Happy Canada Day!
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All posts for the month June, 2014
Dear Canadians – I got you some cake.
Posted by emilylhauser on June 30, 2014
https://emilylhauserinmyhead.wordpress.com/2014/06/30/dear-canadians-i-got-you-some-cake/
Israel’s addiction to military force, its only response in times of crisis.
People have short memories. It’s an all-too-human quality that frankly allows politics to continue. But even so, there are times when Israelis’ short-term memory loss can leave me breathless.
When three yeshiva students were kidnapped two weeks ago, the collective response was immediate, and visceral: Bring the boys home, and spare no effort, no matter how costly or violent. The nation’s security forces leapt into action, and Israelis’ prayers were mixed with palpable rage. Few worried that dozens and then hundreds of people – Palestinians -were being swept up in a massive and indiscriminate dragnet; few paused to consider the efficacy or ethics of raiding well more than a thousand targets, including private homes, universities, and media outlets; few questioned the wisdom of using live fire against those who dared protest it all, killing (among others) a 15-year old boy and a mentally unstable man on his way to morning prayers. Military spokesman Peter Lerner told us, and few questioned it, that the government and military “are committed to resolving the kidnapping and debilitating Hamas terrorist capacities, its infrastructure and its recruiting institutions.”
And perhaps – perhaps – if these methods had successfully resolved past abductions, if the forces intent on grabbing Israelis had abated, perhaps we could at least understand the impetus, struggle as we might with the unending horror of this unending war. But the simple fact is that all of these methods, all of them, have been used time and again, and all have failed spectacularly.
To continue reading, please click through to Haaretz.
Posted by emilylhauser on June 27, 2014
https://emilylhauserinmyhead.wordpress.com/2014/06/27/israels-addiction-to-military-force-its-only-response-in-times-of-crisis/
“Why can’t ‘run like a girl’ also mean ‘win the race’?”
Thanks to @blazing over on Twitter, I just welled up watching the following, what amounts to an ad for Always feminine products.
I’ve thought about the phrase “like a girl” a lot, and every time I do, it makes me furious. It’s belittling and dehumanizing and deeply destructive, for girls and boys alike (click here to read me talking a little bit about all that) and I’m genuinely glad and grateful that Always decided to take it on. I’m already a customer, so I can’t say that I’ll switch brands or anything now, but I would if I could! Thanks, Always.
Posted by emilylhauser on June 27, 2014
https://emilylhauserinmyhead.wordpress.com/2014/06/27/why-cant-run-like-a-girl-also-mean-win-the-race/
Why does the UN love these Israeli caves? Jesus Christ Superstar, obvs!
What makes a place so special that it might be considered the inheritance of all humanity — a World Heritage site, as it were?
If you were to consult UNESCO’s list of World Heritage criteria, you would see that the international body that determines such status considers ten benchmarks. Does the site “bear a unique or at least exceptional testimony to a cultural tradition or to a civilization,” for instance, does it “contain superlative natural phenomena”? All those things are, no doubt, very important.
But when it comes to one of the most recent additions to the U.N.’s list, Israel’s Beit Guvrin Bell Caves, there’s even less doubt as to what the real reason was: “Jesus Christ Superstar.”
Oh, you won’t find a hint of the rock opera in UNESCO’s announcement, or in any of the various press reports — but trust me.
The Bell Caves served as the location par excellence for a crucial early set piece in the 1973 film version of the musical, directed by Norman Jewison. The disciples and their women have set up camp (goats and all) more or less at the feet of Jesus, and are exuberantly demanding to know (in the parlance of the time): “What’s the buzz? Tell me what’s a-happenin’!” Jesus insists that even if they knew the path they trod, they wouldn’t understand, but the excited acolytes will not be dissuaded. Mary Magdalene comes along and soothes Jesus with a cool face-and-foot wash, and Jesus allows as only she knows what he really needs.
But then! A drastic tonal change: In comes Judas….
To read the rest, please click through to The Forward.
Posted by emilylhauser on June 27, 2014
https://emilylhauserinmyhead.wordpress.com/2014/06/27/why-does-the-un-love-these-israeli-caves-jesus-christ-superstar-obvs/
Gay, ultra-Orthodox – and married.
What do you do if you’re ultra-Orthodox and gay? You almost certainly hide.
On Thursday, Israeli daily Yediot reported new figures released by religious-gay support group Hod indicating that “two-thirds of ultra-Orthodox homosexuals [in Israel] have chosen to marry women despite their sexual inclination”; almost all of the more than 1,100 men included in Hod’s report admitted to having sex with other men at least once a month.
According to Hod founder Ron Yosef, an Orthodox rabbi and gay activist:
The situation of homosexuals in the Haredi society is much more difficult because of the social isolation they live in. A gay Haredi man cannot share his situation with his friends in the community or the yeshiva, his family members or rabbis, and “coming out of the closet” is definitely inconceivable.
To read the rest of this, please go to The Forward.
Posted by emilylhauser on June 6, 2014
https://emilylhauserinmyhead.wordpress.com/2014/06/06/gay-ultra-orthodox-and-married/
I’m No One’s ‘Heretic’
Last Wednesday we learned that, while speaking at a fundraising gala for the ultra-Orthodox Agudath Israel of America, Rabbi Yaakov Perlow, head of that organization, slandered virtually every Jew on the planet, down to and including a bunch of plain-old-Orthodox folks. We were told that attendees of the event were “stunned.”
“The Torah must be guarded from the secular forces that seek to corrupt its values and the lives of [Jews], from intruders who sometimes in the name of Judaism completely subvert and destroy the eternal values of our people,” Perlow said. And also: “[The Reform and Conservative Movements] have disintegrated themselves, become oblivious, fallen into an abyss of intermarriage and assimilation. They have no future, they almost have no present.” And furthermore, the Open Orthodoxy movement is “steeped in apikorsos [heresy].”
It was quite the little speech. But stunned? Really? Attendees were stunned? Do they not get out much?
Perlow heads an organization that is, by definition, extremist. They believe themselves to be upholding the strictest, and thus most correct, interpretation of God’s own Divine law; they believe that the existence of the Jewish people, the coming of Messiah, and quite possibly the world itself depends on the painstaking observance of that interpretation — which is not, in their understanding, an interpretation at all, but simply Jewish law, halakhah.
Of course he thinks you’re a bad Jew — no, I’m sorry, not a “bad Jew.” He thinks that you’re a literal danger to Judaism itself. You have come — yes, you! — to “subvert and destroy the eternal values” of the Jewish people. You! (Unless you happen to be Haredi, and Perlow’s kind of Haredi at that, in which case, welcome to Forward Thinking, we try to be a very welcoming blog).
To finish reading this, please go to The Forward.
Posted by emilylhauser on June 3, 2014
https://emilylhauserinmyhead.wordpress.com/2014/06/03/im-no-ones-heretic/
