tolerating this terrible inequality—there are obsessed politicians working in a frenzy to make sure that EVERYONE shares "the burden”! (Although chocolate and TV has never seemed much of a burden to me, personally, but then again, I’m not exactly an anti-Torah Leftist. Anti-Torah Leftists seem to feel differently about things.)
 
In other words: No parasites allowed!
 
Okay. Let’s define that more clearly:

• Learning Gemara – parastical.
• Watching depraved American sitcoms in IDF uniform while eating Reese’s Pieces – doing your civic duty and sharing the military burden.

Got it? Good!
 
Needless to say, fond reader, this is EXACTLY why I made aliyah and supported my son in his IDF service: so that he could become fully acquainted with ALL the degenerate Hollywood programming I’d left far behind! Plus chalav akum candy bars!

Im tirtzu, ein zo agadah!

​But seriously now, not all the recruits were lounging about.

There were 2 dati soldiers who used all that spare time to learn chevrusa together.
 
And this may shock the “share the burden” extremists, but learning Gemara in all your spare time actually does more for Israel’s security and success than Friends and American candy bars.
 
Now, if they had all that spare time and weren’t really serving a role necessary to Israel’s security, then why couldn’t they just be in yeshivah? What is the point?
 
However, I do want to commend them and say that if the IDF was an authentically Jewish army, this is what the soldiers would be doing when not actively engaged in a vital task: learning Torah.

Kol hakavod to these two bachurim.

NOTE: There WERE indeed VITAL military duties carried out on this base. 100%.

​But it sure wasn't everyone.

And that's the whole point of this post.

One of my son's cousins spent his entire military service guarding a weapons storage INSIDE an armored corps base.

Is this necessary or not?

Yes, in-base weapons need guarding. Some soldiers steal things.

But I question whether you need actual soldiers or whether Israel's hi-tech systems would be both cheaper and more effective than a teenage boy.

Literally, I question this. I don't know enough about security system effectiveness and costs to answer this affirmatively.

However, I suspect this is yet another non-essential job available to take in the glut of soldiers not qualified for essential jobs, but I'm honestly not sure and am willing to be corrected by someone who actually knows for sure.

Finally, there is something in the IDF called shavua-shavua (week-week).

​This means that for 1 week, you are on an army base, then the next week you work at a pizza parlor or waiting tables in a restaurant, then the next week you are on base again, then the week after that, you’re back to pizza and waiting tables.

And this continues until you are officially discharged from the IDF.
 
Now, why would the IDF institute something like shavua-shavua?

​Because there are way too many people for certain jobs.

For example, you couldn’t have all the firemen or cooks serving at the same time because there just aren’t enough jobs to go around. Meaning, some parts of the IDF are vastly overstaffed.
 
Having said that, the IDF very recently phased out a lot of shauva-shavua roles, but shavua-shavua still exist for cooks and I can’t remember who else.
 
But the necessity of shavua-shavua is something else to keep in mind when someone starts frothing at the mouth about charedim not “sharing the burden.”

​If there is a glut of soldiers in certain areas, then why are they so obsessed with increasing this glut?

Years ago, a young woman told me of her IDF service, which consisted of her & 4 other girls gazing at the same radar screen on the off-chance that they might spot something suspicious. (Occasionally they did, but it was almost always a false alarm.)

​She was embittered about it because it had been clear to her that while you might need 2 radar-gazers, you certainly do not need 5 per screen.

​And so she spent her service doing this useless busy-work while subjected to standard military discipline if she didn’t do her useless busy-work according to protocol. (Plus, I think there was also lots of coffee-bringing involved.)

Furthermore, when I was a young datia-leumit, I met a young man who explained that his army service consisted of tending fields on a kibbutz. Not GUARDING the fields from marauders, but actually working like a farmer.

I totally did not get this at that time. Completely flummoxed, I kept asking him about it in an effort to clarify. ("But how is that ARMY service? Why did the IDF put you there? Why do they need SOLDIERS to till the fields?")

Realizing how foolish it sounded, he got all sheepish about it, which made me realize I should leave him alone and change the subject. So I did. 

Later, I asked my combat and sherut leumi friends for clarification, but they just laughed, agreeing that it did sound kind of absurd to label farming as military service. And no one was able to explain the rationale behind it.

But the above taught me that parts of the IDF were and are overstaffed, and that they assign people to meaningless duties simply because with a mandatory draft, there is no other choice.
 
But I was really shocked to learn of the amount of “soldiers” serving in useless positions or positions of questionable necessity, and spending a huge chunk of their “service” in vapid recreation.

​The above examples are just a sampling.

As you can see from the above, the basic technical act of IDF enlistment does not in any way guarantee that you end up sharing any kind of burden.

It COULD mean that if you go to a position VITAL for Israel's security.

But for many recruits, the "burden" is largely imaginary. Some recruits aren't doing anything remotely burdensome or even minimally useful. (I'm looking at you, Culture & Recreation Girl!) It's propaganda.

From a purely rational military point of view, it greatly disturbs me that certain officials are so obsessed with enlisting every last 18-year-old in the country, even if it means a waste of funds for completely meaningless duties, when Israel is surrounded on every border by masses of terrorists who are horrifically savage and intent on the genocide of every Jew in Eretz Yisrael.
 
Why are certain politicians and certain military officials so much more obsessed about ensuring that Shmulik from Bnai Brak serves even the most meaningless role (as long as it’s in “official” army capacity) rather than learning Torah or getting a vocation or getting married and raising a family?
 
Why is that more important to them than securing Israeli citizens against war and genocide?
 
Rationally speaking, as political & military leaders in such a dangerous & volatile region, their ONLY focus should be on security.
 
So why the obsession with recruiting every last Tova, Dan, and Hirshy?

Note: For a purely charedi view on the whole topic of mandatory IDF recruitment, you can read how Rav Avigdor Miller answered this question:

How could you say that a person should avoid military service in Israel when there are millions of Jews living there who have to be protected?

It's shocking how current his answer was because he said this in 1978!!!

Let's talk a bit about reading signs & interpreting messages from God, Heavenly Hints, etc.
 
And let's do it from a traditionally Jewish point of view (which is the only legitimate way to do it).
 
This means the following:

• Hashem sends us signs to prod us in the right direction.

Fortunately for us, He has, in His Great Mercy & Compassion, given us a handy book delineating how He defines “the right direction” (i.e., the Torah). 

• Judaism acknowledges & faces paradox head-on.

So if you are a black-and-white thinker, then even the more basic Jewish concepts will befuddle you (as they did me when I originally started my foray into frumkeit).

But black-and-white thinking can be remedied by studying Jewish sources, pondering them, and freeing your mind to reach its higher potential, a potential that has been limited by living in Edomite society.

Hanging out with good frum Jews and listening to classes by good frum Jews can also help a lot with expanding a constricted mind.

It’s not your fault if you started out that way, born into that society, but each person has a responsibility to at least start freeing his or her mind at some point.

(Not to mention, a freer mind makes for a happier mind.)

Even one little step at a time, even going at a snail's pace, can accomplish an astonishing amount over time.
 
Needless to say, I’m not an expert on suffering or all that Chazal has to say. (A talmid chacham is an expert in all this.)  

​So we're going to address this topic from a much more basic perspective.

First of all, let’s look at one of the worst trials people face - death - & also look at many of the reasons Judaism offers for this frightening & traumatizing trial: 

(NOTE: These can also be reasons for any kind of suffering.)

• The person has lived out his or her pre-destined amount of years.

 

• The person is relatively sin-free, and therefore his or her death (or suffering) is an atonement for the Jewish people. (In other words, Hashem takes this one person, rather than 1000 other people.) This kind of death is often reserved for either an unusually good adult or for an innocent child or baby, and should motivate the rest of to do teshuvah so that the innocent need not suffer.

 

• The person has completed his or her tikkun (soul rectification), often connected to stuff they didn’t rectify in a previous incarnation.

 

• The person is a bad person (i.e., death as a punishment).

 

• The person has not been living life “right” (according to Hashem’s definition) and needs a certain type of death as an atonement in order to avoid Gehinnom. (This often means a martyr’s death, al Kiddush Hashem, a death doing something heroic for the Jewish people, etc.)

 

• The person is going to end up doing some bad things later on, so Hashem takes him or her out of the world so that person won’t die a sinner and so that the person will inherit a good portion in the Next World rather than burn or be totally cut off. (This is a preventative death.)

 

• In a mass situation (like a plague), there’s the concept that “the destroyer” has been given permission to cut down the good people along with the bad. (Usually, however, the good people are also dying for reasons stated above AND unfathomable reasons. Hashem is always Just. We just pray for Him to be Merciful too.)

​

• Other reasons I’m not remembering right now.

 
But to repeat: All of this is a vast oversimplification of the topic.
 
The calculations of Hashem are far beyond human understanding, as Hashem Himself explained to Moshe Rabbeinu when asked about seeming unfairness in life.
 
Yet paradoxically, Hashem expects us to both accept His Judgments AND examine things according to our understanding (by using the Guide—Torah—He gifted us) in order to learn from loss and other painful events in order to take lessons for our own self-improvement.
 
That's right. It's NOT to finger-point or to luxuriate in our feelings of fake self-righteousness, but to self-introspect and thus self-improve.
 
So, for example, as you can surmise, a person might die due to a combination of the above factors, not just one factor.

​(For example, a person can die as an atonement AND because of completing soul-rectification related to stuff from a past incarnation. AND due to other unfathomable reasons.)

Part of the struggle here is when a person has a different definition of good than Hashem’s definition.
 
For example, a Jew might be part of decimating the Jewish people via intermarriage.

Sure, that’s not his intention. He thinks he's being open-minded and helpful. But the bare-boned fact is that he is destructively misguided and he is doing a truly terrible thing that brings terrible din to the world.

And many times, such a person does have an inkling of it because intermarriage and a shrinking Jewish population is discussed ad naseum even among non-Orthodox Jews.

If he married a non-Jewish woman and brought non-Jewish kids into the world, then there is a Jewish lady out there living without her bashert and Jewish kids who cannot be born — i.e., Jewish souls that were meant to come down via his union with his Jewish bat zug, but cannot because the conduit for these souls simply isn’t there.
 
And to add fat to the fire, he may actively encourage intermarried couples and help them stay married — in other words, actively assisting or encouraging other Jews to commit one of the most destructive sins.

All this is in addition transgressing Shabbat, kashrus, and much else commanded in the Torah.

Yes, he might observe some commandments, like the commandment to give tzedakah or do chessed, but he is mostly indulging some of the most destructive sins — and doing so consistently for decades.
 
Yet because he has an appealing personality, many people will label him as “a good person,” and furiously resist any peep that he might have died as (or partly as) a punishment for his many very severe transgressions (whether he meant them or not).
 
This comes because such people cannot accept that Hashem’s definition of good differs from their own. 

(And again, even frum people can fall into this mistake.)
 
But adopting such an egalitarian attitude leads to spiritual stagnancy and eventually, to bitter din.

If we take the lackadaisical attitude of “We just can’t understand these things at all in any way no matter what, so why bother?”, then we simply continue with our lives as we were.
 
No change, no growth, no self-improvement, no overturning horrific judgments, no preventing atrocities — just feelin’ good and self-satisfied.
 
And yes, even frum people can get all mushy-brained about this, becoming surprisingly defensive if other frum Jews cast judgement on the untimely death of, say, an appealing yet tragically sinful (whether from ignorance or intent) and completely unremorseful Jew points toward this sinful Jew dying because of, well, his sins (at least as part of the reason).
 
So if something happens to a sincerely frum person (or a person who is on the journey toward being a sincerely frum person, even if he or she hadn’t yet completed that journey), Hashem is giving us a TOTALLY DIFFERENT message than if the same thing happens to a Jew who consistently, copiously, and unremorsefully transgresses Torah.
 
And yes, of course, there are certainly situations in which the message seems quite muddled.
 
At a fundamental level, we simply CANNOT KNOW.
 
But these things do demand at least some self-introspection. Not finger-pointing, but just figuring out at least a little bit of the message and what it means for the rest of us.
 
To do otherwise is considered cruel, as discussed in the Torah (Vayikra 26:27-28, for one), Rambam (Hilchot Taanit, Chapter 1, Paragraph 3), and numerous other sources.

And needless to say, the self-improvement for a person differs according to individual level and individual knowledge.

For example, a person who does not keep Shabbat might want to start from there.

Yet a person who already keeps Shabbat should look into improving shemirat Shabbat or focus on another area of Torah in which there is a weakness, like lashon hara, finding the good in others, expressing gratitude to Hashem, and so on.
 
It depends…which is why each person needs to invest in personal self-introspection to work out the message and direction for him or her.

Just as another example, Rabbi Alon Anava frequently mentions that after his near-death experience, he worked on doing teshuvah from the inside-out. Meaning, he still looked secular on the outside for 2 or 3 years after his big wake-up call because he was working on his middot, inner refinement, and even Shabbat...but he simply didn't LOOK like he was doing all that.

So self-improvement is an individual process.

Needless to say, I'm talking to myself as much as anyone else. I need to do more serious self-introspection & self-improvement as much as anyone.

There’s a general message for klal Yisrael & a personal message for each individual person too.

To sum up:

• Hashem is behind every single occurrence.

 

• Hashem's definition of good & bad differ than that of society. Suffering & death should be viewed through Hashem's Eyes, and not those of the surrounding society.

 

• Suffering demands self-introspection: Brachot 5a - "If a man sees that misfortunes are coming upon him, he shall examine his deeds."

 

• Judaism offers some guidance on finding the messages. (See list toward beginning of post.)

 

• Tehillim 25:8: "Yoreh chataim b'derech - Hashem teaches unintentional sinners the way." One way to teach is via suffering.

 

• Gates of Teshuvah: "When a person accepts mussar, and he'll improve his ways and deeds, he should rejoice over them as over great successes."

By using your suffering as hints to discover what you need to work on in yourself, you turn your flaws and sins into great successes. Rather than getting depressed over your failings or engulfed in toxic shame, you should davka feel very happy.

• Different types of death mean different things, depending on what happened, how it happened, to whom it happened, and when.

 

• We cannot know for sure the reasons behind death and other suffering, but we are expected to search for some kind of message.

 

• Attributing suffering to natural causes is cruel because it leads to more suffering. (See HERE for more on this idea.)

 

• Attribution and searching for messages doesn't mean finger-pointing at others. We need to take the lessons for ourselves.

Just as 2 contrasting examples:
1) If a sinful person dies an untimely or unusual death, it should be a hint to us to fix our own ways so we don't end up like him.

2) If a pure person dies an untimely or unusual death, it should be a hint to us to fix our own ways because that pure person likely died for the sins of their society (i.e., us).

(Note: There are also OTHER reasons, like the person's own tikkunim and stuff leftover from their past lives. but as far as WE go, we focus on the message for US. Their tikkunim are theirs.)

• Judaism is not simplistic.

 

• Judaism demands the development of complex thinking.

 

• Judaism fully acknowledges and works with the reality of paradox: 2 opposing ideas can both be true.

​

• Regardless of the message or reason for suffering or death, people in pain should still be treated with compassion & empathy.

​Hopefully, we can all continue to grow in the best direction and do real teshuvah, which can prevent bitter decrees (sort of like the ones that are happening now, as much as they are also softened with rachamim) and bring Mashiach in a sweet way.

This German grandfather spent the Shoah years murdering Jews in cold blood. Babies, children, men, women, elderly…he hunted them down and slaughtered them while proudly wearing the skull-and-crossbones insignia. The Death Head members ran & staffed the death camps & committed other massacres, like the La Paradis massacre in 1940 France. 

Just looking at him in his uniform, you knew exactly who and what he was, and what he did.
 
And this was his day job, so to speak.
 
Think about that for a moment. Think about what an unbelievably heartless & evil person he must have been (and still was--let's be honest).
 
Completely remorseless and unfathomably evil, he felt good about doing such an “important” job for Nazi Germany.

Yet out of all those years of murdering innocents, he unexpectedly pitied 3 Jewish boys in hiding and spared their lives for reasons even he himself could not understand or explain.
 
And it’s impossible to explain it away by explaining that the Jewish boys’ situation was simply the most pitiable he’d seen.

That can’t be.

​He rounded up for slaughter other Jewish children in similar (if not more pitiable) situations.
 
Did those 3 boys have zechut avot (merits from illustrious ancestors)? Did Hashem have big plans for them or the offspring they would later have? Was someone davening for them? Was it all of these or was it something else entirely?
 
We can’t know.
 
But one thing we do know from exhortations and mussar all through Tanach & Chazal is that Hashem can do ANYTHING He wants.

And Hashem can turn the heart of whomever He wants.
 
And beyond human comprehension, Hashem can even turn the heart of an unfathomably evil blood-thirsty Death Head Jew-hunter—if Hashem wills it.

To me, THAT is the big lesson of the above story.

How can it be that such an evil person, a true Amalekite, someone so consumed with the annihilation of Jews that he continuously & personally perpetrated horrors on innocent people--how can such a person suddenly be "touched" by the "plight" of 3 Jewish boys?

Where could that astounding blip of "sympathy" possibly come from?

It’s very easy to get wrapped up in a specific politician and his or her viewpoints (whether for or against).
 
It’s even easier to get wrapped up in the conventional democratic way of fighting an opponent or political movement you find distressing or even dangerous.

Yet when you have obviously & unabashedly anti-Jewish politicians, it seems a bit silly for Jews (including some frum Jews) to run after purely political solutions.
 
Needless to say, we are usually expected to make some effort, but it's important for daas Torah to decide how much effort derech hateva Jews should make, while taking other factors into consideration. ​

​And perhaps I’m wrong, but I don’t see that the general population cares much about a politician’s views on Israel.

And I'm not sure how much people care specifically about the Jewish community of their country, especially seeing as Jews tend to get along just fine without anyone else's help and are also such a small (though prominent) minority. I honestly don't think many people are concerned about increasing Jew-hatred in society. They neither feel it nor see it.

​They care MUCH more about issues that directly affect them.

For example, who (outside of Jews) feel that America or Britain’s relationship with Israel really affects them or the country?
 
Many Jews feel that one of the big lessons from the Shoah is to pay a lot more attention to politics, especially if someone says he wants to kill you.
 
I don’t argue with that, but I simply follow it up with the question: “And then what?”
 
Why? Because I don’t see that any amount of campaigning and political participation and voting in the “right” people could have turned the tide of Nazism or Communism.
 
I think that many Jews in democratic countries have grown overconfident. 

​We’re used to having a voice and feeling equal.
 
But really, what’s the correct attitude and action to take?

​Chazal tells us that the heart of a leader is in Hashem’s Hand.
 
We’ve seen this throughout history.
 
Here’s one bizarre example:

​At the same time he upheld the savage Inquisition in Spain, King Charles V (1500-1558) provided German Jews with protection.
 
It makes no sense.
 
Yet it happened.
 
Who would have thought that the same king who allowed terrible torture and burning of Jews could also be their protector?
 
And this is what happened even earlier with King Achashverosh, who hated Jews even more than Haman...yet signed on a decree to prevent their genocide.

On the flip side, you have the more positive figure of Republican Calvin Coolidge, who served as the 30th American President during the years 1923-1929.

Coolidge was different than other politicians. Entering the presidency after the particularly corrupt Warren Harding, Coolidge got rid of the corrupt and inept people and hired decent officials in their stead.

In favor of small government, Coolidge cut taxes and lowered government spending.

He granted Native Americans US citizenship and instituted programs to improve conditions on reservations. Contrast him to Teddy Roosevelt (President from 1901 to 1909), who once called them "squalid savages" whose land needed to be "taken by the white race," and shoved them off reservations to give that land to American squatters, tourists, and national forests.

Coolidge defended the rights of black Americans and constantly pressured Congress to pass anti-lynching laws, refusing to appoint any KKK members to office.

He supported the nomination of a black Republican to Congress, shortened the workweek for women and children, increased teacher's salaries, and supported veterans.

As far as Jews go, he also seemed a relatively decent guy.

For example, Coolidge attended the cornerstone-laying of the Jewish Community Center of Washington, D.C. in 1925 and he said some very nice things. He praised Jewish participation in America’s Revolution of Independence, calling Judaism “the faith of liberty” and stating that "Hebraic mortar cemented the foundations of American democracy."

​During the speech he included Jews in his opinion that when people have the freedom “to find the places for which they are best fitted…the vast multitude will rise to a higher level, to wider horizons, to worthier attainments."(1)   
 
When unable to attend the Convention of the Zionist Organization in 1924, Coolidge extended his regrets for not coming and his good wishes to the attendees, then wrote:
“I have so many times reiterated my interest in this great movement that anything which I might say would be a repetition of former statements, but I am nevertheless glad to have this opportunity to express again my sympathy with that deep and intense longing which finds such fine expression in the Jewish National Homeland in Palestine.” (2)
 
Regarding a book of Jewish thought by England’s Chief Rabbi sent to Coolidge by an American Jew in 1923, Coolidge responded with a thank-you note which he included the following:
“…I can see that it will prove of interest and value.” (3)

So he seemed to appreciate Jews and seemed as pro-Israel as an American president could be without there actually being a State of Israel.
 
And I’ve never found any anti-Jewish statements by him.
 
Yet it was this pro-Israel, Jewishly appreciative President who put the cap on Jewish immigration to America when he signed the 1924 Immigration Restriction Act.
 
Based on testimony by the Eugenics(!) Head Office to Congress, this new law designated that 86% of immigrants come from Western & Northern Europe, while Southern & Eastern European immigrants could make up only 9% of total immigrants.
 
Nine years before the evil fuehrer came to power in Germany, this law became the reason why Jews had such a hard time escaping Europe during the Nazi era.

​The primary reason why physically intimate relationships between the same gender is wrong is because the Torah clearly states that it’s wrong. Hashem despises such relationships.
 
Furthermore, if you study the deeper significance of a marital relationship between husband & wife (on all levels: spiritual, emotional, physical, etc.), you understand more why a same-gender relationship is so incredibly corruptive and destructive.
 
Such people are seriously hurting themselves, in addition to their society, and cause harm in unseen spiritual realms.
 
One of the strongest weapons used against the proponents of traditional marriage is the idea that same-gender attraction is “normal.” They claim it’s innate and cannot be changed.
 
If you even suggest that one’s orientation can change, you will be subjected to disdain and vitriol.
 
And it has even became a human rights issue.

Human rights usually deal with truly horrific things, like child trafficking, slavery, long-term internment in terrible prisons for non-crimes, torture, concentration camps, genocide, and more.
 
With regard to same-gender attraction—particularly among males—it is all about taavah.

It’s just about being able to act on your taavah.

Sure, some of them will start blabbing on about “love,” but the kind of lifelong monogamous relationship (marriage) that regular men and women seek under the auspice of love does not exist in the male toeva community.

​(Statistics show that they are incapable of both a long-term relationship AND a monogamous one. For example, a fully monogamous 20-year relationship is barely found among these men—yet a fully monogamous 20+-year relationship is the norm among husbands & wives.)
 
So it’s basically as if human rights organizations battled for, say, the right to engage in copious, indiscriminate relationships with redheads—as if NOT being allowed to do that is equal to slaving to death for years in a diamond mine in Africa.
 
Despite the obvious ridiculousness, “expert” sources oppose the very idea of what’s known as “reparative therapy” or “conversion therapy.” One human rights organization defines such therapy as “a range of dangerous and discredited practices.”
 
Dangerous, eh?

This community has an abnormally high rate of violence, disease, criminal activity against children, addiction, and a shorter lifespan…yet trying to re-orient their attraction—THAT’S what’s “dangerous”?

​Seriously?

​The DSM no longer considers same-gender attraction something that needs to be (or can be) re-oriented.

Both the American Psychological Association and the American Counselors Association question the ethics of re-orienting a person’s attraction even if the client requests it.
 
Not only that, these organizations advise therapists to actively inform a client that such therapy has not been shown to work and can even be harmful.
 
It is hard to see how attempted therapy can be MORE harmful than a toeva lifestyle, but there are your “experts” for you.
 
The American Psychiatric Association, the American Psychological Association, the American Association of Social Workers, and the American Academy of Pediatrics joined together years ago to oppose reparative therapy.
 
A professor of psychology at the University of California-Davis even stated the following:
“And even if conversion therapies were shown to be successful in more than a relative handful of cases, they would remain ethically questionable.”
 
See? Even if there is a method to successfully change orientation, it is still “ethically questionable,” according to these people.
 
If you read the actual article, it’s full of gobbledygook that you have to sift through to find the actual information.
 
It’s impossible to enter into a rational discussion when the “experts” themselves are so dead-set against the possibility of re-orientation.

Part of the problem is that therapy for anything is overrated.

Most divorced couples participated in marriage therapy, yet divorced anyway.

Child psychologist John Rosemond has claimed many times that talk therapy does not help children, and can even make their behavior worse. He cites decades of observation to back up his opinion.

Also, the people you’ve known who’ve gone through therapy, what are they like?

The ones I’ve known still have problems (sometimes even serious problems) with emotional immaturity (including one who claimed that therapy helped her emotionally mature so much more), narcissism, and general bad middot. 
 
They may not be worse than everyone else, but they don't seem better either.

More significantly, they don't seem better (or much better) than they were before they entered therapy. 

Meaning, whether you compare them to others or to themselves, there is often a lack of notable improvement.

​And despite so many people digging in their heels to say that people can’t change their orientation, the fact is that people definitely do—and some do even without any therapy or treatment whatsoever.

​For example, a 27-year-old British man (who’d “come out” at the age of 14 with his attraction to men, never had a relationship with a woman, had indulged with over 150 partners, and worked in a service catering to male-male taavah) decided to abstain from any physical relationships for a year.
 
Dominic Hilton made this decision after reading accounts of how abstinence helped people increase their self-esteem and energy, lessen anxiety, and generally helped them get to know themselves better.
 
To his shock, he found himself increasingly attracted to women over the course of that year.
 
His final realization hit when, during a vacation in Spain with a male friend, his friend tried to engage Hilton in Hilton’s usual chitchat about what guys around are attractive.  
 
But “I just couldn’t join in,” said Hilton. “…I just don’t find men attractive anymore.”
 
Hilton also described how his fashion and mannerisms have changed. He no longer feels comfortable in “camp” styles and makeup, preferring instead tracksuits and less quasi-feminine expressions and behaviors.
 
Originally, appearing in the UK Mirror, you can find the above article HERE. 

Robert Oscar Lopez opened up on his blog and American Thinker (How to Survive a Character Assassination) regarding his own “conversion.”
 
Raised by a toeva parent & exclusively involved with other males since age 13, Lopez states that he “identified completely” with toeva and sank into a toeva lifestyle that also consisted of self-destructive behavior, abusive relationships, and drugs.
 
Upon intimacy with a woman for the first time at age 28, Lopez woke to the fact that his former lifestyle actually wasn’t okay. (Part of his thunderbolt insight had to do with the fact that the act could lead to fatherhood.) He married that woman, found God (kind of), and went on to lead a fulfilling life.
 
Interestingly, he says that premarital intimacy with a woman, looking at untsnius pictures of women (often part of reparative therapy), and other unwholesome behaviors is actually NOT ultimately helpful to re-orienting one’s attraction.

He regrets that he himself did so and wishes that he’d married his wife straightaway, having relations only after their marriage.
 
(So this might be one problem with conventional reparative therapy, in that it often encourages unwholesome behavior in the opposite direction, rather than healing the person’s soul.)
 
Working as an English instructor at California State University-Northridge, Lopez ended up being viciously & unrelentingly harassed for 7 years by both his prestigious degreed colleagues and his students. Why? Because he came out as a formerly toeva-oriented person who’d changed and was now happily married.
 
Even “worse,” he detailed his childhood suffering as the child of a toeva parent.

Unfortunately, the mere listening to an honest description of his childhood experiences (by those who don't want to hear it) is forbidden under a Californian discrimination law, which seeks to protect ostriches with their head in the sand from hearing things that they don’t want to hear.

The final problem with any discussion of this issue is the non-Jewish attitude toward mistakes, stumbles, fails, and falls.
 
It’s all black-and-white with no acknowledgement of Hashem’s Hand in things.
 
For example, alcoholism is often considered a “disease” that progresses even if you stop drinking. You are supposed to consider yourself an alcoholic for the rest of your life, even if you abstain completely from any alcohol.
 
If, say, you stumble and get drunk once after 10 years of sobriety, that is considered evidence that you are “still” an alcoholic.
 
The same is true with regard to drugs and food and anything else considered an addiction.

In secular society, you are defined by your addictions. You are defined by your negative traits and your taavahs.
 
Likewise, if a man formerly attracted to men ever finds himself looking at unwholesome images of men or even in a fling with another man, then he is considered to still “really” be attracted to men.

​Liberals especially love this black-and-white idea because they feel it “proves” that reparative therapy (or whatever inspired the man to re-orient his attraction) doesn’t really work and it seals in their own mind their mantra that orientation cannot be changed.
 
(Note: All the anti-Torah social science mentioned in this post is highly reminiscent of the fake science characteristic of murderously totalitarian societies. Please see related links below for more.)

As written about on this blog before, this is one of the very damaging beliefs in Western society, that you are defined by your negative qualities rather than your positive ones.

This false belief insists that your negative traits are the “real” you, when in reality, your positive traits are the real you.
 
Judaism informs us that failing challenges or stumbling into sin can actually be a yeridah for the sake of aliyah—sort of like hitting rock bottom in order to bounce back up as far away from rock bottom as possible, which propels you even higher than before.
 
Sometimes, these fails & falls occur to keep you humble.

Though underrated in society, Hashem cannot stand to be with prideful or haughty person. He can actually be closest to you in your remorse and pain over your fall. (Breslov chassidus goes into this whole concept quite a lot.)
 
Anyway, the point is that we all have traits & taavahs with which we were either born or developed from our environment, and we are supposed to work on overcoming these traits and taavahs.
 
We aren’t supposed to indulge them or give up on them.
 
And we certainly aren't supposed to be defined by them.

Related links:
Torah Declaration FAQ
Rav Zamir on the Root of Same-Gender Attraction
Gender Dysphoria & Cancer
Part 6 - America's Scary New Direction: One-Sided Mockery and Pseudoscience 
Why Life is So Hard & the 1 Thing You Can Do About It

On Friday night, a New York Jewish Democrat councilman collapsed in a movie theater. By Sunday, his death was confirmed.
 
As the media swoons over the “loss,” it quickly becomes clear that they cherish him most for his work on behalf of toeva.
 
This councilman served in a district home to a large & thriving frum community, along with other Americans who initially weren’t so gung-ho for toeva rights & acceptance.
 
But this “progressive” councilman propelled that cultural descent before his constituents wanted it. (And many still don’t want it.)  

​Basically, such youth need genuine compassion, focused on treatment and re-orientation, not further indulgence of a damaging lifestyle.

​They don’t need to run away and live on the streets of New York. And they need a lot more than beds in a shelter.
 
Furthermore, males involved with other males, particularly when its many other males (as is common in this community) have a significantly higher rate of an incurable 100% fatal disease—not something you want to encourage in your community.
 
Men attracted to their own gender also abuse children far out of proportion to their numbers. For example, while less than 3% of Americans identify as attracted to their own gender, men attracted to their own gender are 11 times MORE likely to violate a child. (Please see https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/1556756 and a Harvard study, both of which clearly describe the evidence even as they tell you not to believe it!) 
 
They abuse drugs and alcohol out of proportion to their numbers.
 
Their relationships also tend to be the most violent, surpassing the rate of physical abuse within a relationship for female-female relationships and male-female relationships.

​Why would you want this increased in your community?

​Finally, and most importantly, the Torah categorically forbids toeva relationships, whether for Jews or non-Jews.

Chazal already stated centuries ago that one of the main reasons why Hashem destroyed Sedom was because they enacted marital contracts for toeva.
 
Once toeva becomes officially sanctioned, that signifies the end for such a society. Anyone who cares about the society in which they live must oppose legislation that validates toeva lifestyles and behaviors.
 
Hashem is very Patient and Forebearing with mistakes for all kinds of sins. He gives us a wealth of opportunities to do teshuvah. But once a sin is enacted as a perfectly acceptable norm and protected (or even encouraged) by law—particularly such a severe transgression—then that society is doomed.
 
(Just to contrast: Certain forms of slander are prohibited by American law. If outright baseless character defamation and completely false slander were not only protected by law, but encouraged and celebrated as a “right,” then the culture would become intolerable. And yes, America is heading in that direction too.)
 
Yet this councilman made himself an advocate and activist on behalf of toeva legislation.

Furthermore, his generosity is suspect, as is the case for reshaim.

(We don’t give them the benefit of the doubt; we do the opposite: We suspect their motives even when they do good things.)

​The councilman’s non-profit for the toeva street youth earned nice bonuses for him and his cronies (all of whom were already earning 6-figure salaries), in addition to providing deluxe salaries for the people hired to sit on the board of the non-profit—the cronies’ wives.
 
Coincidence? Hmm…
 
I’ve long noticed that indecent people will do some large act of charity to make themselves look and feel good, plus it’s used a shield against those who see their true colors and wish to unmask them.
 
“But I did this really amazing act of charity, so you can’t say I’m a bad person!” they howl.
 
Yeah, I’ve seen this personally and not just in politics.

​I bet most of us have seen this dynamic.

It's very common for Jews to jump on the bandwagon of a completely repulsive fellow Jew simply because he supports the State of Israel, the IDF, or opposes BDS.

This is a huge mistake.

As someone once explained to me, morally indecent people feel attracted to modern Medinat Yisrael because their moral laxity is acceptable there.

That is not true for anywhere else in the Middle East.

The modern state of Israel would be even more secular had not the religious Jews intervened with all their might.

Also, even the most rebellious Jews are aware that Jew-hatred affects them too, and they relish having a theoretical place to which they can escape, if necessary. (i.e., "If America doesn't work out, I can always go to Israel as my Plan B!")

So their support for Israel tends to be wholly self-serving and based on their perception of Israel as a place where they can indulge their anti-Torah lifestyles.

This is a terrible mistake because as is written, Eretz Yisrael is a Land that "vomits out" those who desecrate her.

Yet the desecration acceptable among secular Leftists in Eretz Yisrael is exactly what these anti-Torah Jews like about it.

​This councilman fought with BDS. So what? BDS flourishes BECAUSE of Jews like this.

(Hashem brings Jew-hatred to the world when Jews hate themselves--meaning, the Torah, which defines Judaism.)

Then, despite all the adulation surrounding the death of this person who, though identifiably Jewish, clearly felt compelled to catch a movie on Lail Shabbat, his behavior toward a fellow (and far better) Jewish competitor crossed the line.

When Russian-born Republican David Storobin chose to run against the recently deceased councilman, it was a breath of fresh air for decent people.
 
As a child, Storobin came with his divorced mother from Belarus. His extended family had been physically decimated by the Nazis, then spiritually attacked by the Communists.

But coming to America, Storobin reconnected with his Jewish heritage and also worked his way up through law school, opening his own firm at the age of 25: a hard-won one-room office.

Actually, that was his second office. His first was not actually even his; a friend allowed him to work out of the friend's office.

But Storobin applied all his grit and became very successful.
 
This is a real self-made man, and not like all the politicians who had tons of help (yet claim to be self-made).
 
I have no clue as to Storobin’s personal observance, but he belonged to an Orthodox shul in Brighton Beach and promoted traditional marriage only, pro-life, the development of small businesses, and school vouchers—all of which benefit both the frum community and the community at large.

But the now-deceased Democrat councilman wasn’t having any of that.

​In a shocking attack, he accused Storobin of “ties to skinheads and neo-Nazi groups and white supremacist groups.”
 
Whoa, quite a mouthful there!
 
It takes quite a lot of ego and callousness to accuse a fellow Jew, whose family was victimized by Nazis, of having ties to Nazis.
 
But anything to take down the competition, eh?
 
Fortunately, people rallied to Storobin’s defense, notably Storobin’s rabbi and the chairman of Agudath Yisrael.
 
Yet the idea had been planted and that district hosts a large minority population for whom “white supremacist” is a high-voltage word, and is anyway associated with “Republican” in the mind of American liberals.
 
Storobin won by a sliver.

​Other evidence exists of the deceased councilman’s greed & cronyism. But he was most known for his advocacy on behalf of toeva.
 
Yet this renegade Jew, known for his chilul Hashem (chilul Shabbat too, apparently) managed to achieve accolades by virtue of a natural charisma (please see Mishlei 11-9: The Absolutely Charming Path to Destruction as to why morally repugnant people are often found attractive) and Liberal politicking gusto.
 
This post came about at the request of a pained reader--who saw this councilman lauded & mourned in a frum newspaper! (He didn’t say which one.)
 
We can’t allow this.
 
Even if we find someone personally appealing, we cannot ignore his trampling of Torah values.
 
And it is wrong to paint a chilul Hashem as a kiddush Hashem. 

It's important to identify Jew-hatred for 2 reasons:

1. To avoid going overboard in self-blame and self-hatred.
2. Jew-hatred is ALWAYS a wake-up call from Hashem.

If Jew-hatred is on the rise for any reason it hides behind, it means that we Jews are supposed to take stock of ourselves and see what non-Jewish attitudes and values we've adopted in place of the beautiful & holy Jewish attitudes & values.

Looking at the whole picture, it really seems like the spotlight on Orthodox Jews for a measles outbreak has more to do with attacking Orthodox Jews rather than a real concern about measles.

​And this post addresses the reasons why that's the likely motivation...

​WITHOUT getting into a vaccine debate, I want to address SPECIFICALLY the attitude toward Jews, particularly Orthodox Jews, with regard to the recent outbreak of measles in New York.
 
Currently, Orthodox Jewish cases of measles have been in the media, both Jewish and not, along with the usual accompanying hysteria and consternation.
 
Traditionally, measles has appeared as a normal childhood disease (like chicken pox).
 
Yes, it can be very uncomfortable.
 
Yes, it can even be deadly.
 
Yes, a measles outbreak must be taken seriously.
 
But if you speak with people old enough to have actually suffered through a bout of measles before the vaccine, it sounds a lot like chicken pox bouts of my childhood: Some kids got it bad, some average, some just suffered a runny nose and slight fever with a dot or two.
 
Yes, both chicken pox and measles can turn deadly.
 
So can the flu.
 
So can the common cold. (One stat said that 4500 people die of rhinovirus, the most common strain of the common cold, each year in the US, but I could not find a source for that.)
 
For every 1000 infected with measles, 1-2 die. The last confirmed measles death in the USA was in 2015, and before that, in 2003.
 
And it’s entirely possible that the current common strain of measles is more virulent than that of 60 years ago.
 
But measles is NOT, say, in the realm of polio, smallpox, tuberculosis, leprosy, HIV, or malaria.
 
It just isn’t.

​And yet, you have headlines about it in both the non-Jewish and Jewish media.
 
The frum media has wholeheartedly embraced the “Vaccinate against measles, you dangerous loons!” side.
 
Cries of “Chilul Hashem!” rise up from all frum sides.
 
Fellow frum Jews want to dox the 1 or 2 rabbis who aren’t pro-vaccination.
 
At least one yeshivah has been closed down because of measles and a new discrimination against Orthodox Jews has developed based on the measles issue—such as a New York bus driver refusing to allow an Orthodox passenger on board, screaming something about measles at the hapless Jew.
 
I’d say the frum community has firmly hopped on board (maybe even overboard) the pro-vaccine side of the whole measles issue.
 
The frum community has gone overboard in taking responsibility.
 
This is so typical because the frum community is the most self-critical community in the world.
 
Yes, we have our deluded self-righteous narcissists. But in general, we are always ready to rip ourselves apart, self-castigating ourselves even for things we personally have NOT done and would NEVER do—simply because another Jew (or 10) who looks frum has done it.

​When people take responsibility for their problems, there is no need to pursue and harass them about it. They are willing to take care of it themselves, even without all sorts of harassment.
 
Yet if you point out that all this response to measles in the frum community smacks of Jew-hatred, you will be charged by fellow frummies who accuse you have burying your head in the sand, not taking responsibility, passing the buck, and one of the worst accusations in frum society today: IGNORING THE REAL PROBLEM.
 
Whew! Pretty heavy stuff.

​But I’ll tell you why it indeed smacks of Jew-hatred and why the widespread acceptability of blaring about Orthodox Jews with measles (even if it’s true) is not a good sign.
 
Here is the golden rule of thumb:
If it’s only a problem when JEWS do it—and other groups get a free pass when doing the exact same thing or WORSE—then Jew-hatred is at its root.
 
So let’s look at other groups.

​First of all, as of September 2018, the vast majority of measles in the US came from Venezuela. (Not Orthodox Jews, but Venezuela.)

​Because of a measles epidemic there (4605 cases, 62 deaths), the CDC issued a Level 3 Travel Alert, discouraging Americans from going to Venezuela.
 
In 2014, Ohio experienced an outbreak of 383 cases of measles, the majority appearing among the unvaccinated Amish.
 
In 2014, Minnesota experienced a measles outbreak (78 cases) that originated among unvaccinated Somalis.
 
Did these cases make headlines? Did you hear about these at all?

Did you know that one is far more likely to catch measles from someone recently from Venezuela than from an Orthodox Jew?
 
No, of course not. It’s only when (over 120) Orthodox Jews have measles that measles is a widely publicized problem.
 
And did you see any Venezuelans or American tourists from Venezuela self-flagellating about their part in spreading measles? What about the Somalis? The Amish?

Neither did I.

​Nobody feels bad about these things as a group—except the noble Orthodox Jew.

​While the initial development of AIDS is murky, the spread of this disease came about through debauched behavior, particularly on the part of men involved with their own gender.
 
And it continues to be a problem in that community and communities in the Third World in which debauched behavior between men and women is rampant.
 
Unlike measles, HIV/AIDS is 100% fatal and has no cure.
 
Furthermore, unless a person is tested, one can flit gaily through life for 10 years, infecting others, before symptoms appear.
 
And there are other populations with very high rates of it.
 
For example:

• 53% of Eastern & Southern Africans have HIV.
• 16% of Western & Central Africans have HIV.
• 14% of Asians and Pacific Islanders have HIV.
• 10% of LA males involved with other males is HIV-positive (Los Angeles Times, Feb. 17, 2001).
• 1%-4%, depending which country in Central & South American, the Caribbeans.
• 0.3% of North Americans have HIV.

 
Now, legal immigrants are screened for such things, so we don’t need to worry about them.
 
However, illegal immigrants are not.

​And in fact, a free clinic in California has said that 100% of their female patients tested positive and most are immigrants (legal? illegal?) from Central America.
 
Should we not allow, say, LA men attracted to their own gender into our schools and universities?

And why aren't clubs catering to toeva shut down if schools with measles are shut down?
 
And before you say, “Well, it’s not an airborne disease, so it’s okay,” there have been rare cases of HIV being contracted through being kissed or bitten by an HIV-positive person.
 
Regardless, you’d think that with an INCURABLE 100% FATAL and common disease, people might be more cautious and also forgiven for discriminating against populations in which HIV is common, but I would like to see the popular response to any southern Californian university or public place that would deny entry to a toeva male or a Latina woman based on their much higher likelihood of carrying an incurable 100% fatal disease.

(Actually, I wouldn't like to see the popular response. They'd be screaming about discrimination.)
 
And would newspapers blare such headlines?
 
And finally, I’d like to see toeva publications and representatives lambaste themselves (just like Orthodox Jews are) for this crisis and very real health hazard.
 
I would like to see toeva men and southern Californian Central Americans ban each other from parties, simchas, and other get-togethers (just like some Orthodox Jews do) in which this disease might be spread further.

Let them admit only those who’ve been tested and tested negative for this incurable 100% fatal disease.
 
(And if you think that because it’s not airborne, then it can’t be spread at group functions—especially those where there is likely to be drinking, etc.—then you aren’t aware of what can go on at these functions.)
 
If frummies can do all that for measles, then why can’t these groups do it for an incurable 100% fatal disease?

And why can't these groups do all the above for the following disease, which IS airborne...

​So...what do you think of tuberculosis?
 
The US has one of the lowest rates of TB in the world.

​In contrast, Mexico has 10 times the rate and much of Africa and other countries have 100-150 times the rate.
 
Again, legal immigrants are tested for TB. We don't need to worry about them.
 
Illegal immigrants are not tested.
 
In California, 84% of TB patients are foreign-born.
 
TB is a real concern because it is potentially fatal and highly contagious as an airborne disease. One person with active TB will infect 10-15 others over the course of a year. Furthermore, a recent strain of TB resists all the standard anti-TB drugs. And another strain is impossible to cure at any cost, making certain strains of TB incurable.
 
This is obviously much more serious than measles, yet the groups infected with TB (especially the most dangerous strains) are not being highlighted in any way.

We do not see bus drivers refusing to stop for members of these groups or any other form of group discrimination based on this very real and dangerous disease-risk.

​And any discrimination against such groups because of disease is severely castigated in Western society.
 
(This is despite the fact that such strains of TB are almost exclusively found among specific groups from specific regions, something which is not true about Orthodox Jews & measles.)

​Other infectious diseases, like dengue from Asia and chagas from Central & South America, were unknown in the United States until recently.
 
Dengue is spread by mosquitoes and there is no medication for it, although as of 2016, the FDA approved a vaccine for it.
 
(Actually, information regarding dengue is contradictory. Some say dengue isn’t so bad and people recover after a few days with a lifelong immunity to it, while others say it’s pretty bad and that re-infection IS possible, with a serious increase in complications and fatalities from a 2nd-time infection. So there you go.)
 
Chagas is still not recognized by most US doctors (meaning, even if someone has it, the doctor won’t think to check for it & therefore cannot treat it) and it entered the American blood supply because blood banks did not think to check for it until 2006 (because it was unknown in the US).

​Leprosy used to be extremely rare in the US (900 cases between 1962-2002), but now it has doubled.

Leprosy passes from mouth/nose droplets and is curable.

But it takes anywhere from a few weeks to many years for symptoms to appear and the vast majority of cases are found in people from India and anywhere south of the US.

The rate of leprosy has doubled and increased in the US. And while considered curable, the strain has been mutating.
 
Furthermore, due to their unfamiliarity with leprosy, many American doctors aren’t quick to diagnose it. This means that 25% of lepers end up with disfigurement and disabilities impossible to remedy even after the disease is finally diagnosed and cured.
 
Finally, until 1997, the only Americans with leprosy were those who’d been infected while abroad.

​But in 1997, the first diagnosis appeared in a man who’d never left the US.

​This made leprosy endemic to the US for the first time.

This is all clearly as bad as or even worse than measles among Orthodox Jews.
 
Yet are any of these groups self-flagellating because of it?
Are there headlines about it?
Are people discriminating against them because of it?
 
As is well known, it is considered racist to even mention the bare fact that infectious diseases have been brought into America by certain groups—unless, apparently, the group is Jewish.

This is true even when the only source for a disease is from this particular group (which is not true for Orthodox Jews & measles).
 
So to sum-up:

• Orthodox Jews are not the prime carriers or sport the largest outbreaks of measles or other infectious diseases in the US, but they are the only group being spotlighted.

 

• No other group is displaying nearly the same level of shame, concern, or responsibility for their group’s tendency toward a particular outbreak.

 

• No other group is facing discrimination (including among its own members) for its infectious diseases—including those suffering fatal incurable diseases.

 
Yes, I feel measles should be taken seriously. But I think ALL infectious diseases should be taken seriously—especially untreatable & easily transferable diseases.

Here is a sampling of some of the links to the information in this post:
http://sci.rutgers.edu/forum/showthread.php?2097-Cases-of-leprosy-on-the-rise-in-U-S
https://sma.org/illegal-immigration-and-the-threat-of-infectious-disease/
http://www.usillegalaliens.com/impacts_of_illegal_immigration_diseases.html
https://townhall.com/columnists/walterewilliams/2018/08/29/immigrants-and-disease-n2513341
https://www.amfar.org/worldwide-aids-stats/
https://www.precisionvaccinations.com/international-travelers-bring-measles-usa
https://www.cdc.gov/measles/downloads/measlesdataandstatsslideset.pdf
 
These are not even all the sources. As you can see, I chose a variety of sources. Not all sources share the same politics and attitudes regarding the issues mentioned in the post.

Please note:
I do NOT want the comments section to turn into a vaccine debate. The subject of the post is discrimination (and our need to embrace our authentic Torah Judaism more fully), not vaccine effectiveness or lack thereof. Thank you.

Let's start giving our neshamahs, our God, and our Torah more love.

For a few years now, I've been concerned about the response of the Jewish newspapers (including blogs) to acts of Jew-hatred and any kind of discrimination against Jews.

Jews who aren't fully committed to Torah observance mean well, yet lack the knowledge to respond properly.

But even some frum Jews get sidetracked - and again, it's all with the best of intentions.

Everybody cares about our fellow Jews getting hurt or harassed.

But much of what people mention is either not the solution or not the full solution.

I wanted to write a post on this, but Toras Avigdor beat me to it by putting out a brilliant 8:24-minute video.

In the clip, Rav Avigdor Miller explains how to completely overturn even the most genocidal gezeirah.

Then, at 5:25, he does something he acknowledges that many people don't like (but he does it anyway because it's absolutely necessary & absolute emet); he speaks of what he personally witnessed in Europe leading up to the Shoah, after Hitler (yemach shemo) was already in power...and what we can learn from this to apply to our times.

And also, in the name of the Chafetz Chaim, he blames the newspapers run by assimilated Jews.

And while this blog is far from being a newspaper, blog posts are the modern take on newspaper columns. So I'm taking his comments as personal mussar for myself too.

Anyway, the video packs a powerful punch. Yashar koach to Toras Avigdor for putting together such an important message at such a crucial time.

Here it is:
Rav Avigdor Miller on Our Response to Antisemitism

Note #1: It looks like this class was filmed in Rav Miller's later years. There are English subtitles for those who can't hear the rav clearly.

Note #2: Also, at minute 6:30, Rav Miller quotes the Chafetz Chaim regarding the Jewish community there of that time: "...ki ein bayit asher ein sham mes - There was no home which didn't have there a mes" from Sefer Shemot 12:30, regarding the Plague of the Firstborn in Egypt.

In Sefer Shemot, the word mes (or met) means "dead." But in the clip, Rav Miller translates it as "spoiled" for a metaphorical interpretation. (Please see Yaak's comment below for clarification.)

​May Mashiach please come in a sweet way.

​Needless to say, my personal views fall on the side of the right-wing conservative camp, in both Eretz Yisrael & America.
 
But because the bar of decency and good values has been pushed so far down in America, conservatives end up catering to that level, even when better values and a higher level of decency are what people really need.

​For example, when it comes to premarital hanky-panky, conservatives focus almost solely on preventing pregnancy rather than extolling the virtues of waiting for marriage.

(Yes, there are conservatives like Ben Shapiro extolling the virtues of pre-marital abstinence, but the discussion still focuses more on pregnancy-prevention.)
 
In addition to pregnancy-prevention, conservatives speak a lot about alternatives to abortion. It has never been easier to be an unwed single mother than it is today (which has its upsides and downsides) and adoption is also an option.

​But there are problems with both unwed single motherhood (and unwed motherhood in general) and yes, there are problems with adoption. Yet while some conservatives do discuss the importance of marriage before motherhood (including the value of even shotgun weddings), the downsides of adoption are ignored, presumably because of the fear of a potential mother choosing abortion in order to supposedly “save” herself and her unborn child potential suffering.
 
Furthermore, many conservative female pundits have taken on dressing like bimbos (when all men still need to wear full suits and ties in order to be taken seriously as professionals), presumably to burst the stereotype of the staid religious conservative woman.  To my mind, there’s a happy medium of looking classy and stylish without looking like a cocktail waitress, but despite the intelligence and integrity of a lot of these women, they obviously disagree.

​Finally, this whole thing with Joe Biden is just weird.
 
Now, many of you women reading this have been out in the professional environment. You’ve worked with men.
 
How acceptable or common was it for a male co-worker to stand behind you, put his hands on your shoulders and start rooting through your hair like a hog in search of truffles?

It’s wasn't! And it's not! And we all know that.
 
For those of you guys were not shomer negiah at some point in your life, how many of you pawed your female colleagues and snorted her hair — and did so in a high-level professional situation, like during White House ceremonies?
 
None of you! (Probably.)
 
It’s not normal behavior and we all know this.
 
And yet the conservative media focuses on how this is worse than Trump’s improprieties (to point out Leftist hypocrisy) and how the women didn’t seem to enjoy it and because they were in a situation with important dignitaries and on camera, didn’t feel like they could protest in any way.
 
Okay, these are good points.
 
But the main point is that HE SHOULDN’T BE DOING IT AT ALL.
 
ESPECIALLY to the little girls who are so obviously uncomfortable with his pawing and whose parents either don’t or won’t put a stop to it when they are standing right there (presumably, once again, because of the situation and the cameras).
 
And his whole obviously fake & lying “excuse” of just being a warm, friendly guy — why don’t we see him pawing male staff members, if he is such a warm and naturally touchy-feely dude?
 
How come he’s not snorting through THEIR hair?
 
And why is the deciding factor whether the women like it or not?

​Yes, it’s important to note that the women (and the young girls for that matter) DON’T seem to like it at all.
 
But let’s also look at it this way:
 
Let’s say that you’re a guy at a high-level professional government conference or ceremony, which is being filmed nationwide. Now let’s say one of your female colleagues whispers to you something like, “Hey, could you please start vacuuming my hair with your nose and pawing my shoulders?”
 
Would you do it?
 
Most likely not.
 
Why?
 
Because it’s REALLY weird and inappropriate to do something like that!
 
It just IS.

​The above conservative fail (or partial fail, if you will) highlights one of the many brain-straightening aspects of Judaism.
 
Halacha forbids Jewish men from looking at women, even if she wants to be looked at.
 
Halacha forbids Jewish men from touching women, even if the woman demands to be touched.
 
It’s just plain forbidden.
 
It’s not appropriate. It’s not allowed.
 
And while the halacha isn’t exactly the same for non-Jews, it’s suffice to say that throughout history and in the vast majority of cultures including and up until today, pawing women and rummaging through their hair with one’s nose was considered inappropriate (at best—I’d like to see someone try this in Saudi Arabia).
 
Anyway, the point is one of PERSONAL responsibility and PERSONAL decency, regardless of what the other person is doing or saying.
 
The other person’s response shouldn’t necessarily be the deciding factor for common decency.