CSA in the Frum Community

This post has nothing to do with me, or living in Israel, so if you read this blog solely to stalk me (Thanks, I'm flattered!) you can stop reading now. That said, it is my blog and there are no rules (if there were I wouldn't follow them anyway), so I'm going to go off on a tangent. 

There's a video going around the Internet, it's all over Facebook and Twitter, so chances are you've already seen it. The video is of a frum (Orthodox Jewish) lady, telling her story about the Childhood Sexual Abuse she experienced and (perhaps) worse, the reaction from the community when she came forward. If not, you should watch it, link below. It's fairly long, but worth the time IMO. 

It obviously took tremendous courage for her to make this speech in front of all those people and in front of the tens of thousands of people who watched the video. She should be an inspiration for all of us to speak up for what's right, regardless of the consequences. It's also nice to see how many people showed up to listen to her and how positively they reacted. That's the good part. 

Now for the bad. CSA (Childhood Sexual Abuse) happens everywhere. Statistically around 1 out of every 20 children will be victimized (some say it's as high as 1 out of every 4 girls and 1 out of every 6 boys) and no group is immune to it. It would be nice to believe that our community is better, but there's no evidence to support that and there's no sense in burying our heads in the sand. I'm not an expert on this, by any stretch of the imagination, but obviously there are things we can do to protect our kids. Education and supervision are the most obvious and seem like good places to start. Perhaps more important is getting known abusers off the streets and that's where the biggest problems are.

It's sickening that this happens, but humans are flawed and do all kinds of messed up things. What bothers me the most is the response that this girl and others I've heard about receive when they go forward with their stories. It's understandable for a Rabbi as a human to make a mistake and mishandle a case, especially if they don't have any experience dealing with issues like this. What's inexcusable to me is the perversion of Halacha (Jewish Law) and the victim shaming, especially by Rabbis who should know better. I can understand anyone giving the benefit of the doubt to someone accused of CSA. Obviously every case needs to be investigated by competent authorities before someone is considered guilty. That being said, I would expect any human being to feel compelled to at least make the accuser feel believed and to do whatever they could to get them help (IMO that includes making sure their case is investigated by the police). 

There are no competent halachic authorities who prohibit reporting molesters to the police. Simply by claiming that it is prohibited, they would prove themselves to be incompetent. In fact, all the major orthodox rabbinic organizations agree that anyone with firsthand knowledge of CSA is obligated by the Torah to report it to the police. There are some who stipulate that one must consult with a Rabbi before reporting, to determine if the basis for suspicion is sufficient evidence to file a report (I think this is stupid, but I'm no posek). Why then do we keep hearing more cases of Rabbis failing to instruct victims to go to the police and worse, vilifying those who do go to the police? 

I don't have the answers. It's clear to me that regardless of their intentions, these rabbis and members of our communities are doing irreparable harm, not only to the current and future victims, but to all of Judaism. Judaism without compassion is not a religion that can last. If we foster an environment where victims are as afraid (if not more) of the reactions from our community as they are of their abusers, do we deserve to last? 

So, what do we do about it? Again, I don't have the answers. It seems to me that we can learn from Sima Yarmush and stand up to any rabbis who are on the wrong side of this issue. There are countless websites that expose molesters and their supporters, unfortunately most of them seem to be run by lunatics. The conspiracy theories they post as fact and the callousness they show over attacking reputations of respectable Rabbis does more harm than good. It's important to realize that Rabbis are not Gods, they're human and they make mistakes. I'm ok with pointing out their mistakes, but I don't think it's ok to vilify them, especially without knowing the full story. There are some who deserve to be vilified, but a balance is needed and the websites I've seen don't seem to have good judgment when it comes to this. http://www.jewishcommunitywatch.org/ seems to be an exception to this, I'm very impressed with what I've seen from them and hopefully their work will help us all. 

One of the most important things we can all do is educate ourselves on the facts of CSA. The biggest obstacle to dealing with these issues is ignorance. If you wish to become informed check out http://www.jewishcommunitywatch.org/education-center/ for some helpful information. 

One last thing. If you are the kind of person who would shun someone for going public with their abuse story. If you would say nasty things to them, talk about them disparagingly behind their backs, etc. Please let me know who you are so I can keep my family far far away from you. Thanks! 

P.S. Every time I write anything about sexual abuse, inevitably someone sends me a message asking if I was abused. I'll save you some time and tell you that I have never been abused. Not too long ago I believed this was a non-issue in the frum world. One Thursday night I was getting cholent at a restaurant (before I owned it) and I heard a group of guys loudly and callously discussing a story about a boy who committed suicide after he was abused. That night I did some research online and was shocked by how many cases there were. Later I found out that two of my friends were abused as well (you may be wondering "What? Dovid has two friends?" well, yeah I guess at some point I did actually talk to people :-))

Bein Hazmanim (Spring Break)

One of the very few things I liked about being in Yeshiva when I was younger was Bein Hazmanim, the vacation time between semesters. Twice a year (Pesach and Summer) we got a whole month off from the learning and insanely restrictive rules and were free to do as we pleased (well, not exactly, but close). Unfortunately, in the real world, vacations like that just don't happen. While I was fortunate to be able to take a number of vacations, I can't remember a single vacation that I didn't have to work at all.

Now that I'm back in Yeshiva, by choice, Bein Hazmanim doesn't quite have the same appeal. Sure I could use the time off, but I'm here because I want to learn, not for vacation. In any case, I still have a business to run, so it would only be a half day vacation. Still, I'll admit I was kind of looking forward to the time off for the last few weeks.

The week or two before the end of the zman (semester) is mostly spent studying for bechinos (finals). On the last day of the zman the Rosh Yeshiva (Dean) gives an oral test to everyone in the Yeshiva on everything you learned that zman. I was in a complicated position for this test, as I missed the first few weeks of Yeshiva. I'm also apparently very bad at hiding my boredom in class when I already know what's being taught, so I was moved to a higher level class after a week and a half. I was a little worried about being tested at the higher level, considering that I only learned some of the material in the lower level class. Fortunately, I felt like I understood everything in the new class well enough that I had plenty of extra time to go back and learn the other material on my own.

Three days before the test, I found out that the test was going to cover a whole bunch of material that I never learned. Instead of reviewing the material that I had learned, I learned all the new material in the days before the test. Turns out this was a good idea, as the test ended up being entirely on this new material (new for me, everyone else had learned it before I got here). One thing I don't like is that they don't give you any kind of grade here. It's not really necessary, because you and everyone else in your class know how you did. I felt like I did well enough, but it was kind of disappointing to be tested only on material that I learned in three days, instead of the material that I knew so well, in depth.

The day after the test the Yeshiva went on a Tiyul (trip) that deserves it's own post and then Bein Hazmanim started. I was wondering what I'd do with an extra 5+ hours every day. Unfortunately, Matis has Pneumonia, the flu and an ear infection and Nehama has the flu, so I've been stuck at home most of the time. Not quite the vacation I'd pictured. 

Purim in Jerusalem

I found out about a week before Purim that in Jerusalem Purim is completely different than in the rest of the world. While everyone else celebrates on the 14th of Adar, here they celebrate on Shushan Purim, the 15th. Maybe I knew that before, but I completely forgot about it. It's especially odd, as cities just a few minutes away celebrate at the normal time.

One of the things I like about being here, 7 hours (6 for the next two weeks or so) hours ahead of Detroit, is that we're always...ahead. So, it was quite strange to hear from my family and to see the pictures of everyone dressed up in their costumes on Thursday, which was more or less a normal day here. And when we celebrated on Friday, everyone in the states had already been sober for hours (maybe).

Another interesting thing here is that the celebrations start well before Purim. The whole last week there were people walking around Jerusalem in costume (come to think of it, they might have just been weirdos).

On Thursday night after Megilla (I'll admit I really missed the Detroit Megilla reading, which is so much nicer than the one I went to), I managed to overcome my old man inertia and I went out to see what was going on around town. I planned to take the bus & train to Machane Yehudah, walk around there, continue until Ben Yehudah St. and then walk to Geulah. Turns out the buses and especially the trains, can't mover very well on Purim. It took about 45 minutes for what is normally a 10 minute ride. Everyone was dressed up and mostly drunk, or acting like it.

One nice thing (I'm choosing to take it as a good thing anyway) is that everyone here celebrates, even if (maybe especially if) they don't have any other connection to Judaism. It certainly makes for more interesting costumes. Machane Yehudah and Ben Yehudah St. were mob scenes, similar to Time Square on New Years Eve, except more lively and entertaining.

On Friday we had a brunch seudah so as not to have it interfere with Shabbos. Somehow I ended up hosting the Seudah for 5 seminary girls (two of them were my sisters), my nephew and my in-laws. We had bagels, lox, fake cream cheese and eggs with salami. There might have been more food, I don't recall. After the meal, Matis and I went around town with the girls and made some friends on the train, which was probably the most fun of the day. We walked to Geulah and met my totally sober (in case the grandparents are reading) cousin, but nothing interesting was happening because it was so close to Shabbos. The buses and trains stopped operating and we got stuck. We walked for about a half hour before finally finding a taxi that would take us the rest of the way (most of them refused to take us, b/c it wasn't a high enough fare).

We made it home less than an hour before Shabbos and fortunately we were able to put the seminary girls to work getting everything ready and that's the end of the story. Most of my pictures didn't come out, but here are a few that did. I threw in a few videos for good measure, but they may cause motion sickness, watch at your own risk. 

Not actually sure this was a costume. 

Are they selling alcohol? 

Dude, never break character! 

Not happy with his costume. 

Maybe some beer will help?

All happy now! Our costume/theme was green, I'm still not sure how that works. 

Picture with our new BFFs, notice how my sisters were such good seminary girls and stood 10 feet away from the boys.