Women Assault Rabbis with Sights and Smells (And Other Interesting Tales from Lakewood)

     One of the reasons that this blog is called "Jewish Outreach: What Your Rabbi Isn't Telling You" is due to the inaccurate picture of ultra-orthodox life often painted by Jewish outreach/kiruv workers.  Once one leaves the idyllic realm of kiruv experiences, there is a very real world that exists on the other side of a few semesters or years at yeshiva or seminary that most people people don't know about, or even understand until moving into such a community. The following excerpts from screenshots were recently taken from the publication "The Voice of Lakewood," published for the orthodox community in Lakewood, New Jersey.
     In the first excerpt, notice that  a woman is complaining that young girls (second grade, to be exact,) in a summer camp setting (in someone's home) have exposed skin between their high socks and their skirts. Notice the level of concern of the writer.

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     Notice the second picture in which women and girls are told to cut their hair or sheitels (wigs) to an "acceptable length." This advertisement is endorsed by Lakewood rabbonim (rabbis) and roshei yeshiva (heads of yeshivas.) 

     The third picture, a letter to the Voice of Lakewood, signed "Appalled in Lakewood," is from a father who is appalled that his daughter's teacher wears a wig that is longer than her shoulders. This is apparently in direct conflict with the family's values which stress that a married woman's wig must not go past her shoulders. Rather than complain to the community, perhaps he could have explained to his daughter that different people hold by different beliefs, even within the realm of orthodox Judaism. Kiruv is often  guilty of the same thing, teaching that orthodox Judaism, and Judaism in general, can only be practiced one way--the way of the kiruv worker.

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     Picture four provides further understanding of the status of women in the Lakewood orthodox community. Mothers of cheder (school-age) boys are urged by "a Lakewood Rebbi" "not [to] dress up excessively ... and definitely do not wear perfume" for parent-teacher conferences with the rebbi (a male teacher.) This "Lakewood Rebbi" then asks "why can't we trust the child's father to go alone and bring home a report? ...Perhaps the mothers could set up a phone meeting with the rebbi. He would be thrilled to do so instead of being assaulted by all types of sights and smells two evenings a year." It seems that "a Lakewood Rebbi" is trying very hard to be labeled a misogynist, proclaiming in print his disgust for women and belief that women really don't need to have any part in their male children's education.

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If you weren't already sure as to why the Lakewood orthodox community feels that women's modesty, or tznius, is important, the following letter to the Voice of Lakewood should clarify their perspective. You see, when one is first learning from his/her kiruv/outreach rabbi, one isn't told that the reason ultra-orthodox women are pressured to dress a certain way  is because of the belief that a woman's hemline directly affects whether or not Jews get hurt or die. (This isn't an isolated incident. Signage to this effect was found in Brooklyn, where women learned that they'd be "severely punished" for not following the laws of modesty. You can also read about how the ultra orthodox community consistently obscures the faces of females in their publications.) The author of this letter, who signs off as "Someone Who's Embarrassed of the Image of Lakewood," offers readers what should be understood as concern: "What are you doing to yourself and others? That person that got hurt or died--it might have been because of you." She further states that her husband "refuses to go to the grocery store because he feels like it's a junkyard looking at all that garbage that people are wearing." I'd like to think that perhaps this is just her husband's excuse to get his wife to go shopping so that he doesn't have to, but alas, the prevalent feeling is that the women must help protect their husbands from impure thoughts. To do so, they use community pressure to push their beliefs on others within the community--even those who might not be observing at the same level.

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     The question is, why is  what goes on in Lakewood, New Jersey, relevant to this blog? After all, Lakewood isn't the be all and end all of campus (or other) kiruv practice. But that's just my point. Lakewood is an ultra-orthodox community. Like other ultra-orthodox communities, there are people in and from Lakewood who work or volunteer with kiruv organizations. These letters are in their community's magazine and are representative of issues that are grappled with by those in the community. These letters are indicative of the archaic lens through which community leaders view and control  women and their bodies in the name of Judaism. When whole communities buy into the belief that the length of a woman's skirt is responsible for "116 accidents this past week," it creates a danger for the rights of all people--those already in, and those first coming into, these communities. When kiruv professionals push their beliefs on people who have little or no experience with ultra-orthodox Judaism, they leave out the part about how they believe a too-short hemline or the exposed skin of an 8 year-old's leg has caused death and destruction to Jews; and how guilt, fear, intimidation, and community pressure will keep women behaving to whatever tznius (modesty) standard has been deemed socially acceptable. 

Update: For more on this topic, read "Shmiras Einayim --Try it, You'll Like it!"over at Kol B'Isha Erva.