Gender equality is a "faddish belief"

[2xx1xy1JD]

garnelironheart.blogspot.ca/2012/11/when-only-mechitzah-is-left.html

This had me banging my head on the desk this morning.

For a bit of background - "Garnel" is a Modern Orthodox guy. His style tends to be a bit "anyone to the right of me is a fanatic, anyone to the left is a heretic". In this case, he's criticizing the Open Orthodoxy movement, which is on the far liberal side of Orthodoxy.

I understand some of his points - he's saying that the focus on participating in synagogue services is misguided, because in Orthodox Judaism, group prayer isn't just something done once a week to feel good, but something that men 13 and over are required to do 3x/day and most women don't want to be subject to that obligation. Fine, it's an argument that gets repeated a lot. He could have made that argument without also adding this:

Inequality does not denote a superiority/inferiority relationship within Judaism but it does seem to within secular liberalism. For those Orthodox Jews who are enamoured by secular ethics and wish to practice a Judaism that is both traditional but also in consonance with the latest faddish beliefs in the West there is therefore a problem when it comes to how women are treated within Orthodoxy.

Gender equality, like skinny jeans, is apparently just the latest fad in the West.

Garnel is critiquing this article:

http://morethodoxy.org/2012/10/15/women ... ev-farber/

In doing so, he manages to quote parts of the above article completely out of context, and add a healthy dose of "isn't modern western society so horrible that we're going to hell in a handbasket".

So, Farber's article makes the point that ancient Jewish sages ruled that women shouldn't lead public prayers or Torah readings, even though they could, because it would offend the honor of the men (suggesting that they were so incompetent that they needed a woman to do these things for them). Farber goes on to say:

The sociological realities nowadays are entirely different. In our world, women hold every position of respect and power in the public sphere as men do. Women serve in Congress and the cabinet, women are judges, doctors, lawyers and police officers. The idea that a group of modern Western men would feel offended if a woman were to perform a public function in a synagogue should be laughable, except for the fact that they may think it a religious violation. But it is only a religious violation since the rabbis believed that the men would be offended. It is a vicious cycle that continues nowadays only due to the unfortunate combination of inertia, obliviousness to halakhic sources, and paternalism.

How does Garnel respond? With this doozy:

Ultimately, Rabbi Farber shows his hand. It isn't Torah values that guide his traditionalism but modern feminist values.

The sociological realities nowadays are entirely different.

Yes, a society in which women are treated as objects useful only for sex and having babies. A society in which the killing of unborn babies is treated as a "right" and men and women procreate without creating a stable family unit within which to raise the children. A society that is debating whether or not mind-altering drugs should be legal because apparently reality is too boring for too many people.

:roll:

[SayNoToMullets]

Reality is many things, but it is not boring. And sure enough, you couldn't make up a winner like this. Gender equality is not a fad but a goal, and one that our society has not achieved yet. We've made great progress, but when our autonomy is even up for debate, we can't take the standing we do have for granted.