In the News

Y-Love, over at Jewlicious, calls attention to a crazy new trend in the ultra-Orthodox community. A small group of women in Israel, intent on being as uber-modest as possible, have started voluntarily wearing burkas and hijabs. Y-Love links to and quotes from Muqata blog, which has translated part of the Haaretz article about the new fashion move:

Appropriate for Synagogue: and mosque, too.

A group of Ultra-Orthodox chareidi women in Ramat Beit Shemesh have hyperbolated tznius [laws of modesty] to the extreme and now wear burkas whenever they go outside their home. Not advocated by any known rabbi, the burka fad is apparently a radical ultra-Orthodox feminist "invention", and many are wary of this custom being adopted or repudiated. The radical Beit Shemesh tznius patrol is even scratching it's head whether someone managed to out do them, and leave them in the dust with the liberal left.

The husband of one such woman took his wife to Beit Din (religious court) to request from her to remove the burka due to shalom bayit (a peaceful home). The court ordered a religious divorce even though the husband didn't even request one -- because the court found her behaviour to be so bizarre.

Mother in Israel posts some truly unbelievable pictures, and the issue is being discussed everywhere from the Forward’s Bintel Brief to the Lilith blog where Friend of Jewcy Rebecca Honig Friedman writes:

 

They are adopting the ideal of modesty that to some extent has been ingrained in them by male religious authority (and no doubt by female authorities, too), but they are doing so on their own terms. They are taking the power of dictating women’s dress away from the male religious authorities in their community, deciding for themselves what modesty means and, in classic fashion, being persecuted for it.

These women have the right to wear whatever they want, but we should also question the values that have led them to such extreme decisions, and the society that perpetuates those values.

I’ll be the first to admit it: there are days when I would happily put on a burka so as not to have to spend half an hour blow-drying my hair and putting on makeup in order to be presentable. And I think the visceral negative reaction to burkas has more to do with the mistreatment of women in Afghanistan and other Muslim countries than with the burka itself (and anyway, all of the pictures I’ve seen so far are not of women in burkas, they’re of women wearing jilbab). Do I think the women in Ramat Beit Shemesh are going overboard? Absolutely. But though I find it all pretty strange, it’s not as offensive as if they were being told to wear jilbab by their rabbis, which, no doubt, is just round the bend.

Last night the 92nd Street Y hosted a debate between Mr. "Shalom in the Home" Rabbi Shmuley Boteach and the inimitable Christopher Hitchens on the existence of God, something so wholly unprovable that the only guaranteed outcomes were bruised egos and hangover scars from all the ecclesiastical elbowing and bad kosher wine. The buzz around the sold-out event was louder than a book-selling rabbi's shrill or a drunk Englishman's demand for another drink. (Just speaking stereotypically of course.)

The 92Y Blog has a video excerpt from the evening, and we asked bloggers in attendance for feedback. Looks like God took a beating of Biblical proportions:

Felix Salmon: "I can't recall ever seeing such a lopsided debate -- if 'debate' is the mot juste, which it really isn't. Boteach didn't even attempt to defend his side of the motion, preferring instead to bash Hitchens's book; he ignored substantially everything that Hitchens said. His logorrhea was an embarrassment, especially when it became obvious that he had no strategy at all: all of his points about evolution, for instance, even if they had hit their mark (which they didn't) did nothing to bolster his purported cause. In any case, he was disqualified on account of Godwin's Law so many times that Hitchens would have won by default even if he didn't win overwhelmingly on the merits."

Rex Sorgatz: "Rabbi Shmuley Boteach proved, once and for all, that god is not dead. He's just exceptionally boring."

Neal Ungerleider: "Here's the thing... despite both Hitchens and Boteach being annoying, self-righteous egomaniacs, there's a difference between the two. Last night's debate taught me that Hitchens is an intelligent, annoying, self-righteous egomaniac. I wish I could say the same for Boteach. However, he still didn't convince me on the non-existence of God. Sorry, Hitch."

Lilit Marcus: "Thanks, Shmuley Boteach, for caring more about selling copies of your latest book than about making people who believe in God not come off like complete morons."

Phoebe Maltz: "I found myself wishing the rabbi could make one coherent point, not just evoke the Holocaust every two seconds, only to call Hitchens 'not a Nazi, but.'"

Sara Ivry: "Boteach’s repeated use of the name 'Christoper Hitchens' really made me think of the Bill Murray segment of Coffee and Cigarettes where RZA and GZA keep calling Bill Murray 'BillMurray,' as if one word. It made the whole debate seem particularly absurd, but at least brought back the good days of Wu Tang."

Daniel Radosh: After the way Hitchens treated Boteach, it was a little hypocritical of him to chastise God for condoning bloodbaths. To see the rabbi reduced literally to incoherent sputtering was almost sad, but then again, he had no one to blame by himself. Declaring that Steven Jay Gould, author of the classic essay 'Evolution as Theory and Fact,' did not believe in evolution, was probably not the wisest strategic gambit. I think the exchange that best captured the evening came when Boteach accused Hitchens of 'character assassination,' and Hitchens retorted, 'you should be more concerned that your character is committing suicide right here in front of everyone.'"

David Kelsey: "In a strange twist demonstrating that this debate was not personal in the least, both men argued that the other’s moral decency proved his own point. Boteach argued that morality came from religion generally, and Judaism’s influence specifically. 'It’s our morality he is embracing,' insisted Boteach. But Hitchins countered that, 'Religion borrows its morality from us, not us from religion.'”

Jeff Bercovici: "Hitchens wiped the floor with Boteach to such an extent that it was actually Hitchens who lost, in a sense, just by showing up. Lost stature, that is. He should be debating his equals, not publicity-hungry TV rabbis."

Rachel Sklar: "In the cab on the way home, we coined a new phrase: 'To Shmuley,' denoting the making of pathetic, unsupported non-sequitur arguments and the taking of flailingly weak intellectual positions, with a dash of name-dropping bluster thrown in for good measure. Excruciating. Christopher Hitchens could Bo-teach him a few things about theology!"

Emily Gordon: "Is God a mystical force or a conscious mind (I liked the moderator's vision of 'a New Yorker cartoon kind of God'), a present parent or a deadbeat dad, the same idea in many forms (including nonreligious ones) or accessible only by secret red phone? How can people be born moral, or inherently moved by religion or the Golden Rule, given all the baddies that both Hitchens and Boteach included in their survey of humanity, and how do you account for their nasty behavior? There are countless questions that could have made for a spirited and genuinely intellectual debate instead of the ping-pong of statistics, political arcana, and smooth putdowns--all of which I enjoyed, of course--that stood in for it. I would have liked to have heard how humanism can transcend the question altogether, or account for both points of view in a civilized and meaningful way, but it was not to be. I admire the Y for holding the debate, though, and perhaps it can be reprised with different and more fruitful combinations."

Die Laughing: the Suharto wayFormer Indonesian dictator Suharto is finally dead, leaving behind a legacy of ethnic and political persecution and genocide. Estimates on the number of Communists, activists, political opponents, and ethnic Chinese killed under his rule range from hundreds of thousands to millions, and Suharto died accused of embezzling more than any other world leader in history: An estimated $15-$35 billion over three decades. The Economist says that in death, Suharto cheated justice.

Coincidentally, Suharto died on the UK's Holocaust Memorial Day, which marks the anniversary of the liberation in 1945 of Auschwitz-Birkenau and aims to prompt British action on behalf of all persecuted peoples.

One Briton who has been prompted into action is Prince Charles himself. More news out of England has the press throwing a royal fit over Prince Charles' decision not to attend the Beijing Olympics. Though no reason was officially cited, it's safe to assume that the Prince's longstanding support of Tibet and the Dalai Lama has something to do with it.

Meanwhile, the death toll in Kenya is soaring as the country's ethnic and political crisis continues to worsen. Atrocities being perpetrated in the mob violence include forced circumcisions on Luos by Kikuyus. A New York Times article quoted one Kenyan woman as saying, "God made all of us. We need his help."

Finally, a Sikh couple in France are founding their own school to skirt the pesky turban ban, which went into effect in French state schools in 2004. Gurdial Singh says, "It would be a huge campus with schools, colleges and a university, imparting both professional and general education without any ban on anybody's religious dress or something that exhibits one's religious affiliation." Sounds idyllic to me.

Previous: Germany supports Chinese oppression of Tibet

If you’re not deeply invested with the goings on in smallish Hasidic sects, you may not have heard that the Grand Rabbi of the Boro Park clan of the Spinka Hasidic dynasty, 59-year-old Naftali Zvi Weisz, was arrested in December and charged with defrauding the government out of almost $35 million.
The Blame Game: Like Monopoly, but with less losing

The Hasidic community freaked out in response to this arrest, but not because they’d been had by a rabbi who turned out to be an asshat. Instead, everyone was up in arms trying to figure out who had ratted the Rebbe out. The FBI leaked documents about the investigation on the internet, and an informant called only ‘RK’ was revealed to be the source of much of the damning information (the rest came from the work of Bureua’s Yiddish translation team—no lie). Eventually, Robert Kasirer, a Modern Orthodox businessman in LA was identified as the informant. According to the Forward, Kasirer provided state’s evidence against the Hasidic rebbe in exchange for a lighter sentence on previous fraud charges stemming from his health care business.

But who cares who the informant is, really? Thank God we got this fraud off the street, right? Not so much. Because being an informant, a moser, is among the biggest no-nos in the Hasidic community.

Continue reading...

Totally kosher: How cute is this little Hebraic rebel? If it seems like everyone and their great aunt has a fairy tattooed on their lower back, and if you're thinking of joining the crowd, check out the article in today's New York Times about the newish trend of people paying big bucks for elaborate temporary tattoos. Apparently the temp variety has gone all mainstream. The very end of the article quotes Michael Benjamin, the president of Temptu, a New York supplier of mock tattoos and body paints, saying "I get to be a nice Jewish boy who looks tough."

Temporary tattoos have been a part of Jewish life for centuries, especially in communities from North Africa and the Middle East. Intricate henna designs and henna ceremonies are common for people who are engaged. Hennapedia gives a nice summary of how henna is used in Kurdish Jewish tradition, and you can look at pictures from tons of henna ceremonies at onlysimchas.

It's a short journey from the rise of temporary tattoos to someone saying that if you have a tattoo you can't be buried in a Jewish cemetery. We've actually already covered that on Faithhacker before, but just to review, while permanent tattoos are specifically prohibited in the Torah, having one doesn't preclude your ability to be buried in a Jewish cemetery. In other words, they're definitely a no-no, but if you've got one, you can definitely be buried near your family, and fully participate in all synagogue rituals.

But now that there's rad fake tattoos, why get caught up in the real thing? May I suggest a big Jewcy tattoo on your left butt cheek?

Tibet and Germany: so close, yet so very far awayDashing hopes that were raised by German Chancellor Angela Merkel's controversial visit with the Dalai Lama last year, Germany seems to have decided that trade relations trump human rights.

Germany has now agreed "not to support or encourage any attempt to seek Tibet's independence," despite Merkel's assurance to the Dalai Lama that she supported "his efforts to maintain the cultural identity of Tibet" and "his policy of non-violent striving toward religious and cultural autonomy." Oh, and also despite all that talk that's been going on about China's occupation and oppression of Tibet since, oh, about 1951.

This news is a bit of a letdown for those who were hopeful about Merkel's influence.

Previous: Bad News For Christians

 

Jewish Living Magazine has just released their list of "Hip Hebraic Homepages" and tipped me off once the list was ready. For reasons quite obvious once you reach the end (kvell, kvell, kvell), I just had to share. Taken straight from Jewish Living:

SHUL OF ROCK

www.jewsrock.org Chaim Witz, Perry Bernstein, Jeffrey Hyman. Half the fun of Jewsrock is finding out the given names of pop icons like Gene Simmons, Perry Farrell, and Joey Ramone, respectively. You can also tour the rock ’n’ roll “Challah Fame” or take the “Jew or Not?” quiz. Between the lines, there’s a serious message about pride in Jewish accomplishments, and a dedication to smashing my-son-the-dentist stereotypes. Alas, the Web site appears to have gone static, but is no less rockin’ for it

KOSHER COMEDY

www.bangitout.com When a site bills itself as “kosher comedy for the circumcised,” expect few sacred cows. Part gimlet-eyed news digest, part Onion-like satire, and part self-tweaking Jewish social club, BangItOut mashes raucous headlines (“New Book Helps Rabbis Stay Away From Hot Widows”), amusing photos (the Barbie menorah is a favorite), and see-it-to-believe-it videos (don’t miss the hilarious “jPhone” commercial). As their site promises, “If something’s funny and Jewish on the Internet, it’s either on here or linked from here.”

COME ON, FEEL THE “OYS”

www.klezmershack.com As this site points out, “klezmer is a popular music form that is no longer exclusively Jewish.” Likewise, KlezmerShack isn’t just about klezmer anymore; it’s blossomed into a one-stop shop for news about Jewish music, hot cultural events worldwide, reviews, even music videos grabbed from YouTube (you haven’t lived until you’ve heard “A Hard Day’s Night” in Yiddish). Webmaster Ari Davidow—an online strategist for a Jewish nonprofit by day—oversees the festivities with charm, wit, and infectious joy.

COOLEST JEWISH RECORD LABEL ON EARTH

www.jdubrecords.org If your knowledge of Jewish music stretches from “Hava Nagila” to… “Hava Nagila,” expand your horizons at the online home of JDub, the coolest Jewish record label on the planet. You’ll impress your kids with casual references to ultrahip bands like Golem, Balkan Beat Box, Socalled, and the LeeVees. Then the whole family can download inimitable JDub videos and songs (like all four segments of Socalled’s mystical sci-fi, hip-hop Claymation opus “500-Pound Planet”). Who says parents and kids can’t agree on music?

SCHMOOZE, SHVITZ, SHOP

 www.jewcy.com What began as a retailer of risqué rags (the “Chai Maintenance” T-shirt was a fave) has become the center of Jewish hipsterism’s new wave. The shirts are still there, but so is smart original reporting and opinion, a vibrant social network, and much discussed blogs such as “The Daily Shvitz” and “Faithhacker.” Brains, attitude, and sheer chutzpah make Jewcy a daily must-read.

 Good Shabbes, all. Mwah.

Please, please, please: be careful.I was reading tonight about the rabbi who wrote a letter of apology to her congregation after being busted for driving under the influence. Rabbi Amy Bernstein of Temple Israel in Duluth, Minnesota had apparently shared a bottle of wine with a few people and then was speeding home in hopes of arriving before her daughter's bedtime when she was pulled over for going about 75 in a 55 mph zone on an icy night with a .11 percent blood-alcohol level.

There are some cringe worthy factors in her situation-- drinking and driving, icy weather, speeding-- at .11 she wasn't sober but she likely wasn't completely wasted, either, and it's not uncommon to drive over the speed limit, and certainly not unusual in the least for a parent to step on the gas a little in anticipation of time with their children. Fair enough. And, Rabbi Bernstein wrote a very humble and, I thought, beautiful letter to her congregation stating, “We have got to be really attentive to our own inner lives and our own best practices and the need to slow down in general — the need to stay centered and whole so that we don’t get careless. Because that’s what happened — I got careless. Those of us who teach about that need to take our own advice.’’ Rabbi Bernstein, who has been planning to take a three-month sabbatical in Israel since before this incident then wrote, "“This incident has shocked me into awareness that there are several important things that need my careful attention right now. I promise to make my time in Israel a time of real inner work and careful reflection on the meaning and direction of my life.’’

I like her letter. Her congregation is standing behind her, and I think that's honorable and I would hope I would and could do to same if my own rabbi was in Rabbi Bernstein's shoes. Also in her letter, she wrote, “… This has been a traumatic wake-up call for me and I can only beg your forgiveness and promise that it will, of course, not happen again.”

Personally, I hope she means what she wrote, which I'm sure she does. I'm sure she's a fine person, a wonderful person, even, and I don't think she's a bad person for what she did. But more than anything else, I hope her congregation was listening, and I hope with everything I have that her congregation took her words personally, and took them in and will think very hard about their own actions.

You see, that is my hope because, I have a little bit different perspective on DUI. I lost a beloved family member to a drunk driver when she was only twenty-four years old. The driver responsible for her death was, like Rabbi Bernstein, driving with honorable intentions, eager to reach family on the other side of his drive. He was certainly a fine enough and well-liked person in the community, certainly not meaning to hurt anyone and, I honestly believe, absolutely not intending to kill anyone, but, in his case, tragically and quite accidentally, did.

If you have a problem with alcohol and you are ready, please consider talking to your Rabbi or family, or whoever, or maybe touching base with JACS, or checking out many of the meetings that are starting to be held in shuls now, instead of just churches. A lot of us, and I'll be the first to admit I've caught myself thinking this, have this thinking that we, Jews, because of reverential feelings for kiddush or for whatever reason, are somehow exempt from alcohol-related issues, but it's just not true and I've got to think that we're doing ourselves a major disservice by not recognizing members of our community who need our support.

But, let me be completely clear. I only mention substance dependency because we're talking about booze, but I do not, under any circumstances, think that people who are driving under the influence are alcoholics. Some probably are, but, honestly, I worry more about the casual drinkers. We all keep our eyes on the big boozers in the circles we run in and we know not to let them drive under any circumstances. But, the casual drinkers who just catch a nice buzz then decide to head home seem like they're not doing too terrible of a thing, as if surely the "don't drink and drive" slogans aren't talking about them, surely not, but let me tell you under no uncertain terms that it only take a moment of lapsed judgment or a second of delayed reaction to make everything horribly different. And, let's be honest, we've all probably, at one time or another in our lives, driven or started to drive and only then realized we maybe were a little in the cups. We've probably all driven at one point when we probably should have not.

So, it's my hope that we all really think very carefully of Rabbi Bernstein's words, not only on this issue, but in many areas of our lives, and that we take them very personally and really hear them:

"We have got to be really attentive to our own inner lives and our own best practices and the need to slow down in general — the need to stay centered and whole so that we don’t get careless."

Though they often behave like godless heathens, the stars are "just like us," as the old saying goes. They, too, search for divinity and meaning in their lives--a quest that can sometimes lead to trouble. The latest spiritual superstar pitfalls:

• Cruise: he's number 2Madonna has been accused of using her charity, Raising Malawi, as a front to raise funds for the Kabbalah Center. Her reps are calling said accusations "outrageous, incorrect, inaccurate, hurtful and malicious."

• The internet is all a-twitter with rumors of Britney's possible conversion to Islam.

• Soccer star Kaka, Fifa "World Player of the Year," may be in some hot water due to his ties to an apparently corrupt evangelical church.
  

• Andrew Morton, author of the unauthorized biography of Tom Cruise, which paints him as "Scientology’s de facto second in command," is standing by his book despite threats of legal action. It's in bookstores today.

• Better yet, check out Cruise's terrifying Scientology Indoctrination Vid, over at Gawker.

Girls Write Now: Show a little love, eh?According to the National Association of Secondary School Principals (NASSP), low literacy ability leads to low grades and low achievement levels—which can and usually does then ultimately lead to a high drop-out rate. In the same report, it is noted that of high school seniors, way less than half read at a level required to comprehend a school textbook. The focus of curriculum being on standard testing in the US at the moment allows students little time to explore artistic and literary pursuits, and so writing programs are just not available to students. In a 2000 SCANS Report, research showed students with access to music, theater and creative writing all performed better than students without.

So, recently, when I learned about a truly wonderful organization that is doing some really incredible work in this area, I knew I'd found an organization I wanted to support. Meet Girls Write Now, an organization that "provides a safe and supportive environment where girls can expand their natural writing talents, develop independent creative voices, and build confidence in making healthy choices in school, career and life." Sounds great, right? Wait, wait, it gets even better!

Girls Write Now "provides at-risk New York City high school girls with emerging writing talent an opportunity to be custom-matched with a professional woman writer who serves as her personal mentor and writing coach, meeting with her weekly for the duration of an entire school year, and for up to four years. GWN also enrolls each student in a vibrant writing community — all mentees and mentors gather monthly for genre-based group writing workshops conducted at our offices within Teachers & Writers Collaborative in midtown Manhattan. The year is punctuated by three annual readings, college and career prep seminars, field trips to cultural events, and endless opportunities for scholarships and publication. The magic of the program is reflected in a solid nine-year track record, a 75-percent member retention rate, a 100-percent college acceptance rate, an annual anthology of original writing, and the seven-genre portfolios each student emerges equipped with each season. Founded in 1998, GWN was the first organization to ever present this combination of powerful services, and it continues to be the only program of its kind in the eastern United States."

Helping Others: To Do Their Best Girls Write Now has, in addition to mentoring sessions, writing workshops, a reading series, a Life Adventure series of writing and performance workshops, support for students parsing through the rigors of college admissions, events and activities, and scholarships and contests, but they created Girls Write Forever, a program that helps give supporters so many options to ensure the good work of Girls Write Now can continue into the future. (Now, if I can just figure out where they sell those great t-shirts!)

To support this organization with a donation or an in-kind donation please click here. To volunteer, here, and for litty girls in New York City, click here. And, if you find yourself in New York on January 18th, and you do roll on Shabbes, by all means, get yourself to the Winter Pair Reading and see your ten bucks doing a lot of good.

Jewish-German community leaders are pissed.

A smoking ban just went into effect in Germany and opponents of said ban have been selling t-shirts online that feature the ol' Judenstern we had to wear back in the day. Only, instead of "Jude", the star on the t-shirts said "Raucher" (smoker), to suggest that discrimination against smokers is not unlike anti-Semitism in Nazi Germany.

Judenstern: Way to bring up old shit.The shirts went on sale online in the days before the smoking ban in ten out of Germany's sixteen states, which went into effect on New Year's Day. Dennis Kramer of DPM, the marketers behind the shirt said citizens needed to be aware of "disgraceful discrimination against smokers" in bars and restaurants and called the shirts "the most aggressive smokers' resistance shirt available" but added he only "wanted to show that smokers are being discriminated against in bars". The website has since been shut down, but a couple of websites seem to still be selling the shirts.

Germany's Central Council of Jews called the t-shirts "crude, brainless and tasteless" and added that anyone who "compares the plight of the Jews during the Third Reich to smokers who are thought to be discriminated against" to be people who have learned "absolutely nothing". Dieter Graumann, the deputy president of the Central Council of Jews in Germany said, "This is an absolute abuse of the Jewish genocide... It is a scandal to exploit the murder of the Jews in order to symbolize the people's desire to smoke." But, it might be more than just a matter of taste-- In Itzehoe, where DPM is based, prosecutors confirmed a formal investigation has been launched to establish whether they could prosecute, being that the display of Nazi symbols is prohibited under German law. Obviously.

 

(I'm an oft-multi-tasking dumb-ass, and failed to save this post, written prior to Shabbes, properly, so we'll operate in the better-late-than-ever/glad-I-decided-to-work-on-Sunday mindset, yes? Great. In any case, I beg your pardon.)

In November, I remember reading about a Jewish cemetery near Baltimore getting vandalized and thinking, "What if surviving relatives can't afford to restore the headstones?" and only paragraphs later reading a spokesperson's statement:

For gravestones that cannot be traced to a family, Mr. Cohn said the congregation will likely absorb the cost of repair, which he said will be about $125 per stone. He said the cemetery – which likely dates back to the mid-19th century, according to the congregation—is not insured for vandalism, and perpetual care only covers the upkeep of the grounds.

“Morally and ethically, it’s our responsibility. But legally, it’s not. Families will have to pay for it, and we feel very, very bad about this,” said Mr. Cohn, who noted that the congregation plans to install high-intensity lighting at the cemetery. “It will cost us, it will cost the families, and we’ll absorb what we can. But it’s limited. Where are the funds? It’s not like, bingo, we have the funds.”

If you want to fuck with me: then fuck with me. Not dead people.On Jan 1st, a Jewish cemetery back east in New Brunswick, NJ was vandalized, and I quickly found mention of a restoration fund in an article reporting the arrest of the teenagers responsible for the damage.

About a week ago, here in Chicago where I live, someone, or a group of someones probably, broke onto the grounds of Westlawn Jewish cemetery and vandalized gravestones with swastikas, line-slashed Magen David symbols, threats, slogans... the usual hate graffiti schtick.

Anyway, the price tag on getting things back in order is estimated to be between $100,000 and $150,000 and thought there are some unclear bits of information floating around here, it seems that the financial responsibility is falling upon surviving families. I haven't heard anything official from the JUF, as far as funds being used to offset their expenses, but I'm sure it's either forthcoming, or I've just yet to track it down. In any case, the cost is going to be considerable, every bit will surely count, and my feeling is that because hate against some of us is hate against all of us, and so responsibility also falls equally.

I'm sure earmarked donations would be welcome here:

Westlawn Cemetery and Mausoleum (Vicki Pulido, General Manager), 7801 W. Montrose Avenue, Chicago, Illinois 60706
(773) 625-8600

 

Challah for Hunger: Creative loafing.Tonight, I was hanging out with a couple of friends, talking about this and that and a conversation about poaching pears turned into a conversation about baking which turned into a conversation about a particular challah recipe, which turned into the discovery that only a couple of degrees of separation stood between me and this organization: Challah for Hunger. I headed home, Googled it up, and, well, that pretty much brings us up to right now.

In an incredible stroke of luck, it being Social Justice Tuesday and all, the very first sentence seen upon entering the site is: "Challah for Hunger is a national organization centered around activism and social justice." Blammo. It continues, "With our weekly challah sales, we raise money and awareness for the victims of the genocide in the Sudan. Challah for Hunger has sent more than $20,000 to relief organizations and thousands of letters to Washington, urging elected officials to take action. We also work to inspire others, both on our campuses and around the world, to take a stand against genocide."

At the moment, there aren't too many chapters of this organization, but the site provides tons of information for starting your very own chapter. You can of course support their efforts by purchasing your challah from a chapter near you, as well, and if you take a little time and write a letter to an elected official or media outlet about Darfur, they'll give you a discount. Looking for inspiration? They have a sample letter available and links that point you to places to get a little more information or to find other ways to help the crisis in Darfur.

 

This photo: inspired Liverpool's RESPECTacles Project. In November, Liverpool was chosen to hold England's national Yom HaShoah observance, led by Chief Rabbi Sir Jonathan Sacks and the Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams. So Liverpool decided upon the RESPECTacles Project, a result of a collaboration between the Liverpool Town Hall and the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust.

The project was inspired by a photo of a pile of damaged glasses worn by Shoah victims, which will be on display from January 21st through 26th in Liverpool. According to the Liverpool city website:

The unique project wants to put across the message that all individuals, particularly our young people, can play their part in genocide prevention simply by having, showing and insisting upon RESPECT for other human beings and for their differences.

Danny Radcliffe (Harry Potter) gave a pair, along with his costar Jason Issacs, who will be taking part in the services held on Yom HaShoah at Liverpool's Philharmonic Hall on January 27th. Jerry Springer gave a pair, too, along with Yoko Ono, Stephen Fry, Paul O’Grady and Ronnie Corbett. (Elton John? I'm looking in your direction. Ahem. Glasses? Hi?)

On Liverpool City Council's website, there is still a call out for donations of glasses, sun and non. Eyewear donors are invited to label their glasses with a name in honor or memorial, as well. No specifics are given on donating by mail from stateside, but there is a bit of contact info (scroll about midway down) on their site, including a name and phone number, and I'm sure there's still time to coordinate something if you have old specs to give.  After Yom HaShoah, all glasses will be donated to Vision Aid Overseas, which aids people in obtaining much-needed prescription glasses in developing countries.

Oh, big news in the world of Agunot this week!

Fear not, Agunot!: Canada will save you. But, should it?Canada doesn't mess with religious matters in its courts so much, but the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that the civil divorce agreement signed by Jason Marcovitz, in which is specifically agreed to give his wife, Stephanie Bruker, a get, was declared a valid contract that overrides his assertion for protection under freedom of religion. (Having never been divorced myself, is it standard in a civil divorce to specify a get to be forthcoming? I would imagine not and that this case could potentially hyper-sensitize civil divorce language if a husband has any inclination towards hesitating on the get, no?) The couple married in 1969 and obtained a civil divorce in 1980, with Marcovitz initially agreeing to give a get and later changing his mind, until 1995 when he did finally give her a get, at which point she was 46 years old, past child-bearing age for many women, as the court noted.

So, the court awarded his ex-wife almost $50K in damages, on the grounds that her ability to remarry and have more children was blocked by Marcovitz's lack of cooperation. (What, do you think, is a fair settlement for being barred from remarrying and having children or more children? Can you put a price on that, really? And, is it somehow worth more or less in damages if there were no previous children? Discuss.)

Evelyn Brook, president of the Canadian Coalition of Jewish Women for the Get, called the decision "a great relief." The ruling "does not say that he had to give her a get. It simply said that because he didn't, then there are things to forfeit," Brook told JTA. "For every husband who has gone back on his promise" in a divorce settlement, "this makes a difference." While many women's groups are gung-ho about this ruling, yet many in the legal world aren't so sure this is a good thing, as this ruling could be the first bit of tiptoeing into religious meddling by courts.

Marcovitz's complaint and reason he claimed to withhold the get from Bruker was that she'd had breached their civil agreement by becoming less observant and by turning the couple's daughters against him. This decision was reached 7-2 by Canada's Supreme Court, with the dissenting judges stating Marcovitz's promise was nothing beyond a moral obligation and that "finding otherwise will expand courts into areas where they have no jurisdiction", JTA reports this morning.

The Marcovitz/Bruker case was the first to be presented to Canada's Supreme Court since Ottowa's amendment to the Divorce Act in 1990, which prohibited people from creating or maintaining obstacles for their former spouse to marry religiously.

Surely we have an Agunot or two in our readership that could provide some insight here? Surely a few people with greater knowledge of the Canadian legal system than I can offer? Or, with great knowledge of American family law and how, if at all, this ruling could make waves in our courts...?

 

 

Jewish Book Council: Next year, my books are totally going to be in the running for this. Uh, hello? Anyone?The Jewish Book Council, who is behind the Sami Rohr Prize for Jewish Literature, has announced this year's five finalists for said prize, basing their selections on a "demonstration of a fresh vision and evidence of future potential to further contribute to the Jewish literary community. The prize honors an emerging author in the field of Jewish literature who has written a book of exceptional literary merit that stimulates an interest in themes of Jewish concern."

This year, the prize of $100,000 will be awarded to a writer of non-fiction, with the winner to be announced at a spring awards ceremony, at which point, the identities of the contest judges will also be revealed. So, while we're waiting to hear the winner, we might as well read the finalists and start a betting pool:

Ilana M. Blumberg for Houses of Study: A Jewish Woman Among Books (University of Nebraska Press)

Eric L. Goldstein for The Price of Whiteness: Jews, Race and American Identity (Princeton University Press)

Lucette Lagnado for The Man in the White Sharkskin Suit: My Family's Exodus from Old Cairo to the New World (Ecco)

Michael Makovsky for Churchill's Promised Land: Zionism and Statecraft (Yale University Press)

Haim Watzman for A Crack in the Earth: A Journey Up Israel's Rift Valley (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)

Man, I forgot all about this guy's song. Well, let's dust it off and enjoy it another year, even if it is a day late. (And, on a related note, hit Tamar's post that ponders our actions on Christmas and Easter.)

On the way home from the nightly Limmud bar, this Israeli guy -- I only remember his first name, Roi -- heard that I was a poet and dropped a poem; I only remember the chorus:

 On the London Underground, everything is wild

On the London Underground, where Bowie was a child

This country has a different magic for everyone. Tonight someone was telling me how the British Jewish community has an inferiority complex, compared to all the cool countercultural Jewish stuff that's going on in the US. I told him that we should have an inferiority complex, too -- this might be the only place where Jews of so many different stripes, visceral and physical, can get together and throw this many ideas at each other. It's seriously amazing how many people can get together and not get angry at each other (well, not get irreconcilably angry) and have Breslov and Chabad Chasidim jamming onstage, and then walk across the street to hear an awesome yet harmless-looking Liberal rabbi tell about her past breaking into abandoned buildings and setting up punk-rock squats, then launch into a half-hour impassioned defense of Sex Pistols impresario Malcolm McLaren. I know I keep using the word "impassioned," but it's not an accident -- pretty much everything people do here feels like their lives are on the line, or that their lives are being defined.

Oh! And good old DJ Handler finally put up some pretty awesome Limmud photos over on Shemspeed. Go check 'em out and see what you're missing. (And, if you're here, check out Rabbi Raz Hartman's Chasidic minyan....7:45 am till we run out of breath.)

Today at Limmud, nothing has happened yet -- well, it's 7:30 in the morning and my rabbi from yeshiva just pounded on my door to wake me up, but I asked him to, and now I'm iChatting to my wife and her big expectant belly. It kicks when I talk to it -- and I am feeling uncomfortably like our friend George Weinberg (of John Saffran vs. God fame, if you're Australian -- but, if you're Australian, you probably know George Weinberg anyway), who travels a lot and, when he is home, his daughter runs to the computer video camera to talk to him.

Last night, I hopped between two events -- one of the difficulties of an event like this, where at any given moment you could be having six completely different life-changing experiences. At 11pm was the Y-Love show, featuring guest M.C. Daniel Silverstein (of the band Emunah, until 2 nights ago) and about a zillion screaming girls, and upstairs, as far removed as you could get, was a crowd of people sitting in a nearly-dark room, surrounding Rabbi Raz Hartmann, who was teaching nigguns, wordless Chasidic melodies, and then, between them, giving over tidbits of Rebbe Nachman teachings. Like, for instance, did you know that it was traditional for prophets to not give over prophecies without accompaniment? There's one part of Prophets where someone is literally, like, "Fetch my backing band -- I need to prophecize." And then, like Sarah Silverman, they pop up, ready for a jingle-perfect tune about....well, no, probably not about *that.*

I'm not a sci-fi geek. But, almost a decade ago, I had a roommate that introduced me to the world of the cons. ComiCon, GenCon, something that seemed tailored for the renaissance fair, er, faire crowd, a couple of Star Trek cons and such. She and her boyfriend were sci-fi lovin', comic book readin', -Con attendin', role playin' folks. (It's not my bag, but rest assured, I'm not making fun. I'm all for people doing whatever they're into. Anyway.)

Even in a galaxy far, far away: You can still sorta-kinda keep Shabbes.During this time, it was explained to me that several of such -cons host wedding and religious services in theme of the event, and both admitted they'd only seem limited Jewish weddings or services in their travels, or at least always saw more activity from other religious groups, which always seemed odd to me, with so many comic superheroes having such good Jewish roots and with the Star Trek Dr. Spock "live long and prosper" hand gesture having a Jewcy base as well. Isaac Asimov? Harlan Ellison? David Brin? Mind you, that's only what I was told based on the events they attended. I never braved an event to verify any of their claims for myself.

About a month ago, Jewish Journal of Los Angeles ran a short piece that caught my attention and reminded me of these conversations with the roommate and her guy. LosCon, an annual weekend Sci-Fi invasion at the LAX Marriott had featured a Sci-Fi Catholic mass and a Sci-Fi pagan/wiccan circle and last year, thanks to uber-sci-fi-fan, Marsha Minsky, a minyan was added to the schedule of events, Beit LosCon. She's named herself "Rabbi of the Con", though she doesn't have a rabbinical ordination and her services, based on a conservative liturgy, brought about two dozen people of the thousand or so in attendance of LosCon.

Could one do a B'nai Mitzvah at a 'con? Has anyone?

I'd just like to eveyone to take a moment and imagine what a Sci-Fi or RenFaire Shabbat service might involve. And, if you've been to one, please tell us about it. I'm dying to know if it's tailored to the occasion. Discuss.

Chuppah? Jewish wedding?: Is that 'Merican?I'm a writer, so I work out of my apartment. Most of the other residents of my building are 9-5ers, so I enjoy very quiet workdays. But, sometimes one of my upstairs neighbors is home during the day, too, and is so very noisy and so sometimes I turn on the television to cancel out her midday dance club or the late evening rendezvous she enjoys with her boyfriend (whom she praises during such rendezvous by first and last name).

Anyway, that's not the issue. I turned on the television for some white noise and landed on TLC. I don't remember what show made me stop on that channel, nor was I paying much attention to the programming all morning, but it was on and canceling out the noise from above, for the most part.

I make a point to take a moment and step away from my desk for lunch usually, or at least I try to most days, and as I did this, I got sucked into a show called A Wedding Story and was prompted to write a letter to the network. A Wedding Story is as the title would suggest-- the story of a couple getting the last-minute stuff together for their wedding and this particular episode was of Sarah (Christian from the US, her family is from the US) and Kamir (Muslim from the US, his family is from Morocco) who decided to have two destination weddings, one a protestant ceremony (which seemed pretty secular) and the other Muslim. During the early segment of the show, captions indicated the choice the couple made to have two weddings with the caption, "Two weddings. One Islamic. The other American."

Blink, blink. Blink.

Granted, I like to pick my battles, but this wording really bothered me because the implications were so culturally insensitive. Really, consider the implications. Is Islam a place? Is American a religion? Okay, I'm being a smart-ass, but really, this usage indicates that American is the same as Christian and, well, it isn't. With this wording, one has to assume TLC takes to position that "American wedding" excludes Jewish, Hindu, Muslim, Wiccan-- and any other wedding tradition that isn't Christian? It might be, and probably is, a simple matter of semantics, an oversight maybe, but for it to air, a lot of people within the network had to see it and either not be bothered by it, not care enough to speak up or not even realize what it implied. I doubt the bride and groom saw the show prior to it airing, and so I wonder, too, what the groom thought? He probably felt marginalized at the implication that Muslim didn't qualify as American. How could he not?

So, I wrote an email to the network. It was a calm, polite email that asked for a reply in the matter, so while the network probably doesn't give a shit about my letter and will never respond, if they do, you'll be the first to hear about it.

MCS: For reals, yo.I'm just hearing about this, but yesterday in the Canadian Jewish News, Avrum Rosenweig printed a letter written in response to his last couple of days of blog posts written about a Jewish Canadian woman suffering from MCS (multiple chemical sensitivity) who has become homeless and is living in her car. Right? What? Did you hear about this? Here is the initial blog post, followed by the second and finally, her letter of response below. Rosenweig noted in his article, as I will also note in this post, that this woman still needs support and assistance. Personally undereducated in matters of MCS (though I will begin looking around right away) and not entirely sure how much help she still needs, I haven't the foggiest idea where to begin to help her, though I'm sure some of you do. All I know is that it's really fucking cold in Canada and surely a car is no place to survive a Canadian winter. Just after some people came forward to assist her, she wrote:

For the past year and a half, I, a Jewish woman with MCS, have struggled to survive in my car. This experience has shaken the very foundation of my belief in a good and loving God.

This summer, however, a dedicated doctor referred me to another caring doctor. He in turn put me in touch with Ve’ahavta [the Canadian Jewish Humanitarian and Relief Committee], namely Avrum.

After exhausting all potential helping avenues, I reached out to catch this last lifeline. Given my disappointment and frustration with our health care and social services, I agreed to yield my fate to members of my Jewish community.

After the articles about my situation appeared in The CJN, I cannot tell you how touched I was by the generosity of spirit and the genuine compassion of the newspaper’s readers. Given the criticism I have received and others’ judgmental attitudes, as well as the rejection, abandonment and alienation I experienced subsequent to the onset of MCS, the response of well-wishers, creative problem solving and the offer of financial assistance was a breath of fresh air.

So often people make good economic investments without a second thought. They know, based on personal intuition and/or business acumen, that the returns will be most satisfying. These past few weeks, however, I am pleased to say I have witnessed generosity beyond any rational comprehension. (This is not to discount the support of a few dear friends; a special aunt and efforts by family members).

A number of readers have suggested feasible ways for me to renew my hope to live a normal life once again. Collectively, they have begun to offer me the potential of securing shelter and money to facilitate the costly transition from my car to that of a safe and secure home, and they have referred me to a professional who specializes in the treatment of MCS.

All of these special fellow Jews, and others, have moved me in a way that is really beyond words. But since words are the only medium available to me to express this gratitude, I have put pen to paper. These angels have invested in a human life – my life.

They don’t know it yet, but by doing so they have invested in the Jewish community at large. With my renewed health, I aspire to continue the efforts to ameliorate the lives of others living with MCS.

I plan to establish an MCS support group, and later I hope to lobby for a pilot residential environment geared exclusively to the needs of those tormented by MCS.

Honestly, one would be hard-pressed to identify a better way to invest their money. After all is said and done, material things come and go. Love, compassion, kindness, pride, faith and hope endure for a lifetime and then some. To those readers who gave of their hearts and took the time to respond, you brought much warmth and comfort to my chilled existence.

And to those readers who went above and beyond that to bring about concrete changes to my declining health status and my meagre physical environment, I bless you with this sentiment. May God, whom I questioned, bestow upon you the daily compounded interest of love and good that truly does exist in the Almighty and through the Jewish people.

For more information about MCS, click here.

 

 

 

Just got back from the swanky new Jewcy office where I happened to mention that I'm going to the Limmud convention in England over Xmas break. Tahl The Editor got excited and asked if I could blog it, upon which *I* got excited, because I'm supposed to speak at a dozen or so sessions and haven't actually thought of anything to say at any of them.

As a point of fact, I'm not entirely clear on what Limmud is. This is what I do know: Limmud is the Hebrew word for learning, and the weeklong conference has featured sessions with Nobel-contending authors, the director of Tiny Ninja Theater, my rabbi from