I came to Holland in the summer of 1992 because I wanted to be able to determine my own future. I didn’t want to be forced into a destiny that other people had chosen for me, so I opted for the protection of the rule of law. Here in Holland, I found freedom and opportunities, and I took those opportunities to speak out against religious terror.
In January 2003, at the invitation of the VVD party, I became a member of parliament. I accepted the VVD’s invitation on the condition that I would be the party’s spokesman for the emancipation of women and the integration of immigrants.
What exactly did I want to achieve?
First of all I wanted to put the oppression of immigrant women -- especially Muslim women – squarely on the Dutch political agenda. Second, I wanted Holland to pay attention to the specific cultural and religious issues that were holding back many ethnic minorities, instead of always taking a one-sided approach that focused only on their socio-economic circumstances. Lastly, I wanted politicians to grasp the fact that major aspects of Islamic doctrine and tradition, as practiced today, are incompatible with the open society.
Now I have to ask myself, have I accomplished that task?
I have stumbled often in my political career. It has sometimes been frustrating and slow. However, I am completely certain that I have, in my own way, succeeded in contributing to the debate. Issues related to Islam – such as impediments to free speech; refusal of the separation of Church and State; widespread domestic violence; honor killings; the repudiation of wives; and Islam’s failure to condemn genital mutilation -- these subjects can no longer be swept under the carpet in our country’s capital. Some of the measures that this government has begun taking give me satisfaction. Many illusions of how easy it will be to establish a multicultural society have disappeared forever. We are now more realistic and more open in this debate, and I am proud to have contributed to that process.
Meanwhile, the ideas which I espouse have begun spreading to other countries. In recent years I have given speeches and attended debates in many European countries and in the United States. For months now, I have felt that I needed to make a decision: should I go on in Dutch politics, or should I now transfer my ideas to an international forum?
In the fall of 2005 I told Gerrit Zalm and Jozias van Aartsen, the leaders of the VVD, that I would not be a candidate for the parliamentary elections in 2007. I had decided to opt for a more international platform, because I wanted to contribute to the international debate on the emancipation of Muslim women and the complex relationship between Islam and the West.
Now that I am announcing that I will resign from Dutch politics, I would like to thank the members of the VVD for my years in parliament – to thank them for inviting me to stand for parliament, and -- perhaps more importantly -- for putting up with me while I was there, for this has been in many ways a rough ride for us all. I want to thank my other colleagues here in parliament for their help, although some of our debates have been sharp. (Femke Halsema, thank you especially for that!). I would also like to thank the 30,758 people who in January 2003 trusted their preference vote to a newcomer.
But why am I not remaining in parliament for my full term, until next year’s election? Why, after only three and a half years, have I decided to resign from the Lower Chamber?
It is common knowledge that threats against my life began building up ever since I first talked about Islam publicly, in the spring of 2002. Months before I even entered politics, my freedom of movement was greatly curtailed, and that became worse after Theo van Gogh was murdered in 2004. I have been obliged to move house so many times I have lost count. The direct cause for the ending of my membership in parliament is that on April 27 of this year, a Dutch court ruled that I must once again leave my home, because my neighbors filed a complaint that they could not feel safe living next to me. The Dutch government will appeal this verdict and I grateful for that, because how on earth will other people whose lives are threatened manage to find a place to stay if this verdict is allowed to rest? However, this appeal does not alter my situation: I have to leave my apartment by the end of August.
Another reason for my departure is the discussion that has arisen from a TV program, The Holy Ayaan, which was aired on May 11. This program centered on two issues: the story that I told when I was applying for asylum here in Holland, and questions about my forced marriage.
I have been very open about the fact that when I applied for asylum in the Netherlands in 1992, I did so under a false name and with a fabricated story. In 2002, I spoke on national television about the conditions of my arrival, and I said then that I fabricated a story in order to be able to receive asylum here. Since that TV program I have repeated this dozens of times, in Dutch and international media. Many times I have truthfully named my father and given my correct date of birth. (You will find a selection of these articles in the press folder). I also informed the VVD leadership and members of this fact when I was invited to stand for parliament.
I have said many times that I am not proud that I lied when I sought asylum in the Netherlands. It was wrong to do so. I did it because I felt I had no choice. I was frightened that if I simply said I was fleeing a forced marriage, I would be sent back to my family. And I was frightened that if I gave my real name, my clan would hunt me down and find me. So I chose a name that I thought I could disappear with – the real name of my grandfather, who was given the birth-name Ali. I claimed that my name was Ayaan Hirsi Ali, although I should have said it was Ayaan Hirsi Magan.
You probably are wondering, what is my real name?
I am Ayaan, the daughter of Hirsi, who is the son of a man who took the name of Magan. Magan was the son of Isse, who was the son of Guleid, who was the son of Ali. He was the son of Wai’ays, who was the son of Muhammad. He was the son of Ali, who was the son of Umar. Umar was the son of Osman, who was the son of Mahamud. This is my clan, and therefore, in Somalia, this is my name: Ayaan Hirsi Magan Isse Guleid Ali Wai’ays Muhammad Ali Umar Osman Mahamud.
Following the May 11 television broadcast, legal questions have been raised about my naturalization as a Dutch citizen. Minister Verdonk has written to me saying that my passport will be annulled, because it was issued to a person who does not hold my real name. I am not at liberty to discuss the legal issues in this case.
Now for the questions about my forced marriage. Last week’s TV program cast doubt on my credibility in that respect, and the final conclusion of the documentary is that all this is terribly complicated. Let me tell you, it’s not so complex. The allegations that I willingly married my distant cousin, and was present at the wedding ceremony, are simply untrue. This man arrived in Nairobi from Canada, asked my father for one of his five daughters, and my father gave him me. I can assure you my father is not a man who takes no for an answer. Still, I refused to attend the formal ceremony, and I was married regardless. Then, on my way to Canada -- during a stopover in Germany -- I traveled to the Netherlands and asked for asylum here. In all simplicity this is what happened, nothing more and nothing less. For those who are interested in the intimate details of my transition from a pre-modern society to a modern one, and how I came to love what the West stands for, please read my memoir, which is due to be published this fall.
To return to the present day, may I say that it is difficult to live with so many threats on your life and such a level of police protection. It is difficult to work as a parliamentarian if you have nowhere to live. All that is difficult, but not impossible. It has become impossible since last night, when Minister Verdonk informed me that she would strip me of my Dutch citizenship.
I am therefore preparing to leave Holland. But the questions for our society remain. The future of Islam in our country; the subjugation of women in Islamic culture; the integration of the many Muslims in the West: it is self-deceit to imagine that these issues will disappear.
I will continue to ask uncomfortable questions, despite the obvious resistance that they elicit. I feel that I should help other people to live in freedom, as many people have helped me. I personally have gone through a long and sometimes painful process of personal growth in this country. It began with learning to tell the truth to myself, and then the truth about myself: I strive now to also tell the truth about society as I see it.
That transition from becoming a member of a clan to becoming a citizen in an open society is what public service has come to mean for me. Only clear thinking and strong action can lead to real change, and free many people within our society from the mental cage of submission. The idea that I can contribute to their freedom, whether in the Netherlands or in another country, gives me deep satisfaction.
Ladies and Gentlemen, as of today, I resign from Parliament. I regret that I will be leaving the Netherlands, the country which has given me so many opportunities and enriched my life, but I am glad that I will be able to continue my work. I will go on.
------------------------------------------------
The Dutch version is below.
Persverklaring Ayaan Hirsi Ali
In de zomer van 1992 ben ik naar Nederland gekomen. Ik wilde mijn leven in eigen hand nemen. Omdat ik me niet wil laten vangen in een toekomst die anderen voor mij uitstippelen. Zoals velen heb ik gekozen voor de bescherming van de vrijheid. Die vrijheid heb ik hier gevonden.
Hier heb ik de mogelijkheden gekregen en aangegrepen voor mijn strijd tegen religieuze terreur.
In de winter van 2003 ben ik lid van de Tweede Kamer geworden. Dat was op uitnodiging van de VVD. Mijn voorwaarde was dat ik woordvoerder emancipatie en integratie zou worden. Dat is gelukt, maar in de politiek gaat niets vanzelf. Want wat wilde ik in het parlement bereiken?
Allereerst wilde ik de ondergeschikte positie van migrantenvrouwen aan de orde stellen, en met name die van moslimvrouwen.
Ik wilde aandacht voor de cultuur en religie van etnische minderheden en niet alleen voor hun sociaal-economische omstandigheden.
Ten slotte wilde ik dat het tot de politici hier zou doordringen dat de islam op belangrijke punten onverenigbaar is met de liberale rechtstaat.
En nu mag ik mij afvragen: ben ik hierin geslaagd?
Politiek was voor mij een kwestie van vallen en opstaan. Soms was het frustrerend en ging mij het allemaal veel te langzaam. Maar dit weet ik zeker: op mijn manier heb ik bijgedragen aan de debatten. Over de islam, de bedreiging van de vrijheid van meningsuiting, de scheiding tussen kerk en staat, huiselijk geweld, eerwraak, vrouwenbesnijdenis, het dumpen van vrouwen in hun land van herkomst. Deze zorgwekkende onderwerpen zijn niet meer weg te denken uit Den Haag.
De maatregelen die het kabinet neemt geven mij voldoening. Veel illusies over de multiculturele samenleving zijn voorgoed verdwenen: we zijn veel realistischer en opener geworden in het debat.
Intussen zijn mijn ideeën ook in het buitenland doorgedrongen. De afgelopen jaren heb ik in Europa en Amerika veel lezingen gehouden en debatten gevoerd.
Ik moest een afweging gaan maken. Ga ik verder in de Nederlandse politiek of moet ik mijn standpunten in een internationale omgeving uitdragen? In het najaar van 2005 vertelde ik Gerrit Zalm en Jozias van Aartsen dat ik niet beschikbaar zou zijn voor de lijst van 2007.
Ik kies nu voor een internationaal podium, omdat ik wil bijdragen aan het grensoverschrijdende debat over de emancipatie van moslimvrouwen en de ingewikkelde relatie tussen de islam en het Westen.
Ik wil de VVD bedanken voor mijn jaren in het parlement. Dat deze partij mij heeft gevraagd en - belangrijker nog - het met me heeft uitgehouden, is niet vanzelfsprekend. In het bijzonder wil ik mijn waardering uitspreken voor mijn fractiegenoten.
Ik wil mijn collega’s in de kamer bedanken, voor hun steun, al waren de debatten soms vinnig en scherp. Femke, dank je wel. Dank ook aan die 30.758 mensen die hun stem toevertrouwden aan een nieuweling.
Nu zult u zeggen, waarom blijf ik niet tot aan de verkiezingen van volgend jaar? Waarom heb ik besloten om na bijna drieëneenhalf jaar mijn lidmaatschap van de kamer te beëindigen?
Sinds ik in het voorjaar van 2002 publiekelijk over de islam ben gaan spreken, zijn de bedreigingen begonnen. Al ruim voordat ik in de politiek ging, is mijn bewegingsvrijheid daardoor ernstig beperkt. Dat is na de moord op Theo van Gogh alleen maar erger geworden.
De directe aanleiding voor het beëindigen van mijn kamerlidmaatschap is dan ook dat ik voor het einde van de zomer uit mijn huis moet vertrekken. Op 27 april heeft het hof die uitspraak gedaan. Naar aanleiding van een klacht die mijn buren hebben ingediend - omdat zij zich in mijn buurt niet veilig voelen - heeft het Hof hen in het gelijk gesteld en mij vier maanden de tijd gegeven om mijn huis te verlaten.
Nu moet ik weer verhuizen, maar ook mijn nieuwe buren weten van de uitspraak van dit Hof.
Minister Donner is in beroep gegaan tegen deze uitspraak en ik ben hem daar erkentelijk voor: want hoe zal het anderen vergaan die worden bedreigd wanneer deze uitspraak overeind blijft? Aan mijn situatie verandert het niets: ik moet in afwachting van het beroep weer mijn koffers pakken.
Een andere aanleiding voor mijn vertrek vormt de discussie over het tv-programma De heilige Ayaan. Daarbij gaat het om twee kwesties: de onjuiste gegevens die ik heb verstrekt om erkend te worden als vluchteling en het verhaal over mijn uithuwelijking.
Over het feit dat ik met een onjuiste naam en geboortedatum, en met een onjuist vluchtverhaal, naar Nederland ben gekomen, ben ik altijd zeer open geweest. In 2002 heb ik op televisie de precieze toedracht rond mijn aankomst voor het eerst uit de doeken gedaan. Sindsdien heb ik het tientallen keren herhaald, in binnen- en buitenland, in kranten, op radio en televisie. In de persmap vindt u een selectie hiervan. Ik heb vele malen de naam van mijn vader genoemd, ik heb mijn geboortedatum gegeven.
Nu vraagt u zich wellicht af: Hoe heet ik?
Ik ben Ayaan,
de dochter van Hirsi,
die de zoon is van Magan,
de zoon van Isse,
de zoon van Guleid,
die de zoon was van Ali,
die de zoon was van Wai’ays,
die de zoon was van Muhammad,
van Ali, van Umar,
van het geslacht Osman, de zoon van Mahamud.
Ik ben van deze clan. Mijn oervader is Darod, die achthonderd jaar geleden vanuit Arabië naar Somalië kwam en de grote stam van de Darod stichtte. Ik ben een Darod, een Macherten, een Osman Mahamud, en een Magan.
Vorige week was er nog enige verwarring over mijn naam.
Hoe ik heet ?
U weet nu hoe ik heet.
Er schijnen juridische vragen te bestaan omtrent de rechtsgeldigheid van mijn naturalisatie. Minister Verdonk heeft een onderzoek gelast. Ik kan de juridische problematiek niet overzien, maar ik wil wel zeggen: Hoe vaak geven mensen op de vlucht uit angst andere namen op? Wanneer het gaat om louter onjuiste persoonsgegevens is het ontnemen van de nationaliteit, in alle gevallen, ik herhaal: alle gevallen, een buitenproportionele sanctie.
Dan het verhaal over de uithuwelijking. Het tv-programma van vorige week trekt mijn geloofwaardigheid in twijfel. De slotconclusie van de makers is dat het allemaal erg ingewikkeld is. Ik kan u zeggen: dat valt wel mee.
De stelling dat ik vrijwillig een huwelijk ben aangegaan en aanwezig ben geweest op de bruiloft, is eenvoudigweg volledig onwaar. Er komt een verre neef uit Canada. Hij vraagt mijn vader om een van zijn vijf dochters. Mijn vader wijst mij aan. Ik kan u verzekeren mijn vader neemt geen genoegen met een ‘nee’. Onderweg naar Canada heb ik van een tussenstop in Duitsland gebruik gemaakt om naar Nederland te gaan en hier asiel aan te vragen.
Dat is in alle eenvoud het verhaal. Niets meer. Niets minder.
Kortom.
Ik ben dertien jaar geleden naar Nederland gekomen om mijn leven in eigen hand te nemen, om me niet te laten vangen in een leven dat anderen voor me uitgestippeld hadden.
Echter.
Het is moeilijk om met zoveel dreiging en politiebescherming te leven.
Het is moeilijk om als volksvertegenwoordiger te werken als je geen huis hebt. Moeilijk, maar nog niet onmogelijk.
Het is onmogelijk geworden nu de minister een hard oordeel over mijn Nederlanderschap heeft geveld.
Dit stemt me treurig, want ik zou mijn mandaat als kamerlid graag tot september willen afmaken.
Ik ga weg, maar de vragen blijven. De vragen over de toekomst van de islam in ons land, over de onderdrukking van vrouwen in de islamitische cultuur en over de integratie van de vele moslims in het Westen. Het is zelfbedrog om te denken dat alles weer zal worden als vroeger: na elf september is de wereld veranderd.
Ik ga door met het stellen van ongemakkelijke vragen. De weerstanden die dat oproept, zijn voor iedereen duidelijk. Ik voel de plicht om anderen te helpen in vrijheid te leven, zoals anderen dat ook voelen voor mij. Dat ik aan die emancipatie kan bijdragen - of dat nu in Nederland is of in een ander land – stemt mij gelukkig.
Ik ben Ayaan, de dochter van Hirsi, die de zoon was van Magan.
Vandaag leg ik mijn lidmaatschap van de Tweede Kamer neer.
Ik ga Nederland verlaten.
Verdrietig en opgelucht zal ik opnieuw mijn koffers pakken.
Ik ga door.
Tuesday, May 16, 2006
HOLLAND: SMALL-MINDED DUNG HEAP
Ayaan Hirsi Ali is losing her Dutch citizenship, resigning from Dutch politics, and leaving for the United States.
This is a direct result of a hatchet job by the newsprogramme Zembla, the sometime mouthpiece of the Dutch Labour Party (Partij van de Arbeid), which last week broadcast the. Shocking. News. That. Ayaan. Had. Not. Been Truthful. When Applying. For Asylum.
This was not entirely unknown. In fact, this had been well known even before she became a citizen. Many years before she entered Dutch politics. And way before she went from the PvdA to the VVD (Liberal Party). Nor had she ever said otherwise. She admitted that she embroidered her tale originally in order to be granted asylum. Repeatedly, and publicly.
She lied about her exact name and birthdate.
Minor errors, really, as is made clear by the press-release, but the Dutch have a talent for making a mountain out of a molehill.
The speed with which the Dutch Liberal Party rushed to stab her in the back was phenomenal.
Rita Verdonk, Dutch Minister for Integration, and member of the same party as Ayaan Hirsi Ali, pulled strings and worked over the weekend to yank Ms. Hirsi Ali's citizenship. Which is amazing, because Dutch bureaucrats normally don’t work more than half days even during the week. And this is vacation-time in Europe. But rules, even when they have been rewritten several times since Ayaan Hirsi Ali was granted asylum, are rules.
Hans Wiegel, one-time prime-minister candidate and failed leader of the liberals, popped his head out of the mud to state that Ayaan Hirsi Ali leaving politics and the country was not a loss.
Dutch politicians have once again proven that hypocrisy is a skill at which they excel.
And gallantry is something of which they have never even heard.
Oh well. A loss for the Netherlands, a gain for the United States.
This is a direct result of a hatchet job by the newsprogramme Zembla, the sometime mouthpiece of the Dutch Labour Party (Partij van de Arbeid), which last week broadcast the. Shocking. News. That. Ayaan. Had. Not. Been Truthful. When Applying. For Asylum.
This was not entirely unknown. In fact, this had been well known even before she became a citizen. Many years before she entered Dutch politics. And way before she went from the PvdA to the VVD (Liberal Party). Nor had she ever said otherwise. She admitted that she embroidered her tale originally in order to be granted asylum. Repeatedly, and publicly.
She lied about her exact name and birthdate.
Minor errors, really, as is made clear by the press-release, but the Dutch have a talent for making a mountain out of a molehill.
The speed with which the Dutch Liberal Party rushed to stab her in the back was phenomenal.
Rita Verdonk, Dutch Minister for Integration, and member of the same party as Ayaan Hirsi Ali, pulled strings and worked over the weekend to yank Ms. Hirsi Ali's citizenship. Which is amazing, because Dutch bureaucrats normally don’t work more than half days even during the week. And this is vacation-time in Europe. But rules, even when they have been rewritten several times since Ayaan Hirsi Ali was granted asylum, are rules.
Hans Wiegel, one-time prime-minister candidate and failed leader of the liberals, popped his head out of the mud to state that Ayaan Hirsi Ali leaving politics and the country was not a loss.
Dutch politicians have once again proven that hypocrisy is a skill at which they excel.
And gallantry is something of which they have never even heard.
Oh well. A loss for the Netherlands, a gain for the United States.
Thursday, May 11, 2006
FREE ALAA AHMED SEIF AL-ISLAM
Jameel at the Muqata posts about an Egyptian who is being held in prison for something so mundane as blogging. Well, that is to say, blogging in a way that the Egyptian authorities do not like. [Note: Jameel is at this address: http://muqata.blogspot.com/]
You and I have the right to say whatever we darn well want, in almost any way we want - it's called freedom of speech, and is apparently something we're trying to teach the Iraqis (quite successfully, I might add) - but in Egypt the authorities have a hard time understanding the concept. Even more so when literate people try it.
So of course Alaa Ahmed Seif Al-Islam is in the klink.
Now, why should I care? Why should you care?
1. Well, he's pretty much on our side, and has not tried to blow any of us sky-high. Which is very refreshing, and we might as well admit that we like that.
2. He's in jail for speaking out, and we like people who speak out. Societies that allow loudmouths to point out that the emperor has no clothes will have far fewer naked ugly fat men walking around - you know what I mean.
3. I've never had any limitation on my freedom of speech, and neither have you. But, in a general sense, when freedom of speech is limited somewhere, it affects freedom of speech everywhere. So we are obligated to speak out.
HOW CAN YOU SPEAK OUT?
A good place to start is here:
http://freealaa.blogspot.com/
Or here:
Freedom of Speech Starts With Freeing the Speaker
http://abbagav.blogspot.com/2006/05/freedom-of-speech-starts-with-freeing.html
Or here:
Let the blogger go
http://ontheface.blogware.com/blog/_archives/2006/5/10/1944991.html
Sign petitions, or organize one and have others sign. Write pointed (yet polite) letters to politicians and of course to the Egyptian embassy and consulates. Wake up your congressman.
On a related note, there are blogs written by people in the Arab world wich are very well worth reading. Here's a few to get you started:
http://www.bigpharaoh.com/
[Educated broadminded Egyptian, probably gonna end up in the klink too.]
http://mahmood.tv/
[Bahraini with a business bent, but more education than your typical American suburbanite bidniz drone. Witty.]
http://www.sandmonkey.org/
[Snarky, secular, and passionate. All-round decent fellow, great list of other Middle-Eastern bloggers on his blog roll, and an icon of Johnny Bravo (!) in his blog title bar.]
http://muttawa.blogspot.com/
[One of the best reads ever. An Arab Jonathan Swift. ]
And if you want to know what it's like to be in an Egyptian jail, go to Alaa's site itself, right here:
http://www.manalaa.net/alaa_blogs_from_prison
Oh, and visit Jameel (here: http://muqata.blogspot.com/).
You and I have the right to say whatever we darn well want, in almost any way we want - it's called freedom of speech, and is apparently something we're trying to teach the Iraqis (quite successfully, I might add) - but in Egypt the authorities have a hard time understanding the concept. Even more so when literate people try it.
So of course Alaa Ahmed Seif Al-Islam is in the klink.
Now, why should I care? Why should you care?
1. Well, he's pretty much on our side, and has not tried to blow any of us sky-high. Which is very refreshing, and we might as well admit that we like that.
2. He's in jail for speaking out, and we like people who speak out. Societies that allow loudmouths to point out that the emperor has no clothes will have far fewer naked ugly fat men walking around - you know what I mean.
3. I've never had any limitation on my freedom of speech, and neither have you. But, in a general sense, when freedom of speech is limited somewhere, it affects freedom of speech everywhere. So we are obligated to speak out.
HOW CAN YOU SPEAK OUT?
A good place to start is here:
http://freealaa.blogspot.com/
Or here:
Freedom of Speech Starts With Freeing the Speaker
http://abbagav.blogspot.com/2006/05/freedom-of-speech-starts-with-freeing.html
Or here:
Let the blogger go
http://ontheface.blogware.com/blog/_archives/2006/5/10/1944991.html
Sign petitions, or organize one and have others sign. Write pointed (yet polite) letters to politicians and of course to the Egyptian embassy and consulates. Wake up your congressman.
On a related note, there are blogs written by people in the Arab world wich are very well worth reading. Here's a few to get you started:
http://www.bigpharaoh.com/
[Educated broadminded Egyptian, probably gonna end up in the klink too.]
http://mahmood.tv/
[Bahraini with a business bent, but more education than your typical American suburbanite bidniz drone. Witty.]
http://www.sandmonkey.org/
[Snarky, secular, and passionate. All-round decent fellow, great list of other Middle-Eastern bloggers on his blog roll, and an icon of Johnny Bravo (!) in his blog title bar.]
http://muttawa.blogspot.com/
[One of the best reads ever. An Arab Jonathan Swift. ]
And if you want to know what it's like to be in an Egyptian jail, go to Alaa's site itself, right here:
http://www.manalaa.net/alaa_blogs_from_prison
Oh, and visit Jameel (here: http://muqata.blogspot.com/).
Wednesday, May 10, 2006
KVETCH! KVETCH! KVETCH! Or, in defense of Lakewoodyid, while not yielding more than an inch. More or less.
This posting is in reference to Dovbear’s posting regarding the Gerrer and Rav Aharon Leib Steinman chartering the first class section of an El Al flight, and requesting no women flight attendants in their section (see here: http://dovbear.blogspot.com/2006/05/what-unbelievable-waste-of-money.html), and in relation thereto my own snarky posting (see here: http://atthebackofthehill.blogspot.com/2006/05/first-el-al-hotty-contest.html ) in which I joyfully announce a beauty contest, requesting essays naming and describing the El Al flight attendant most likely to cause a disruption in the force….., erm, disturbance of a Tzaddik’s spiritual equilibrium.
There were fairly few visitors who left comments on my blog (but I treasure them all the more, oh happy few – “The fewer men, the greater share of kavod; Hashem’s will! I pray thee, wish not one man more;
B’ mishaybeirach avoseinu, I am not covetous for gold, Nor care I who doth feed upon my cost; It yearns me not if men my garments wear; Such outward things dwell not in my desires. But if it be an aveirah to covet koved, I am the most offending soul alive". --- from the play ‘Melech Chaim Ha-Chamisha’, by R. William Shakespeare).
On Dovbear’s blog, however, it was a different story.
155 comments!
And several writers sought Lakewood Yid’s response. They craved it, they panted as puppies after the hare, they yelped at the prospect of chase. They positively howled.
And he responded.
Hereunder a selection of his responses.
[Note: Statement that he quoted in bold, as is farily typical. His comment thereupon in regular type. My comment to his comment underneath, in bold small type, within square brackets.
>Wow. I eagerly await LY's justification for this.
You asked for it. Here I go.
>I'm offended. How many in the Ger community are struggling to get by, and subsizing on government assistance? Quite a few, I'll bet. And their grand rebbe treats himself, not just to a first class ticket to America, but to the entire first class section?
He brings along his entourage. Some seats are "sold" to those willing to pay for the Zechiyah to travel with the Rebbe.
You'll spend 40k on a SUV, 20k on a pool, 10k on pesach hotel, and they are willing to spend on traveling with the Rebbe. Who are you to judge how they spend there money? (shall I ask you if your $85 custom shirt was a neccasity?
[That point about paying for the zechiyah is a good one. I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if that flight turns a handsome profit well-before they’re airborne. And these people cannot escape – how many hours of subtle pressure will they be subjected to? By the time they’re on the ground in the New World, several will have to whip out their ATM cards just to pay the porters.]
--- - ---
>And what about the women workers who were put out of work? I hope El Al paid them anyway.
Out of work? They simply swapped the females of this flight for the males of another flight.
>If you don't want to see women....stay home!
We believes the opposite. כבודת בת מלך פנימה
[I disagree with him on this one. But I will not argue it - he’s entitled to his opinion, I am entitled to mine. But note the plural form of the verb (‘believes’). In the heat of the moment, his thoughts adhered to a yiddish grammatical pattern. Interesting, no?]
>And just from seeing a fully dressed woman doing her job? That's insane, disgusting and degrading to women.
The Rambam says that one should not even look at the colored clothing of woman. Is that also insane, disgusting and degrading to women?
http://www.mechon-mamre.org/i/5121.htm <http://www.mechon-mamre.org/i/5121.htm>
כ [כא] וכן אסור לאדם להסתכל בנשים, בשעה שהן עומדות על הכבוסה; ואפילו להסתכל בבגדי צבע של אישה שהוא מכירה--אסור, שלא יבוא לידי הרהור.
[The Rambam lived in the Islamic world. I shall assume that there was an influence from his environment, and that he found justifications for something he already believed (much as a Christian will find proof of some mighty weird stuff in the writings of the prophets). ]
>I get that they don't want to watch movies. Whatever. So don't watch the movies. But to have the entire flight without them?
Oh, my heart BLEEEEEDS for those poor unfortunate souls who will have to go for 10 hours without watching the tube. Have a nice chat with your neighbor, read a paper, or close your eyes for some shut eye. And if you are still bored, strike up a conversation with a charedi passenger. You'll be pleasantly surprised.
[I have to agree with him. Absolutely. Talk, read, or sleep. That movie is probably garbage anyway, and how often can you watch Hugh Grant being loveably mumbly gimbolly English? From Heathrow to SF is three good-size books. If you don’t want to rely on the airport shops for reading material, bring some from home. Movies, bah!]
>A rebbe cannot wear sun-glasses? A rebbe cannot divert his eyes and his mind from a shapely ankle? A rebbe might turn into a beast if distracted by a passing snooky? What kind of a rebbe is this?!?!?!?!? Depose the bulgar, and get a rebbe who at least has a modicum of self-control and common sense.
And that from such an illistrious yichus.
Gevald Geshrigen, mein tayera BOTH, hust dee amuhl gehert fin "heilege oigen"? Ken ah heiligeh tzadik zain in ree'ach hakodesh ven es dreit zich yungeh shikses?!?
--- - ---
>Because that money could be used for tzedakah instead of indulgence.
>The very idea of flying first class to collect money for tzedakah is ludicrous.
Its not indulgence. Its Kovod Hatorah. Two of the greatest Gedolei Hatorah should sit farkveched like sardines for 10 hours?
>The big tzadik has spent his whole life immersed in Torah and he can't stop thinking about girls?
>So what? Are the rebbes that fragile that the mere sight of a woman in jeans or a short-sleeved shirt will send them into spasms? Guess none of their Torah study really did them much good, if they're that fragile.
הלל אומר, ואל תאמין בעצמך עד יום מותך
Hillel, who laid on the rooftop covered in snow to hear the words of Torah said that.
>Through your tax dollars. Chasidim are notorious welfare cheats. That's how they get by, as everyone knows. Ger does not offer social services.
Shame on you. Your so concerned about 3 or 4 stewerdess, and you have no problem libeling chasidim as notorious cheats.
[I have a slight problem with generalizations like ‘Chasidim are notorious welfare cheats’. That’s like saying Dutchmen are notorious penny-pinchers, Brabanders are men of blood – brigands, rapists, and incendiarists, and Flemings are soft as butter. There may be a kernel of truth, but it also tars many who are upstanding folks with the same brush.
I will say that I am inclined to believe that many Chassidim are poor as church-mice. A lack of easily convertible capital kinda goes with the territory. I will also grant that some are, by the standards of us outsiders, ethically challenged. Or nearly desperate. And I really get ticked-off by all the querulent shnoderish e-mails I get before Peysach, before Yom Kippur, before Rosh Hashana, before Chanukah, and before anybody else has sent out theirs. No, I cannot afford to drop some dough on every Tom, Dick, and Harry charity.
There are precisely four causes that I contribute to. And I am not a stingy Dutchman when I give (being, instead, more like a Brabander. But that is no nevermind).
1. Breast cancer research and treatment (benign self interest, in a way. There’s roughly one nice mammary per person on this planet).
2.
Aids-related causes. Because I cannot stand that self-righteous, bigoted, blinkered, mean-spirited attitude so characteristic of Fundamentalist Christians and the ultra-right, who hold that “those people” got “just what they deserved”. Who-the-sheol are they to be so judgemental?
3.
Non-denominational drug-treatment. Of which one of the better ones is the centre run by Chabad in Los Angeles (they are probably the LEAST likely to tell a person trying to kick the habit and get his or her life back together to find 'go find Cheeses and be SAYevedddd!').
4.
Street-corner beggars. Many of them are not capable of lifting themselves up by their boot-straps, and it really does take a five days a week to scam the system (and the pay-off, here in SF, is that you can live in a really horrid residential hotel rent free, with no money for food, OR you can eat for two and a half-weeks while living in doorways).]
>As long as they aren't violating indecency laws, it's not the Ger's place to control other people's clothing choices.
They aren't. They are simply chartering a cabin.
>What's really outrageous is that EL Al caved to the demands. If I were running the airline, I'd have told them to blow off and buy their own airplane and hire their own crew.
Boy are you a bad business man.
>Which is why I think that the non-Orthodox who engage in real tikkun olam, even if they have a cheeseburger or two along the way, are doing more of G-d's work and are likely more assured of a place in the world to be.
>Her view of tikkun olam is the only real view of tikkun olam. The hasidic version is horse crap and excuse making.
If you have so little self control that you can't avoid a cheeseburger, your so called "tikkun olam" might be worthless to God.
[The same self-control which I advocate for rebbeyim worried about the temptation of a shapely ankle or a apple-like upper-body part comes into play with cheeseburgers. If a Rebbe can and should ‘not look’, then a frummer yid, a shomer mitzvos, can surely ‘not fress a burger’.
>where does this new style fundamentalist yideskeit come from?
From Avrohom Avinu.
"As he came near and was about to enter Egypt, he said to his wife Sarai, "Behold, I now realize that you are a woman of beautiful appearance."
Rashi:
"The Aggadaic explanation is: Until now he had not been aware [of her beauty] due to the modesty of both of them."
[Sometimes Rashi allowed the fumes from those casks of wine to get to his brain. Emmes.
Avraham Avinu is an interesting and inspiring character precisely because he isn’t a saint. Instead, think of him as the poster-boy for the progression from pretty fair ignoramus to G-od fearing complexity and motivation. The Avraham we first meet in Parshas Lech Leicha is not the same as the man who dies at the end of Chayei Sarah.
Rashi explains, but Rashi at times likes the simplest explanation that will clarify a point. Even if it bends credultiy outta shape entirely.]
>are we all to stop flying unless we can buy first class tickets?is this holiness? is this what the torah wants from us
No. People like you don't need to.
See (cut) analogy about a speck of dirt on a potato.
[It’s a good point. I reject it, but I understand it.]
>I'm pretty sure that the majority of people in williamsburg arent welfare cheats. DB, are you willing to back that statement?
What massive Motzi Shem Rah. And I will say this in defense of those who do cheat. There is a budget to welfare (etc) programs. If not me, the money goes to the next guy. Why should a mexican or black deserve it more than me, if thats what will enable me to learn Torah?
[Many commenters have jumped all over this statement (see here: http://dovbear.blogspot.com/2006/05/crooked-jewish-morality.html - and note especially some of the comments).
But this phrase hinges on the “more than”. This does not mean that they deserve it ‘less than’, as many seem to have read. It suggests to me that their need is equal.
>However, this separation of men and women always gets my goat because it implies literally putting the women at the back of the bus. It also shows a lack of respect for the female flight attendants who want simply to do their jobs.
At Matan Torah, were the women in front or the back? And you are sooooo concerned about a "a lack of respect for the female flight attendants". Where is your respect for two Gedolei Yisroel?
[Both writers here have a point. For myself, I have no problem with women sitting all over the bus – I have enough self-control that I can avoid looking at their shapely cheeseburgers.]
>but...the pursuit of purity should not entail treating women like they are filthy scum that will defile and infect you
Who is treating them like scum? Women have a lofty position in Ultra Orthodoxy. Do you sing Eishes Chayil every friday night? Sit down for a few minutes and analyze what it says and them come back here and tell me that we treat women like scum.
[Note also that the reason why the inheritance of Jewishness comes from the mother is because the neshomo comes from the mother (yes, yes, I know that is hard to swallow for some skeptics – but if you don’t believe that, you probably don’t sing Eishes Chayil either, so….).]
--- - ---
>please explain that bit about the servant (!) looking at the girl with the jugs.
>You know, Eliezer looking at Rivka.
Silly question. It was for the purpose of a shidduch. דאמר רב יהודה אמר רב אסור לאדם שיקדש את האשה עד שיראנה שמא יראה בה דבר מגונה ותתגנה עליו ורחמנא אמר (ויקרא יט <http://www.blogger.com/Local%20Settings/Temp/msohtml1/16/clip_image001.gif> ואהבת לרעך כמוך
And what did Rivka do when they approached yitzchok?
"And she said unto the servant: 'What man is this that walketh in the field to meet us?' And the servant said: 'It is my master.' And she took her veil, and covered herself.
[Ah, he reprimands me with the actual interpretation of the verse.]
>I just realized that the Rebbe seems to prefer gay men to serve him than women....
Disgusting of you. You should bury your head in shame. (even if it was just a joke).
[Two comments:
1.
Maybe the Rebbe is not judgemental. Why should he even devote anytime to considering what the sexual proclivities of people within seeing distance are? I certainly do not secretely go around thinking ‘that one is gay, that one is straight, that one is farklempt, that one has gender issues, and that one likes sheep. Kalvechomer the Rebbe doesn’t either.
2.
Rabbeyim and Catholic padreyim are not the same. I would rather not draw any comparisonim – I am not particularly fond of galachim. And certainly rebbeyim are not teevee-preacher meshuganim, all screaming vicious disapprovalim.]
>and you're just the one to determine how G-d values the efforts of others in the realm of tikkun olam?
Of course not. But neither is Anonymousy who said:
"Which is why I think that the non-Orthodox who engage in real tikkun olam, even if they have a cheeseburger or two along the way, are doing more of G-d's work and are likely more assured of a place in the world to be."
Now here is where I react to one of LY's comments directed at me. I do so because this is my blog, and I can.
>Gevald Geshrigen, mein tayera BOTH, hust dee amuhl gehert fin "heilege oigen"? Ken ah heiligeh tzadik zain in ree'ach hakodesh ven es dreit zich yungeh shikses?!?
Siz a gitte kashe. Ober a tzaddik ken di oign tsukleppn, voss? Reiach hakoidesh iz in rosh - di yinge shikses dreien zich nor ba ponim.
"Shoftim ve shotrim titeinu-lecha, be chol sheariteicha, asher HaShem notein lach" Er ken oikh nit kikn, nit?
The Back of the Hill
----------------- ----------------- -----------------
In conclusion, Lakewood Yid scored many points. I still think that the expense is a monumental waste of money, I still think it shows a lack of humilty, but in the eyes of the Talmedim of the two rabbis in question, it may very well be money well spent.
I also do not agree with much of what he said. Two years from now I might agree more (not likely), and two years from now he may hold a different point of view (a bit more likely).
I also note, again, an anti-Chassidishe taam to many of the comments.
There were fairly few visitors who left comments on my blog (but I treasure them all the more, oh happy few – “The fewer men, the greater share of kavod; Hashem’s will! I pray thee, wish not one man more;
B’ mishaybeirach avoseinu, I am not covetous for gold, Nor care I who doth feed upon my cost; It yearns me not if men my garments wear; Such outward things dwell not in my desires. But if it be an aveirah to covet koved, I am the most offending soul alive". --- from the play ‘Melech Chaim Ha-Chamisha’, by R. William Shakespeare).
On Dovbear’s blog, however, it was a different story.
155 comments!
And several writers sought Lakewood Yid’s response. They craved it, they panted as puppies after the hare, they yelped at the prospect of chase. They positively howled.
And he responded.
Hereunder a selection of his responses.
[Note: Statement that he quoted in bold, as is farily typical. His comment thereupon in regular type. My comment to his comment underneath, in bold small type, within square brackets.
>Wow. I eagerly await LY's justification for this.
You asked for it. Here I go.
>I'm offended. How many in the Ger community are struggling to get by, and subsizing on government assistance? Quite a few, I'll bet. And their grand rebbe treats himself, not just to a first class ticket to America, but to the entire first class section?
He brings along his entourage. Some seats are "sold" to those willing to pay for the Zechiyah to travel with the Rebbe.
You'll spend 40k on a SUV, 20k on a pool, 10k on pesach hotel, and they are willing to spend on traveling with the Rebbe. Who are you to judge how they spend there money? (shall I ask you if your $85 custom shirt was a neccasity?
[That point about paying for the zechiyah is a good one. I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if that flight turns a handsome profit well-before they’re airborne. And these people cannot escape – how many hours of subtle pressure will they be subjected to? By the time they’re on the ground in the New World, several will have to whip out their ATM cards just to pay the porters.]
--- - ---
>And what about the women workers who were put out of work? I hope El Al paid them anyway.
Out of work? They simply swapped the females of this flight for the males of another flight.
>If you don't want to see women....stay home!
We believes the opposite. כבודת בת מלך פנימה
[I disagree with him on this one. But I will not argue it - he’s entitled to his opinion, I am entitled to mine. But note the plural form of the verb (‘believes’). In the heat of the moment, his thoughts adhered to a yiddish grammatical pattern. Interesting, no?]
--- - ---
>And just from seeing a fully dressed woman doing her job? That's insane, disgusting and degrading to women.
The Rambam says that one should not even look at the colored clothing of woman. Is that also insane, disgusting and degrading to women?
http://www.mechon-mamre.org/i/5121.htm <http://www.mechon-mamre.org/i/5121.htm>
כ [כא] וכן אסור לאדם להסתכל בנשים, בשעה שהן עומדות על הכבוסה; ואפילו להסתכל בבגדי צבע של אישה שהוא מכירה--אסור, שלא יבוא לידי הרהור.
[The Rambam lived in the Islamic world. I shall assume that there was an influence from his environment, and that he found justifications for something he already believed (much as a Christian will find proof of some mighty weird stuff in the writings of the prophets). ]
--- - ---
>I get that they don't want to watch movies. Whatever. So don't watch the movies. But to have the entire flight without them?
Oh, my heart BLEEEEEDS for those poor unfortunate souls who will have to go for 10 hours without watching the tube. Have a nice chat with your neighbor, read a paper, or close your eyes for some shut eye. And if you are still bored, strike up a conversation with a charedi passenger. You'll be pleasantly surprised.
[I have to agree with him. Absolutely. Talk, read, or sleep. That movie is probably garbage anyway, and how often can you watch Hugh Grant being loveably mumbly gimbolly English? From Heathrow to SF is three good-size books. If you don’t want to rely on the airport shops for reading material, bring some from home. Movies, bah!]
--- - ---
>A rebbe cannot wear sun-glasses? A rebbe cannot divert his eyes and his mind from a shapely ankle? A rebbe might turn into a beast if distracted by a passing snooky? What kind of a rebbe is this?!?!?!?!? Depose the bulgar, and get a rebbe who at least has a modicum of self-control and common sense.
And that from such an illistrious yichus.
Gevald Geshrigen, mein tayera BOTH, hust dee amuhl gehert fin "heilege oigen"? Ken ah heiligeh tzadik zain in ree'ach hakodesh ven es dreit zich yungeh shikses?!?
--- - ---
>Because that money could be used for tzedakah instead of indulgence.
>The very idea of flying first class to collect money for tzedakah is ludicrous.
Its not indulgence. Its Kovod Hatorah. Two of the greatest Gedolei Hatorah should sit farkveched like sardines for 10 hours?
>The big tzadik has spent his whole life immersed in Torah and he can't stop thinking about girls?
>So what? Are the rebbes that fragile that the mere sight of a woman in jeans or a short-sleeved shirt will send them into spasms? Guess none of their Torah study really did them much good, if they're that fragile.
הלל אומר, ואל תאמין בעצמך עד יום מותך
Hillel, who laid on the rooftop covered in snow to hear the words of Torah said that.
>Through your tax dollars. Chasidim are notorious welfare cheats. That's how they get by, as everyone knows. Ger does not offer social services.
Shame on you. Your so concerned about 3 or 4 stewerdess, and you have no problem libeling chasidim as notorious cheats.
[I have a slight problem with generalizations like ‘Chasidim are notorious welfare cheats’. That’s like saying Dutchmen are notorious penny-pinchers, Brabanders are men of blood – brigands, rapists, and incendiarists, and Flemings are soft as butter. There may be a kernel of truth, but it also tars many who are upstanding folks with the same brush.
I will say that I am inclined to believe that many Chassidim are poor as church-mice. A lack of easily convertible capital kinda goes with the territory. I will also grant that some are, by the standards of us outsiders, ethically challenged. Or nearly desperate. And I really get ticked-off by all the querulent shnoderish e-mails I get before Peysach, before Yom Kippur, before Rosh Hashana, before Chanukah, and before anybody else has sent out theirs. No, I cannot afford to drop some dough on every Tom, Dick, and Harry charity.
There are precisely four causes that I contribute to. And I am not a stingy Dutchman when I give (being, instead, more like a Brabander. But that is no nevermind).
1. Breast cancer research and treatment (benign self interest, in a way. There’s roughly one nice mammary per person on this planet).
2.
Aids-related causes. Because I cannot stand that self-righteous, bigoted, blinkered, mean-spirited attitude so characteristic of Fundamentalist Christians and the ultra-right, who hold that “those people” got “just what they deserved”. Who-the-sheol are they to be so judgemental?
3.
Non-denominational drug-treatment. Of which one of the better ones is the centre run by Chabad in Los Angeles (they are probably the LEAST likely to tell a person trying to kick the habit and get his or her life back together to find 'go find Cheeses and be SAYevedddd!').
4.
Street-corner beggars. Many of them are not capable of lifting themselves up by their boot-straps, and it really does take a five days a week to scam the system (and the pay-off, here in SF, is that you can live in a really horrid residential hotel rent free, with no money for food, OR you can eat for two and a half-weeks while living in doorways).]
--- - ---
>As long as they aren't violating indecency laws, it's not the Ger's place to control other people's clothing choices.
They aren't. They are simply chartering a cabin.
>What's really outrageous is that EL Al caved to the demands. If I were running the airline, I'd have told them to blow off and buy their own airplane and hire their own crew.
Boy are you a bad business man.
>Which is why I think that the non-Orthodox who engage in real tikkun olam, even if they have a cheeseburger or two along the way, are doing more of G-d's work and are likely more assured of a place in the world to be.
>Her view of tikkun olam is the only real view of tikkun olam. The hasidic version is horse crap and excuse making.
If you have so little self control that you can't avoid a cheeseburger, your so called "tikkun olam" might be worthless to God.
[The same self-control which I advocate for rebbeyim worried about the temptation of a shapely ankle or a apple-like upper-body part comes into play with cheeseburgers. If a Rebbe can and should ‘not look’, then a frummer yid, a shomer mitzvos, can surely ‘not fress a burger’.
B'yadacher, I do not consider lapses such a humongous aveirah either. Life is a progression - you should be a better person when you leave it than when you entered. ]
--- - ---
>where does this new style fundamentalist yideskeit come from?
From Avrohom Avinu.
"As he came near and was about to enter Egypt, he said to his wife Sarai, "Behold, I now realize that you are a woman of beautiful appearance."
Rashi:
"The Aggadaic explanation is: Until now he had not been aware [of her beauty] due to the modesty of both of them."
[Sometimes Rashi allowed the fumes from those casks of wine to get to his brain. Emmes.
Avraham Avinu is an interesting and inspiring character precisely because he isn’t a saint. Instead, think of him as the poster-boy for the progression from pretty fair ignoramus to G-od fearing complexity and motivation. The Avraham we first meet in Parshas Lech Leicha is not the same as the man who dies at the end of Chayei Sarah.
Rashi explains, but Rashi at times likes the simplest explanation that will clarify a point. Even if it bends credultiy outta shape entirely.]
--- - ---
>are we all to stop flying unless we can buy first class tickets?is this holiness? is this what the torah wants from us
No. People like you don't need to.
See (cut) analogy about a speck of dirt on a potato.
[It’s a good point. I reject it, but I understand it.]
--- - ---
>I'm pretty sure that the majority of people in williamsburg arent welfare cheats. DB, are you willing to back that statement?
What massive Motzi Shem Rah. And I will say this in defense of those who do cheat. There is a budget to welfare (etc) programs. If not me, the money goes to the next guy. Why should a mexican or black deserve it more than me, if thats what will enable me to learn Torah?
[Many commenters have jumped all over this statement (see here: http://dovbear.blogspot.com/2006/05/crooked-jewish-morality.html - and note especially some of the comments).
But this phrase hinges on the “more than”. This does not mean that they deserve it ‘less than’, as many seem to have read. It suggests to me that their need is equal.
I agree that it is an unfortunate way of expressing the idea. But careful reading, tayere chaveirim, is a mitzvah.
The point about the budget is also fairly accurate – once the pot is empty, even the most deserving pauper cannot get any soup.]
The point about the budget is also fairly accurate – once the pot is empty, even the most deserving pauper cannot get any soup.]
--- - ---
>However, this separation of men and women always gets my goat because it implies literally putting the women at the back of the bus. It also shows a lack of respect for the female flight attendants who want simply to do their jobs.
At Matan Torah, were the women in front or the back? And you are sooooo concerned about a "a lack of respect for the female flight attendants". Where is your respect for two Gedolei Yisroel?
[Both writers here have a point. For myself, I have no problem with women sitting all over the bus – I have enough self-control that I can avoid looking at their shapely cheeseburgers.]
--- - ---
>but...the pursuit of purity should not entail treating women like they are filthy scum that will defile and infect you
Who is treating them like scum? Women have a lofty position in Ultra Orthodoxy. Do you sing Eishes Chayil every friday night? Sit down for a few minutes and analyze what it says and them come back here and tell me that we treat women like scum.
[Note also that the reason why the inheritance of Jewishness comes from the mother is because the neshomo comes from the mother (yes, yes, I know that is hard to swallow for some skeptics – but if you don’t believe that, you probably don’t sing Eishes Chayil either, so….).]
--- - ---
>please explain that bit about the servant (!) looking at the girl with the jugs.
>You know, Eliezer looking at Rivka.
Silly question. It was for the purpose of a shidduch. דאמר רב יהודה אמר רב אסור לאדם שיקדש את האשה עד שיראנה שמא יראה בה דבר מגונה ותתגנה עליו ורחמנא אמר (ויקרא יט <http://www.blogger.com/Local%20Settings/Temp/msohtml1/16/clip_image001.gif> ואהבת לרעך כמוך
And what did Rivka do when they approached yitzchok?
"And she said unto the servant: 'What man is this that walketh in the field to meet us?' And the servant said: 'It is my master.' And she took her veil, and covered herself.
[Ah, he reprimands me with the actual interpretation of the verse.]
--- - ---
>I just realized that the Rebbe seems to prefer gay men to serve him than women....
Disgusting of you. You should bury your head in shame. (even if it was just a joke).
[Two comments:
Maybe the Rebbe is not judgemental. Why should he even devote anytime to considering what the sexual proclivities of people within seeing distance are? I certainly do not secretely go around thinking ‘that one is gay, that one is straight, that one is farklempt, that one has gender issues, and that one likes sheep. Kalvechomer the Rebbe doesn’t either.
2.
Rabbeyim and Catholic padreyim are not the same. I would rather not draw any comparisonim – I am not particularly fond of galachim. And certainly rebbeyim are not teevee-preacher meshuganim, all screaming vicious disapprovalim.]
--- - ---
>and you're just the one to determine how G-d values the efforts of others in the realm of tikkun olam?
Of course not. But neither is Anonymousy who said:
"Which is why I think that the non-Orthodox who engage in real tikkun olam, even if they have a cheeseburger or two along the way, are doing more of G-d's work and are likely more assured of a place in the world to be."
--- - ---
Now here is where I react to one of LY's comments directed at me. I do so because this is my blog, and I can.
>Gevald Geshrigen, mein tayera BOTH, hust dee amuhl gehert fin "heilege oigen"? Ken ah heiligeh tzadik zain in ree'ach hakodesh ven es dreit zich yungeh shikses?!?
Siz a gitte kashe. Ober a tzaddik ken di oign tsukleppn, voss? Reiach hakoidesh iz in rosh - di yinge shikses dreien zich nor ba ponim.
"Shoftim ve shotrim titeinu-lecha, be chol sheariteicha, asher HaShem notein lach" Er ken oikh nit kikn, nit?
The Back of the Hill
----------------- ----------------- -----------------
In conclusion, Lakewood Yid scored many points. I still think that the expense is a monumental waste of money, I still think it shows a lack of humilty, but in the eyes of the Talmedim of the two rabbis in question, it may very well be money well spent.
I also do not agree with much of what he said. Two years from now I might agree more (not likely), and two years from now he may hold a different point of view (a bit more likely).
But he came out swinging, and acquitted himself well. Kol Hakavod.
I also note, again, an anti-Chassidishe taam to many of the comments.
Rabbosai, please! If you think Chassidim do not represent normative Judaism, surely such bitchiness doesn't either!
And, as they say, you win more flies with honey than with vinegar.
And, as they say, you win more flies with honey than with vinegar.
Don't you want some of 'them' to think like little clones of you? Of course you do! Isn't that the reason for aza gekvetch und geschrei?
Verbal baseball bats do not advance that cause.
Besides, who would you rather have covering your back – a buncha stubborn pissant Hhareidim or a buncha bigoted fundamentalist Christians?
I’m probably biased, but I would rather not be in the same state as fundamentalist Christians.
Besides, who would you rather have covering your back – a buncha stubborn pissant Hhareidim or a buncha bigoted fundamentalist Christians?
I’m probably biased, but I would rather not be in the same state as fundamentalist Christians.
Tuesday, May 09, 2006
FIRST EL AL HOTTY CONTEST!
According to an article cited by Dovbear, two leading rabbis [The Gerrer Rebbe and Aharon Leib Steinman] buy up all first class tickets and ask El Al to only post male stewards on flights so they do not have to see women on their way to America.
[Here's the article: http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3248854,00.html and here's Dovbear's post: http://dovbear.blogspot.com/2006/05/what-unbelievable-waste-of-money.html ]
This is because the mere sight of a woman can send a tzaddik into fits of pritzusdikkeite passion. The poor dear has no self control, you see, and appreciates the beauty of ALL of Hashem's creations.
Even El Al Stewardesses.
And even though he's ninety years old.
[A ninety year old having untzniusdikke gedachten? Kol Ha Kavod!!!! The only ninety year old I know drools into his beard and dribbles his prunes and chummus onto his bekeshe when his head wobbles! I am full of admiration for a ninety year old who still has aza lead in his pencil. A tzaddik like that I should be when I'm his age! Mamesh!]
SO, IN ADMIRATION OF THESE TWO ZESTY REBBEIM, AND ACKNOWLEDGEMENT OF A MAJOR TRAVEL PROBLEM FOR FRUMMERLEITE, THIS BLOG ANNOUNCES THE FIRST EVER HOT EL AL MAMA CONTEST!
[Both as a warning, and as a joy to behold]
Please nominate your choice for hottest El Al Stewardess, and explain in an essay of one hundred descriptive words or more why you think she is the candidate most likely to disturb a Chassidic rebbe's spiritual equilibrium.
Accounts of flights to the Holy Land spent in an agony of frustration are also welcome. As are tales of being unspiritual while waiting in line to board ("ooh, those shapely ankles, that tempting sheitel, I cannot take it anymore, ooooh!").
------ ------ ------ ------ ------
NOTE:
Shir HaShirim is all about looking at women (yes, I know, a metaphor for the relationship between Israel and Hashem, but face it, that explanation merely says that you're all his bitch. So back to the pshuta, please).
A rebbe cannot wear sun-glasses? A rebbe cannot divert his eyes and his mind from a shapely ankle? A rebbe might turn into a beast if distracted by a passing snooky?
What kind of a rebbe is this?!?!?!?!?
[How on earth would these prudes have coped with the women of the Tanach? Sarah Imaeinu was a hotty, Rivka was a hotty....., and Delilah...... ?, Oy, Baruch Hashem! And Esther too! Woof! Bark, bark, bark! Woof! ]
Depose the bulgar, and get a rebbe who at least has a modicum of self-control and common sense.
Sheesh. Buncha puritanical protestants.
And that from such an illustrious yichus.
[Here's the article: http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3248854,00.html and here's Dovbear's post: http://dovbear.blogspot.com/2006/05/what-unbelievable-waste-of-money.html ]
This is because the mere sight of a woman can send a tzaddik into fits of pritzusdikkeite passion. The poor dear has no self control, you see, and appreciates the beauty of ALL of Hashem's creations.
Even El Al Stewardesses.
And even though he's ninety years old.
[A ninety year old having untzniusdikke gedachten? Kol Ha Kavod!!!! The only ninety year old I know drools into his beard and dribbles his prunes and chummus onto his bekeshe when his head wobbles! I am full of admiration for a ninety year old who still has aza lead in his pencil. A tzaddik like that I should be when I'm his age! Mamesh!]
SO, IN ADMIRATION OF THESE TWO ZESTY REBBEIM, AND ACKNOWLEDGEMENT OF A MAJOR TRAVEL PROBLEM FOR FRUMMERLEITE, THIS BLOG ANNOUNCES THE FIRST EVER HOT EL AL MAMA CONTEST!
[Both as a warning, and as a joy to behold]
Please nominate your choice for hottest El Al Stewardess, and explain in an essay of one hundred descriptive words or more why you think she is the candidate most likely to disturb a Chassidic rebbe's spiritual equilibrium.
Accounts of flights to the Holy Land spent in an agony of frustration are also welcome. As are tales of being unspiritual while waiting in line to board ("ooh, those shapely ankles, that tempting sheitel, I cannot take it anymore, ooooh!").
[The winning entry will be decided by me, based on my totally fair and balanced judgement. Providing links to photos is not necessary, this is a clean blog after all, but is greatly encouraged nevertheless. The winner gets to guest-post five times, the second runner up three times, and the third prize is one guest post. There will be no cash prizes, nor any pay-outs in lieu of posting - I'm a monumental cheapskate (I'm Dutch, remember?). Multiple entries per contestant are allowed, plagiarism is not a problem in the comments - it's your lookout.]
------ ------ ------ ------ ------
NOTE:
Shir HaShirim is all about looking at women (yes, I know, a metaphor for the relationship between Israel and Hashem, but face it, that explanation merely says that you're all his bitch. So back to the pshuta, please).
A rebbe cannot wear sun-glasses? A rebbe cannot divert his eyes and his mind from a shapely ankle? A rebbe might turn into a beast if distracted by a passing snooky?
What kind of a rebbe is this?!?!?!?!?
[How on earth would these prudes have coped with the women of the Tanach? Sarah Imaeinu was a hotty, Rivka was a hotty....., and Delilah...... ?, Oy, Baruch Hashem! And Esther too! Woof! Bark, bark, bark! Woof! ]
Depose the bulgar, and get a rebbe who at least has a modicum of self-control and common sense.
Sheesh. Buncha puritanical protestants.
And that from such an illustrious yichus.
Monday, May 08, 2006
REPOSTING, SPELL CHECKED VERSON
I am pleased to provide space for a very good friend to guest post below. While Mordechai and I disagree on almost everything, that has not been an obstacle to a deep and enduring friendship for several years, and I respect his point of view. He is in town for a week, and what better time for a guest post than now? For reasons which should be obvious, Mordechai will only use his first name, and not mention the community in which he lives. I have encouraged him to put some of his thoughts into a blog - a suggestion I hope he will take seriously. ---B.O.T.H.
-------------------------------------------------------------
GUEST POST: Rabbosai, there is too much chillul Hashem on the internet. This is why our rabbis have decided that no one should have a computer in the home. But should a computer even be used for scholarly purposes? It has been said that there is much yiddishkeit available on the internet, and there are very good translations, of many precious works on web pages. But there is more on the internet than just good sources and reliable information - there is much violence, obscenity, and very many disturbing webpages. The bad by far outweighs the good.
If cigarettes and smoking are dangerous, if drugs and pictures of obscenity are dangerous, then how much more so uncontrolled surfing? It is much better that people should engage in study in a controlled environment, without the distraction of email and computers.
One who while studying is distracted is in the greatest danger. Many younger men have nearly destroyed their lives by engaging in compiuter. Something which which is so obviously bittul Torah and avodah zarah should not be encouraged. Please join me in speaking out against this - COMPUTERS ARE DANGEROUS, and their daily use should be strongly spoken against.
There is precedent (I am refering to the ban on the Rambam's works of course): in the past, when there were arguments over philosophy, the compromise reached was that men under twenty five years of age should not read science and metaphysics. This was a wise decision. Children do not have the wisdom and the experiance to distinguish between truth, truth, and falsehood. I thank my host for allowing me to write this on his blog.
----Mordechai.
I am pleased to provide space for a very good friend to guest post below. While Mordechai and I disagree on almost everything, that has not been an obstacle to a deep and enduring friendship for several years, and I respect his point of view. He is in town for a week, and what better time for a guest post than now? For reasons which should be obvious, Mordechai will only use his first name, and not mention the community in which he lives. I have encouraged him to put some of his thoughts into a blog - a suggestion I hope he will take seriously. ---B.O.T.H.
-------------------------------------------------------------
GUEST POST: Rabbosai, there is too much chillul Hashem on the internet. This is why our rabbis have decided that no one should have a computer in the home. But should a computer even be used for scholarly purposes? It has been said that there is much yiddishkeit available on the internet, and there are very good translations, of many precious works on web pages. But there is more on the internet than just good sources and reliable information - there is much violence, obscenity, and very many disturbing webpages. The bad by far outweighs the good.
If cigarettes and smoking are dangerous, if drugs and pictures of obscenity are dangerous, then how much more so uncontrolled surfing? It is much better that people should engage in study in a controlled environment, without the distraction of email and computers.
One who while studying is distracted is in the greatest danger. Many younger men have nearly destroyed their lives by engaging in compiuter. Something which which is so obviously bittul Torah and avodah zarah should not be encouraged. Please join me in speaking out against this - COMPUTERS ARE DANGEROUS, and their daily use should be strongly spoken against.
There is precedent (I am refering to the ban on the Rambam's works of course): in the past, when there were arguments over philosophy, the compromise reached was that men under twenty five years of age should not read science and metaphysics. This was a wise decision. Children do not have the wisdom and the experiance to distinguish between truth, truth, and falsehood. I thank my host for allowing me to write this on his blog.
----Mordechai.
ORTHODOX JEWS CELEBRATE CINCO DE MAYO!
Yes, I'm as flabbergasted as you are. But I assure you, it has to be true. For proof, look no further than the following exchange in the comments section on one of Dovbear's posts (http://dovbear.blogspot.com/2006/05/summer-projects.html).
If this isn't conclusive evidence of a whole bunch of nasty Tequila hangovers, I don't know what is.
And Rabbosai, let this be a lesson to stay away from Hornitos or Don Julio (and especially Cuervo, chosvesholem!), - better you should drink Oro Y Azul!
Naphtuli why don't you and CWY retire with Ezzie to the jacuzzi for a threesome. Or a fivesome if egos are counted.
Alex 05.08.06 - 2:29 pm # <http://www.haloscan.com/comments/dovbear/114710391935067484/>
Alex- what do you have against gay people?
Classmate-Wearing-Yarmulka Homepage <http://wearing-yarmulka.blogspot.com/> 05.08.06 - 2:32 pm # <http://www.haloscan.com/comments/dovbear/114710391935067484/>
CWY, Nothing, I am sure your father is a wonderful fellow.
Alex 05.08.06 - 2:32 pm # <http://www.haloscan.com/comments/dovbear/114710391935067484/>
Not that there's anything wrong with it.
Classmate-Wearing-Yarmulka Homepage <http://wearing-yarmulka.blogspot.com/> 05.08.06 - 2:33 pm # <http://www.haloscan.com/comments/dovbear/114710391935067484/>
Alex, you haven't insulted my mother yet.
Classmate-Wearing-Yarmulka Homepage <http://wearing-yarmulka.blogspot.com/> 05.08.06 - 2:36 pm # <http://www.haloscan.com/comments/dovbear/114710391935067484/>
It's be kind to dumb animals week
Alex 05.08.06 - 2:37 pm # <http://www.haloscan.com/comments/dovbear/114710391935067484/>
I thank you and your commenters for the fact that one need look no farther than this thread for prime examples of men being pigs. Assuming that pigs also pee on each other in addition to stinking and rolling around in feces and mud.
RenReb Homepage <http://www.renegaderebbetzin.blogspot.com/> 05.08.06 - 3:39 pm # <http://www.haloscan.com/comments/dovbear/114710391935067484/>
(oh - and grunting and snorting as a means of expression and communication)RenReb Homepage <http://www.renegaderebbetzin.blogspot.com/> 05.08.06 - 3:40 pm # <http://www.haloscan.com/comments/dovbear/114710391935067484/>
As Eric Cartman would say " I love you guys...."
If this isn't conclusive evidence of a whole bunch of nasty Tequila hangovers, I don't know what is.
And Rabbosai, let this be a lesson to stay away from Hornitos or Don Julio (and especially Cuervo, chosvesholem!), - better you should drink Oro Y Azul!
Naphtuli why don't you and CWY retire with Ezzie to the jacuzzi for a threesome. Or a fivesome if egos are counted.
Alex 05.08.06 - 2:29 pm # <http://www.haloscan.com/comments/dovbear/114710391935067484/>
Alex- what do you have against gay people?
Classmate-Wearing-Yarmulka Homepage <http://wearing-yarmulka.blogspot.com/> 05.08.06 - 2:32 pm # <http://www.haloscan.com/comments/dovbear/114710391935067484/>
CWY, Nothing, I am sure your father is a wonderful fellow.
Alex 05.08.06 - 2:32 pm # <http://www.haloscan.com/comments/dovbear/114710391935067484/>
Not that there's anything wrong with it.
Classmate-Wearing-Yarmulka Homepage <http://wearing-yarmulka.blogspot.com/> 05.08.06 - 2:33 pm # <http://www.haloscan.com/comments/dovbear/114710391935067484/>
Alex, you haven't insulted my mother yet.
Classmate-Wearing-Yarmulka Homepage <http://wearing-yarmulka.blogspot.com/> 05.08.06 - 2:36 pm # <http://www.haloscan.com/comments/dovbear/114710391935067484/>
It's be kind to dumb animals week
Alex 05.08.06 - 2:37 pm # <http://www.haloscan.com/comments/dovbear/114710391935067484/>
I thank you and your commenters for the fact that one need look no farther than this thread for prime examples of men being pigs. Assuming that pigs also pee on each other in addition to stinking and rolling around in feces and mud.
RenReb Homepage <http://www.renegaderebbetzin.blogspot.com/> 05.08.06 - 3:39 pm # <http://www.haloscan.com/comments/dovbear/114710391935067484/>
(oh - and grunting and snorting as a means of expression and communication)RenReb Homepage <http://www.renegaderebbetzin.blogspot.com/> 05.08.06 - 3:40 pm # <http://www.haloscan.com/comments/dovbear/114710391935067484/>
----- ----- ----- ----- -----
As Eric Cartman would say " I love you guys...."
MAY THEY ALL HAVE SONS LIKE THIS!
Expect a huge outcry demanding the release of Yisrael Vales.
Why?
Because he is manifestly innocent. As is conclusively proven by his having withdrawn his confession. Surely a frumme yungerman would not lie.
He's a brilliant scholar, why he's a veritable ilui, and a credit to his community, whose estimable rebbeyim have publicly proclaimed him innocent, averring that he's an angel, a dear sweet boy! And his police accusers are guilty of a blood-libel, and probably Arabs to boot, oh lack-a-day!
From Ha'aretz:
"Yisrael Vales, 19, is suspected of beating his son and throwing him against the wall because the baby's cries annoyed him. The infant died of his wounds in early April."
Please note: the baby had evidence of brain hemorrhaging, oedema, violent trauma, and bites on his body.
Attorney Avigdor Feldman told the Jerusalem District Court that he intends to examine the confession Vales gave his interrogators. He asserts that his client was pressured into confessing, being threatened with remaining in custody.
And surely this proves the innocence of the dear sweet angel?
A normal, cynically inclined secular human being would've realized that such a confession, rather than securing his release, would have guaranteed further custody. But Yisrael Vales is a talmid, and consequently not wise to the ways of the world.
Why?
Because he is manifestly innocent. As is conclusively proven by his having withdrawn his confession. Surely a frumme yungerman would not lie.
He's a brilliant scholar, why he's a veritable ilui, and a credit to his community, whose estimable rebbeyim have publicly proclaimed him innocent, averring that he's an angel, a dear sweet boy! And his police accusers are guilty of a blood-libel, and probably Arabs to boot, oh lack-a-day!
From Ha'aretz:
"Yisrael Vales, 19, is suspected of beating his son and throwing him against the wall because the baby's cries annoyed him. The infant died of his wounds in early April."
Please note: the baby had evidence of brain hemorrhaging, oedema, violent trauma, and bites on his body.
Attorney Avigdor Feldman told the Jerusalem District Court that he intends to examine the confession Vales gave his interrogators. He asserts that his client was pressured into confessing, being threatened with remaining in custody.
And surely this proves the innocence of the dear sweet angel?
A normal, cynically inclined secular human being would've realized that such a confession, rather than securing his release, would have guaranteed further custody. But Yisrael Vales is a talmid, and consequently not wise to the ways of the world.
Friday, May 05, 2006
GUEST POST FROM MORDECHAI N.
I am pleased to provide space for a very good friend to guest post below. While Mordechai and I disagree on almost everything, that has not been an obstacle to a deep and enduring friendship for several years, and I respect his point of view.
He is in town for a week, and what better time for a guest post than now?
For reasons which should be obvious, Mordechai will only use his first name, and not mention the community in which he lives. I have encouraged him to put some of his thoughts into a blog - a suggestion I hope he will take seriously.
---B.O.T.H.
-------------------------------------------------------------
GUEST POST:
Rabbosai, there is too much chillul Hashem on the internet. This is why our rabbis have decided that no one should have a compiuter in the home. But should a compiuter even be used for scholarly purposes? It has been said that there is much yiddishkeit available on the internet, and I have seen translations, very good translations, of many precious works on web pages. But the internet is more than just goodness - there is much violence, obscenity, and disturbing webpages. The bad outweighs the good.
If cigarettes and smoking are dangerous, if drugs and pictures of obscenity are dangerous, then how much more so uncontrolled surfing?
It is much better that people should engage in study in a controlled environment, without the disrtraction of email and computers.
One who while studying is distracted is in the greatest danger.
Many younger men have nearly destroyed their lives by engaging in compiuter. Something which which is so obviously bittul Torah and avodah zarah should not be encouraged. Please join me in speaking out against this - COMPIUTERS ARE DANGEROUS, and their daily use should be strongly spoken against.
There is precedent: in the past, when there were arguments over philosophy, the compromise reached was that men under twenty five years of age should not read science and metaphysics. This was a wise decision. Children do not have the wisdom and the experiance to distinguish between truth, truth, and falsehood.
I thank my host for allowing me to write this on his blog.
Mordechai.
He is in town for a week, and what better time for a guest post than now?
For reasons which should be obvious, Mordechai will only use his first name, and not mention the community in which he lives. I have encouraged him to put some of his thoughts into a blog - a suggestion I hope he will take seriously.
---B.O.T.H.
-------------------------------------------------------------
GUEST POST:
Rabbosai, there is too much chillul Hashem on the internet. This is why our rabbis have decided that no one should have a compiuter in the home. But should a compiuter even be used for scholarly purposes? It has been said that there is much yiddishkeit available on the internet, and I have seen translations, very good translations, of many precious works on web pages. But the internet is more than just goodness - there is much violence, obscenity, and disturbing webpages. The bad outweighs the good.
If cigarettes and smoking are dangerous, if drugs and pictures of obscenity are dangerous, then how much more so uncontrolled surfing?
It is much better that people should engage in study in a controlled environment, without the disrtraction of email and computers.
One who while studying is distracted is in the greatest danger.
Many younger men have nearly destroyed their lives by engaging in compiuter. Something which which is so obviously bittul Torah and avodah zarah should not be encouraged. Please join me in speaking out against this - COMPIUTERS ARE DANGEROUS, and their daily use should be strongly spoken against.
There is precedent: in the past, when there were arguments over philosophy, the compromise reached was that men under twenty five years of age should not read science and metaphysics. This was a wise decision. Children do not have the wisdom and the experiance to distinguish between truth, truth, and falsehood.
I thank my host for allowing me to write this on his blog.
Mordechai.
A SURPLUS OF HOT SAUCE
I discovered the following text while researching the issue of illegal immigration.
While it clearly deals with a different time and place, the solution it provides can with only little modification be applied to our own most pressing problem, namely the vast numbers of illegals breaching our southern border.
I therefore venture to humbly suggest that we study this text well, internalize its lessons, and apply them with zest and a keen appetite to our present circumstance.
---B.OT.H.
---------------------------- - ----------------------------
It is a melancholy object to those who walk through this great town or travel in the country, when they see the streets, the roads, and cabin doors, crowded with beggars of the female sex, followed by three, four, or six children, all in rags and importuning every passenger for an alms. These mothers, instead of being able to work for their honest livelihood, are forced to employ all their time in strolling to beg sustenance for their helpless infants: who as they grow up either turn thieves for want of work, or leave their dear native country to fight for the Pretender in Spain, or sell themselves to the Barbadoes.
I think it is agreed by all parties that this prodigious number of children in the arms, or on the backs, or at the heels of their mothers, and frequently of their fathers, is in the present deplorable state of the kingdom a very great additional grievance; and, therefore, whoever could find out a fair, cheap, and easy method of making these children sound, useful members of the commonwealth, would deserve so well of the public as to have his statue set up for a preserver of the nation.
But my intention is very far from being confined to provide only for the children of professed beggars; it is of a much greater extent, and shall take in the whole number of infants at a certain age who are born of parents in effect as little able to support them as those who demand our charity in the streets.
As to my own part, having turned my thoughts for many years upon this important subject, and maturely weighed the several schemes of other projectors, I have always found them grossly mistaken in the computation. It is true, a child just dropped from its dam may be supported by her milk for a solar year, with little other nourishment; at most not above the value of 2s., which the mother may certainly get, or the value in scraps, by her lawful occupation of begging; and it is exactly at one year old that I propose to provide for them in such a manner as instead of being a charge upon their parents or the parish, or wanting food and raiment for the rest of their lives, they shall on the contrary contribute to the feeding, and partly to the clothing, of many thousands.
There is likewise another great advantage in my scheme, that it will prevent those voluntary abortions, and that horrid practice of women murdering their bastard children, alas! too frequent among us! sacrificing the poor innocent babes I doubt more to avoid the expense than the shame, which would move tears and pity in the most savage and inhuman breast.
The number of souls in this kingdom being usually reckoned one million and a half, of these I calculate there may be about two hundred thousand couple whose wives are breeders; from which number I subtract thirty thousand couples who are able to maintain their own children, although I apprehend there cannot be so many, under the present distresses of the kingdom; but this being granted, there will remain an hundred and seventy thousand breeders.
I again subtract fifty thousand for those women who miscarry, or whose children die by accident or disease within the year. There only remains one hundred and twenty thousand children of poor parents annually born. The question therefore is, how this number shall be reared and provided for, which, as I have already said, under the present situation of affairs, is utterly impossible by all the methods hitherto proposed. For we can neither employ them in handicraft or agriculture; we neither build houses (I mean in the country) nor cultivate land: they can very seldom pick up a livelihood by stealing, till they arrive at six years old, except where they are of towardly parts, although I confess they learn the rudiments much earlier, during which time, they can however be properly looked upon only as probationers, as I have been informed by a principal gentleman in the county of Cavan, who protested to me that he never knew above one or two instances under the age of six, even in a part of the kingdom so renowned for the quickest proficiency in that art.
I am assured by our merchants, that a boy or a girl before twelve years old is no salable commodity; and even when they come to this age they will not yield above three pounds, or three pounds and half-a-crown at most on the exchange; which cannot turn to account either to the parents or kingdom, the charge of nutriment and rags having been at least four times that value.
I shall now therefore humbly propose my own thoughts, which I hope will not be liable to the least objection. I have been assured by a very knowing American of my acquaintance in London, that a young healthy child well nursed is at a year old a most delicious, nourishing, and wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, baked, or boiled; and I make no doubt that it will equally serve in a fricassee or a ragout.
I do therefore humbly offer it to public consideration that of the hundred and twenty thousand children already computed, twenty thousand may be reserved for breed, whereof only one-fourth part to be males; which is more than we allow to sheep, black cattle or swine; and my reason is, that these children are seldom the fruits of marriage, a circumstance not much regarded by our savages, therefore one male will be sufficient to serve four females. That the remaining hundred thousand may, at a year old, be offered in the sale to the persons of quality and fortune through the kingdom; always advising the mother to let them suck plentifully in the last month, so as to render them plump and fat for a good table.
A child will make two dishes at an entertainment for friends; and when the family dines alone, the fore or hind quarter will make a reasonable dish, and seasoned with a little pepper or salt will be very good boiled on the fourth day, especially in winter.
I have reckoned upon a medium that a child just born will weigh 12 pounds, and in a solar year, if tolerably nursed, increaseth to 28 pounds.
I grant this food will be somewhat dear, and therefore very proper for landlords, who, as they have already devoured most of the parents, seem to have the best title to the children.
Infant's flesh will be in season throughout the year, but more plentiful in March, and a little before and after; for we are told by a grave author, an eminent French physician, that fish being a prolific diet, there are more children born in Roman Catholic countries about nine months after Lent than at any other season; therefore, reckoning a year after Lent, the markets will be more glutted than usual, because the number of popish infants is at least three to one in this kingdom: and therefore it will have one other collateral advantage, by lessening the number of papists among us.
I have already computed the charge of nursing a beggar's child (in which list I reckon all cottagers, laborers, and four-fifths of the farmers) to be about two shillings per annum, rags included; and I believe no gentleman would repine to give ten shillings for the carcass of a good fat child, which, as I have said, will make four dishes of excellent nutritive meat, when he hath only some particular friend or his own family to dine with him. Thus the squire will learn to be a good landlord, and grow popular among his tenants; the mother will have eight shillings net profit, and be fit for work till she produces another child.
Those who are more thrifty (as I must confess the times require) may flay the carcass; the skin of which artificially dressed will make admirable gloves for ladies, and summer boots for fine gentlemen.
As to our city of Dublin, shambles may be appointed for this purpose in the most convenient parts of it, and butchers we may be assured will not be wanting; although I rather recommend buying the children alive, and dressing them hot from the knife, as we do roasting pigs.
A very worthy person, a true lover of his country, and whose virtues I highly esteem, was lately pleased in discoursing on this matter to offer a refinement upon my scheme. He said that many gentlemen of this kingdom, having of late destroyed their deer, he conceived that the want of venison might be well supplied by the bodies of young lads and maidens, not exceeding fourteen years of age nor under twelve; so great a number of both sexes in every country being now ready to starve for want of work and service; and these to be disposed of by their parents, if alive, or otherwise by their nearest relations. But with due deference to so excellent a friend and so deserving a patriot, I cannot be altogether in his sentiments; for as to the males, my American acquaintance assured me, from frequent experience, that their flesh was generally tough and lean, like that of our schoolboys by continual exercise, and their taste disagreeable; and to fatten them would not answer the charge.
Then as to the females, it would, I think, with humble submission be a loss to the public, because they soon would become breeders themselves; and besides, it is not improbable that some scrupulous people might be apt to censure such a practice (although indeed very unjustly), as a little bordering upon cruelty; which, I confess, hath always been with me the strongest objection against any project, however so well intended.
But in order to justify my friend, he confessed that this expedient was put into his head by the famous Psalmanazar, a native of the island Formosa, who came from thence to London above twenty years ago, and in conversation told my friend, that in his country when any young person happened to be put to death, the executioner sold the carcass to persons of quality as a prime dainty; and that in his time the body of a plump girl of fifteen, who was crucified for an attempt to poison the emperor, was sold to his imperial majesty's prime minister of state, and other great mandarins of the court, in joints from the gibbet, at four hundred crowns.
Neither indeed can I deny, that if the same use were made of several plump young girls in this town, who without one single groat to their fortunes cannot stir abroad without a chair, and appear at playhouse and assemblies in foreign fineries which they never will pay for, the kingdom would not be the worse.
Some persons of a desponding spirit are in great concern about that vast number of poor people, who are aged, diseased, or maimed, and I have been desired to employ my thoughts what course may be taken to ease the nation of so grievous an encumbrance. But I am not in the least pain upon that matter, because it is very well known that they are every day dying and rotting by cold and famine, and filth and vermin, as fast as can be reasonably expected. And as to the young laborers, they are now in as hopeful a condition; they cannot get work, and consequently pine away for want of nourishment, to a degree that if at any time they are accidentally hired to common labor, they have not strength to perform it; and thus the country and themselves are happily delivered from the evils to come.
I have too long digressed, and therefore shall return to my subject. I think the advantages by the proposal which I have made are obvious and many, as well as of the highest importance.
For first, as I have already observed, it would greatly lessen the number of papists, with whom we are yearly overrun, being the principal breeders of the nation as well as our most dangerous enemies; and who stay at home on purpose with a design to deliver the kingdom to the Pretender, hoping to take their advantage by the absence of so many good protestants, who have chosen rather to leave their country than stay at home and pay tithes against their conscience to an episcopal curate.
Secondly, The poorer tenants will have something valuable of their own, which by law may be made liable to distress and help to pay their landlord's rent, their corn and cattle being already seized, and money a thing unknown.
Thirdly, Whereas the maintenance of an hundred thousand children, from two years old and upward, cannot be computed at less than ten shillings a-piece per annum, the nation's stock will be thereby increased fifty thousand pounds per annum, beside the profit of a new dish introduced to the tables of all gentlemen of fortune in the kingdom who have any refinement in taste. And the money will circulate among ourselves, the goods being entirely of our own growth and manufacture.
Fourthly, The constant breeders, beside the gain of eight shillings sterling per annum by the sale of their children, will be rid of the charge of maintaining them after the first year.
Fifthly, This food would likewise bring great custom to taverns; where the vintners will certainly be so prudent as to procure the best receipts for dressing it to perfection, and consequently have their houses frequented by all the fine gentlemen, who justly value themselves upon their knowledge in good eating: and a skilful cook, who understands how to oblige his guests, will contrive to make it as expensive as they please.
Sixthly, This would be a great inducement to marriage, which all wise nations have either encouraged by rewards or enforced by laws and penalties. It would increase the care and tenderness of mothers toward their children, when they were sure of a settlement for life to the poor babes, provided in some sort by the public, to their annual profit instead of expense. We should see an honest emulation among the married women, which of them could bring the fattest child to the market. Men would become as fond of their wives during the time of their pregnancy as they are now of their mares in foal, their cows in calf, their sows when they are ready to farrow; nor offer to beat or kick them (as is too frequent a practice) for fear of a miscarriage.
Many other advantages might be enumerated. For instance, the addition of some thousand carcasses in our exportation of barreled beef, the propagation of swine's flesh, and improvement in the art of making good bacon, so much wanted among us by the great destruction of pigs, too frequent at our tables; which are no way comparable in taste or magnificence to a well-grown, fat, yearling child, which roasted whole will make a considerable figure at a lord mayor's feast or any other public entertainment. But this and many others I omit, being studious of brevity.
Supposing that one thousand families in this city, would be constant customers for infants flesh, besides others who might have it at merry meetings, particularly at weddings and christenings, I compute that Dublin would take off annually about twenty thousand carcasses; and the rest of the kingdom (where probably they will be sold somewhat cheaper) the remaining eighty thousand.
I can think of no one objection, that will possibly be raised against this proposal, unless it should be urged, that the number of people will be thereby much lessened in the kingdom. This I freely own, and 'twas indeed one principal design in offering it to the world. I desire the reader will observe, that I calculate my remedy for this one individual Kingdom of Ireland, and for no other that ever was, is, or, I think, ever can be upon Earth. Therefore let no man talk to me of other expedients: Of taxing our absentees at five shillings a pound: Of using neither cloaths, nor houshold furniture, except what is of our own growth and manufacture: Of utterly rejecting the materials and instruments that promote foreign luxury: Of curing the expensiveness of pride, vanity, idleness, and gaming in our women: Of introducing a vein of parsimony, prudence and temperance: Of learning to love our country, wherein we differ even from Laplanders, and the inhabitants of Topinamboo: Of quitting our animosities and factions, nor acting any longer like the Jews, who were murdering one another at the very moment their city was taken: Of being a little cautious not to sell our country and consciences for nothing: Of teaching landlords to have at least one degree of mercy towards their tenants. Lastly, of putting a spirit of honesty, industry, and skill into our shop-keepers, who, if a resolution could now be taken to buy only our native goods, would immediately unite to cheat and exact upon us in the price, the measure, and the goodness, nor could ever yet be brought to make one fair proposal of just dealing, though often and earnestly invited to it.
Therefore I repeat, let no man talk to me of these and the like expedients, 'till he hath at least some glympse of hope, that there will ever be some hearty and sincere attempt to put them into practice.
But, as to my self, having been wearied out for many years with offering vain, idle, visionary thoughts, and at length utterly despairing of success, I fortunately fell upon this proposal, which, as it is wholly new, so it hath something solid and real, of no expence and little trouble, full in our own power, and whereby we can incur no danger in disobliging England. For this kind of commodity will not bear exportation, and flesh being of too tender a consistence, to admit a long continuance in salt, although perhaps I could name a country, which would be glad to eat up our whole nation without it.
After all, I am not so violently bent upon my own opinion as to reject any offer proposed by wise men, which shall be found equally innocent, cheap, easy, and effectual. But before something of that kind shall be advanced in contradiction to my scheme, and offering a better, I desire the author or authors will be pleased maturely to consider two points. First, as things now stand, how they will be able to find food and raiment for an hundred thousand useless mouths and backs. And secondly, there being a round million of creatures in human figure throughout this kingdom, whose whole subsistence put into a common stock would leave them in debt two millions of pounds sterling, adding those who are beggars by profession to the bulk of farmers, cottagers, and laborers, with their wives and children who are beggars in effect: I desire those politicians who dislike my overture, and may perhaps be so bold as to attempt an answer, that they will first ask the parents of these mortals, whether they would not at this day think it a great happiness to have been sold for food, at a year old in the manner I prescribe, and thereby have avoided such a perpetual scene of misfortunes as they have since gone through by the oppression of landlords, the impossibility of paying rent without money or trade, the want of common sustenance, with neither house nor clothes to cover them from the inclemencies of the weather, and the most inevitable prospect of entailing the like or greater miseries upon their breed for ever.
I profess, in the sincerity of my heart, that I have not the least personal interest in endeavoring to promote this necessary work, having no other motive than the public good of my country, by advancing our trade, providing for infants, relieving the poor, and giving some pleasure to the rich. I have no children by which I can propose to get a single penny; the youngest being nine years old, and my wife past child-bearing.
---J. Swift.
Applying the lessons we can draw from Mr. Swift's essay is supported by no less an authority than our Secretary of the Ulterior, Dov Bear. See here:http://dovbear.blogspot.com/2006/05/my-modest-proposal.html
Additional note: A well-known conservative apikoris cautions that the Mexican food generated by this proposal would not be kosher, and wouldn't even meet the minimal requirements of "biblical kashrus" popular with many Reform Jews.
Grahda, kalvechomer the stringent kashrus qualifications to which the orthodoxim adhere!
But note that there are only about six million Jews in the United States, whereas there are over two hundred and eighty million hungry Gentiles, most of whom are none to picky. So the issue is not one of kashrus, but rather of supply and demand.
Even with Jews (and possibly Muslims and Pentacostals) abstaining, there will NOT be enough to supply the market.
Without some limitations on our consumption, we may end up with the same vexing problem as we have with oil, namely a diminishing supply and rising prices - which would be disastrous!
Write your congressman, and press for regulation.
Comments are of course welcome. I would appreciate your thoughts.
While it clearly deals with a different time and place, the solution it provides can with only little modification be applied to our own most pressing problem, namely the vast numbers of illegals breaching our southern border.
I therefore venture to humbly suggest that we study this text well, internalize its lessons, and apply them with zest and a keen appetite to our present circumstance.
---B.OT.H.
---------------------------- - ----------------------------
It is a melancholy object to those who walk through this great town or travel in the country, when they see the streets, the roads, and cabin doors, crowded with beggars of the female sex, followed by three, four, or six children, all in rags and importuning every passenger for an alms. These mothers, instead of being able to work for their honest livelihood, are forced to employ all their time in strolling to beg sustenance for their helpless infants: who as they grow up either turn thieves for want of work, or leave their dear native country to fight for the Pretender in Spain, or sell themselves to the Barbadoes.
I think it is agreed by all parties that this prodigious number of children in the arms, or on the backs, or at the heels of their mothers, and frequently of their fathers, is in the present deplorable state of the kingdom a very great additional grievance; and, therefore, whoever could find out a fair, cheap, and easy method of making these children sound, useful members of the commonwealth, would deserve so well of the public as to have his statue set up for a preserver of the nation.
But my intention is very far from being confined to provide only for the children of professed beggars; it is of a much greater extent, and shall take in the whole number of infants at a certain age who are born of parents in effect as little able to support them as those who demand our charity in the streets.
As to my own part, having turned my thoughts for many years upon this important subject, and maturely weighed the several schemes of other projectors, I have always found them grossly mistaken in the computation. It is true, a child just dropped from its dam may be supported by her milk for a solar year, with little other nourishment; at most not above the value of 2s., which the mother may certainly get, or the value in scraps, by her lawful occupation of begging; and it is exactly at one year old that I propose to provide for them in such a manner as instead of being a charge upon their parents or the parish, or wanting food and raiment for the rest of their lives, they shall on the contrary contribute to the feeding, and partly to the clothing, of many thousands.
There is likewise another great advantage in my scheme, that it will prevent those voluntary abortions, and that horrid practice of women murdering their bastard children, alas! too frequent among us! sacrificing the poor innocent babes I doubt more to avoid the expense than the shame, which would move tears and pity in the most savage and inhuman breast.
The number of souls in this kingdom being usually reckoned one million and a half, of these I calculate there may be about two hundred thousand couple whose wives are breeders; from which number I subtract thirty thousand couples who are able to maintain their own children, although I apprehend there cannot be so many, under the present distresses of the kingdom; but this being granted, there will remain an hundred and seventy thousand breeders.
I again subtract fifty thousand for those women who miscarry, or whose children die by accident or disease within the year. There only remains one hundred and twenty thousand children of poor parents annually born. The question therefore is, how this number shall be reared and provided for, which, as I have already said, under the present situation of affairs, is utterly impossible by all the methods hitherto proposed. For we can neither employ them in handicraft or agriculture; we neither build houses (I mean in the country) nor cultivate land: they can very seldom pick up a livelihood by stealing, till they arrive at six years old, except where they are of towardly parts, although I confess they learn the rudiments much earlier, during which time, they can however be properly looked upon only as probationers, as I have been informed by a principal gentleman in the county of Cavan, who protested to me that he never knew above one or two instances under the age of six, even in a part of the kingdom so renowned for the quickest proficiency in that art.
I am assured by our merchants, that a boy or a girl before twelve years old is no salable commodity; and even when they come to this age they will not yield above three pounds, or three pounds and half-a-crown at most on the exchange; which cannot turn to account either to the parents or kingdom, the charge of nutriment and rags having been at least four times that value.
I shall now therefore humbly propose my own thoughts, which I hope will not be liable to the least objection. I have been assured by a very knowing American of my acquaintance in London, that a young healthy child well nursed is at a year old a most delicious, nourishing, and wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, baked, or boiled; and I make no doubt that it will equally serve in a fricassee or a ragout.
I do therefore humbly offer it to public consideration that of the hundred and twenty thousand children already computed, twenty thousand may be reserved for breed, whereof only one-fourth part to be males; which is more than we allow to sheep, black cattle or swine; and my reason is, that these children are seldom the fruits of marriage, a circumstance not much regarded by our savages, therefore one male will be sufficient to serve four females. That the remaining hundred thousand may, at a year old, be offered in the sale to the persons of quality and fortune through the kingdom; always advising the mother to let them suck plentifully in the last month, so as to render them plump and fat for a good table.
A child will make two dishes at an entertainment for friends; and when the family dines alone, the fore or hind quarter will make a reasonable dish, and seasoned with a little pepper or salt will be very good boiled on the fourth day, especially in winter.
I have reckoned upon a medium that a child just born will weigh 12 pounds, and in a solar year, if tolerably nursed, increaseth to 28 pounds.
I grant this food will be somewhat dear, and therefore very proper for landlords, who, as they have already devoured most of the parents, seem to have the best title to the children.
Infant's flesh will be in season throughout the year, but more plentiful in March, and a little before and after; for we are told by a grave author, an eminent French physician, that fish being a prolific diet, there are more children born in Roman Catholic countries about nine months after Lent than at any other season; therefore, reckoning a year after Lent, the markets will be more glutted than usual, because the number of popish infants is at least three to one in this kingdom: and therefore it will have one other collateral advantage, by lessening the number of papists among us.
I have already computed the charge of nursing a beggar's child (in which list I reckon all cottagers, laborers, and four-fifths of the farmers) to be about two shillings per annum, rags included; and I believe no gentleman would repine to give ten shillings for the carcass of a good fat child, which, as I have said, will make four dishes of excellent nutritive meat, when he hath only some particular friend or his own family to dine with him. Thus the squire will learn to be a good landlord, and grow popular among his tenants; the mother will have eight shillings net profit, and be fit for work till she produces another child.
Those who are more thrifty (as I must confess the times require) may flay the carcass; the skin of which artificially dressed will make admirable gloves for ladies, and summer boots for fine gentlemen.
As to our city of Dublin, shambles may be appointed for this purpose in the most convenient parts of it, and butchers we may be assured will not be wanting; although I rather recommend buying the children alive, and dressing them hot from the knife, as we do roasting pigs.
A very worthy person, a true lover of his country, and whose virtues I highly esteem, was lately pleased in discoursing on this matter to offer a refinement upon my scheme. He said that many gentlemen of this kingdom, having of late destroyed their deer, he conceived that the want of venison might be well supplied by the bodies of young lads and maidens, not exceeding fourteen years of age nor under twelve; so great a number of both sexes in every country being now ready to starve for want of work and service; and these to be disposed of by their parents, if alive, or otherwise by their nearest relations. But with due deference to so excellent a friend and so deserving a patriot, I cannot be altogether in his sentiments; for as to the males, my American acquaintance assured me, from frequent experience, that their flesh was generally tough and lean, like that of our schoolboys by continual exercise, and their taste disagreeable; and to fatten them would not answer the charge.
Then as to the females, it would, I think, with humble submission be a loss to the public, because they soon would become breeders themselves; and besides, it is not improbable that some scrupulous people might be apt to censure such a practice (although indeed very unjustly), as a little bordering upon cruelty; which, I confess, hath always been with me the strongest objection against any project, however so well intended.
But in order to justify my friend, he confessed that this expedient was put into his head by the famous Psalmanazar, a native of the island Formosa, who came from thence to London above twenty years ago, and in conversation told my friend, that in his country when any young person happened to be put to death, the executioner sold the carcass to persons of quality as a prime dainty; and that in his time the body of a plump girl of fifteen, who was crucified for an attempt to poison the emperor, was sold to his imperial majesty's prime minister of state, and other great mandarins of the court, in joints from the gibbet, at four hundred crowns.
Neither indeed can I deny, that if the same use were made of several plump young girls in this town, who without one single groat to their fortunes cannot stir abroad without a chair, and appear at playhouse and assemblies in foreign fineries which they never will pay for, the kingdom would not be the worse.
Some persons of a desponding spirit are in great concern about that vast number of poor people, who are aged, diseased, or maimed, and I have been desired to employ my thoughts what course may be taken to ease the nation of so grievous an encumbrance. But I am not in the least pain upon that matter, because it is very well known that they are every day dying and rotting by cold and famine, and filth and vermin, as fast as can be reasonably expected. And as to the young laborers, they are now in as hopeful a condition; they cannot get work, and consequently pine away for want of nourishment, to a degree that if at any time they are accidentally hired to common labor, they have not strength to perform it; and thus the country and themselves are happily delivered from the evils to come.
I have too long digressed, and therefore shall return to my subject. I think the advantages by the proposal which I have made are obvious and many, as well as of the highest importance.
For first, as I have already observed, it would greatly lessen the number of papists, with whom we are yearly overrun, being the principal breeders of the nation as well as our most dangerous enemies; and who stay at home on purpose with a design to deliver the kingdom to the Pretender, hoping to take their advantage by the absence of so many good protestants, who have chosen rather to leave their country than stay at home and pay tithes against their conscience to an episcopal curate.
Secondly, The poorer tenants will have something valuable of their own, which by law may be made liable to distress and help to pay their landlord's rent, their corn and cattle being already seized, and money a thing unknown.
Thirdly, Whereas the maintenance of an hundred thousand children, from two years old and upward, cannot be computed at less than ten shillings a-piece per annum, the nation's stock will be thereby increased fifty thousand pounds per annum, beside the profit of a new dish introduced to the tables of all gentlemen of fortune in the kingdom who have any refinement in taste. And the money will circulate among ourselves, the goods being entirely of our own growth and manufacture.
Fourthly, The constant breeders, beside the gain of eight shillings sterling per annum by the sale of their children, will be rid of the charge of maintaining them after the first year.
Fifthly, This food would likewise bring great custom to taverns; where the vintners will certainly be so prudent as to procure the best receipts for dressing it to perfection, and consequently have their houses frequented by all the fine gentlemen, who justly value themselves upon their knowledge in good eating: and a skilful cook, who understands how to oblige his guests, will contrive to make it as expensive as they please.
Sixthly, This would be a great inducement to marriage, which all wise nations have either encouraged by rewards or enforced by laws and penalties. It would increase the care and tenderness of mothers toward their children, when they were sure of a settlement for life to the poor babes, provided in some sort by the public, to their annual profit instead of expense. We should see an honest emulation among the married women, which of them could bring the fattest child to the market. Men would become as fond of their wives during the time of their pregnancy as they are now of their mares in foal, their cows in calf, their sows when they are ready to farrow; nor offer to beat or kick them (as is too frequent a practice) for fear of a miscarriage.
Many other advantages might be enumerated. For instance, the addition of some thousand carcasses in our exportation of barreled beef, the propagation of swine's flesh, and improvement in the art of making good bacon, so much wanted among us by the great destruction of pigs, too frequent at our tables; which are no way comparable in taste or magnificence to a well-grown, fat, yearling child, which roasted whole will make a considerable figure at a lord mayor's feast or any other public entertainment. But this and many others I omit, being studious of brevity.
Supposing that one thousand families in this city, would be constant customers for infants flesh, besides others who might have it at merry meetings, particularly at weddings and christenings, I compute that Dublin would take off annually about twenty thousand carcasses; and the rest of the kingdom (where probably they will be sold somewhat cheaper) the remaining eighty thousand.
I can think of no one objection, that will possibly be raised against this proposal, unless it should be urged, that the number of people will be thereby much lessened in the kingdom. This I freely own, and 'twas indeed one principal design in offering it to the world. I desire the reader will observe, that I calculate my remedy for this one individual Kingdom of Ireland, and for no other that ever was, is, or, I think, ever can be upon Earth. Therefore let no man talk to me of other expedients: Of taxing our absentees at five shillings a pound: Of using neither cloaths, nor houshold furniture, except what is of our own growth and manufacture: Of utterly rejecting the materials and instruments that promote foreign luxury: Of curing the expensiveness of pride, vanity, idleness, and gaming in our women: Of introducing a vein of parsimony, prudence and temperance: Of learning to love our country, wherein we differ even from Laplanders, and the inhabitants of Topinamboo: Of quitting our animosities and factions, nor acting any longer like the Jews, who were murdering one another at the very moment their city was taken: Of being a little cautious not to sell our country and consciences for nothing: Of teaching landlords to have at least one degree of mercy towards their tenants. Lastly, of putting a spirit of honesty, industry, and skill into our shop-keepers, who, if a resolution could now be taken to buy only our native goods, would immediately unite to cheat and exact upon us in the price, the measure, and the goodness, nor could ever yet be brought to make one fair proposal of just dealing, though often and earnestly invited to it.
Therefore I repeat, let no man talk to me of these and the like expedients, 'till he hath at least some glympse of hope, that there will ever be some hearty and sincere attempt to put them into practice.
But, as to my self, having been wearied out for many years with offering vain, idle, visionary thoughts, and at length utterly despairing of success, I fortunately fell upon this proposal, which, as it is wholly new, so it hath something solid and real, of no expence and little trouble, full in our own power, and whereby we can incur no danger in disobliging England. For this kind of commodity will not bear exportation, and flesh being of too tender a consistence, to admit a long continuance in salt, although perhaps I could name a country, which would be glad to eat up our whole nation without it.
After all, I am not so violently bent upon my own opinion as to reject any offer proposed by wise men, which shall be found equally innocent, cheap, easy, and effectual. But before something of that kind shall be advanced in contradiction to my scheme, and offering a better, I desire the author or authors will be pleased maturely to consider two points. First, as things now stand, how they will be able to find food and raiment for an hundred thousand useless mouths and backs. And secondly, there being a round million of creatures in human figure throughout this kingdom, whose whole subsistence put into a common stock would leave them in debt two millions of pounds sterling, adding those who are beggars by profession to the bulk of farmers, cottagers, and laborers, with their wives and children who are beggars in effect: I desire those politicians who dislike my overture, and may perhaps be so bold as to attempt an answer, that they will first ask the parents of these mortals, whether they would not at this day think it a great happiness to have been sold for food, at a year old in the manner I prescribe, and thereby have avoided such a perpetual scene of misfortunes as they have since gone through by the oppression of landlords, the impossibility of paying rent without money or trade, the want of common sustenance, with neither house nor clothes to cover them from the inclemencies of the weather, and the most inevitable prospect of entailing the like or greater miseries upon their breed for ever.
I profess, in the sincerity of my heart, that I have not the least personal interest in endeavoring to promote this necessary work, having no other motive than the public good of my country, by advancing our trade, providing for infants, relieving the poor, and giving some pleasure to the rich. I have no children by which I can propose to get a single penny; the youngest being nine years old, and my wife past child-bearing.
---J. Swift.
------- ------- ------- ------
FARANTWURDUNG:
Applying the lessons we can draw from Mr. Swift's essay is supported by no less an authority than our Secretary of the Ulterior, Dov Bear. See here:http://dovbear.blogspot.com/2006/05/my-modest-proposal.html
Additional note: A well-known conservative apikoris cautions that the Mexican food generated by this proposal would not be kosher, and wouldn't even meet the minimal requirements of "biblical kashrus" popular with many Reform Jews.
Grahda, kalvechomer the stringent kashrus qualifications to which the orthodoxim adhere!
But note that there are only about six million Jews in the United States, whereas there are over two hundred and eighty million hungry Gentiles, most of whom are none to picky. So the issue is not one of kashrus, but rather of supply and demand.
Even with Jews (and possibly Muslims and Pentacostals) abstaining, there will NOT be enough to supply the market.
Without some limitations on our consumption, we may end up with the same vexing problem as we have with oil, namely a diminishing supply and rising prices - which would be disastrous!
Write your congressman, and press for regulation.
Comments are of course welcome. I would appreciate your thoughts.
Wednesday, May 03, 2006
DOS FINFTE... UND DOS VIERTE...
The Fifth of May always feels strange here in the US. I cannot quite get used to the idea of cinco de mayo, seeing as it falls on a date held poignant in the Netherlands.
Yom heruteinu, as Henri Kater used to call it.
Or the day that we were finally rid of those shitbag Germans, as my auntie used to say.
So, a propos thereto, a meise.
May Fourth, as the day preceding liberation day, is the Dutch memorial day. Every year thousands of people gather on Dam Square (and at many other places ) to remember those Netherlanders who did not live to see freedom again.
Wreaths are laid, speeches made, and two minutes of silence is observed.
One year on Dam Square, on May Fourth, a German tourist passes by, doesn't know what is going on, and taps one of the people at the event on the shoulder. "Ei, vass iss heppenink here? Vatt are yu doingg?"
The Amsterdammer patiently explains "sha, we are remembering the immense suffering that our nation experienced at the hands of the Germans during the war".
The German is miffed. "Vell, ve Tchermans suffered a lot during ze var also, you know".
And the Amsterdammer patiently explains "ja, we know. We're celebrating that tomorrow."
Three or four years ago the memorial ceremonies were disturbed by young Maghrebis (of which the Netherlands has very many), who trashed the wreaths, heckled the participants, and gave every evidence of disrespecting the occasion.
This was probably an expression of both anti-Semitism and pro-Palestinianism.
As well as a rude gesture towards Dutch society, of a style which unthinkingly demonstrated that the Maghrebis had absorbed overmuch of Dutch manners, morals, and thoughtlessness. Ironically, by being so utterly un-Dutch they showed how typically Dutch they had become.
But for whatever reason, it ticked off the Dutch. For weeks afterwards the press flowed over with outrage and venom directed at the Maghrebis.
Why exactly were the autochthonous peeved, and why precisely did the allochthonous do what they did?
The autochthonous people (natives) were angry because, of course, the Maghrebis (aka allochthonous, ergo 'immigrants') had disrespected the quarter of a million Dutch who had perished in World War II.
The Dutch-Maghrebi teenagers, on the other hand, saw it as an event with a Jewish focus.
And therein lies the problem.
Of the Dutchmen who perished in WWII, over forty percent were Jewish - nearly three quarters of the Dutch Jewish population did not survive the war. So WWII memorial events naturally tend to stress what happened to the Jews (who may, because of above mentioned events, be notable by their absence).
That the Netherlands is pro-Israel (or perceived as such) is a sore point for many of the Dutch-Maghrebis. Most Dutch will assume that this is because the Maghrebis cannot but be unfairly biased in favour of fellow Arabs. The Dutch-Maghrebis on the other hand, with equal validity, claim that the Dutch are unjustifiably anti-Arab and pro-Jewish.
The Dutch-Maghrebis are right.
The Dutch anti-Arab bias is not based primarily on the situation in the Middle-East, but on the fact that Maghrebis and other Arabs are the 'other', the foreign element, the outsiders, and (historically) the despoilers of Christian countries and slavers of the Mediterranean.
The Dutch pro-Jewish bias is not based primarily on Israel (much though many Dutch admire the Jewish state), but on the fact that for many, Jews WERE Dutch, and ARE dead.
[And the dead are ALL Dutch, you know. Often more Dutch than the living.]
This is a generalization, of course.
There are many other factors in play, such as the perception of shared history and shared values, admiration for a plucky small country that repulsed its enemies and survived against horrific odds, the shared characteristics of stubbornness, brashness, chutzpah, the similarity of the wars of national survival (the Dutch eighty year war against Spain, during which time the rest of Europe either ignored the situation or actively collaborated with the Spanish, which compares with the Israeli resistence to the Paynim while the world apathetizes), and last but not least massive guilt over what had become of Dutch Jewry.
Insofar as the resident Maghrebis understand the significance of what happened to Dutch Jewry, what it means to them is that the Dutch are venerating the memory of a minority that they allowed to be slaughtered, while despising the minority that is there now.
One could argue that if the Dutch want the resident aliens to share their veneration of the Dutch past, they would do well to include them in the Dutch present, rather than sending a message of their eventual fate.
Yom heruteinu, as Henri Kater used to call it.
Or the day that we were finally rid of those shitbag Germans, as my auntie used to say.
So, a propos thereto, a meise.
May Fourth, as the day preceding liberation day, is the Dutch memorial day. Every year thousands of people gather on Dam Square (and at many other places ) to remember those Netherlanders who did not live to see freedom again.
Wreaths are laid, speeches made, and two minutes of silence is observed.
One year on Dam Square, on May Fourth, a German tourist passes by, doesn't know what is going on, and taps one of the people at the event on the shoulder. "Ei, vass iss heppenink here? Vatt are yu doingg?"
The Amsterdammer patiently explains "sha, we are remembering the immense suffering that our nation experienced at the hands of the Germans during the war".
The German is miffed. "Vell, ve Tchermans suffered a lot during ze var also, you know".
And the Amsterdammer patiently explains "ja, we know. We're celebrating that tomorrow."
--- --- --- --- --- ---
Three or four years ago the memorial ceremonies were disturbed by young Maghrebis (of which the Netherlands has very many), who trashed the wreaths, heckled the participants, and gave every evidence of disrespecting the occasion.
This was probably an expression of both anti-Semitism and pro-Palestinianism.
As well as a rude gesture towards Dutch society, of a style which unthinkingly demonstrated that the Maghrebis had absorbed overmuch of Dutch manners, morals, and thoughtlessness. Ironically, by being so utterly un-Dutch they showed how typically Dutch they had become.
But for whatever reason, it ticked off the Dutch. For weeks afterwards the press flowed over with outrage and venom directed at the Maghrebis.
Why exactly were the autochthonous peeved, and why precisely did the allochthonous do what they did?
The autochthonous people (natives) were angry because, of course, the Maghrebis (aka allochthonous, ergo 'immigrants') had disrespected the quarter of a million Dutch who had perished in World War II.
The Dutch-Maghrebi teenagers, on the other hand, saw it as an event with a Jewish focus.
And therein lies the problem.
Of the Dutchmen who perished in WWII, over forty percent were Jewish - nearly three quarters of the Dutch Jewish population did not survive the war. So WWII memorial events naturally tend to stress what happened to the Jews (who may, because of above mentioned events, be notable by their absence).
That the Netherlands is pro-Israel (or perceived as such) is a sore point for many of the Dutch-Maghrebis. Most Dutch will assume that this is because the Maghrebis cannot but be unfairly biased in favour of fellow Arabs. The Dutch-Maghrebis on the other hand, with equal validity, claim that the Dutch are unjustifiably anti-Arab and pro-Jewish.
The Dutch-Maghrebis are right.
The Dutch anti-Arab bias is not based primarily on the situation in the Middle-East, but on the fact that Maghrebis and other Arabs are the 'other', the foreign element, the outsiders, and (historically) the despoilers of Christian countries and slavers of the Mediterranean.
The Dutch pro-Jewish bias is not based primarily on Israel (much though many Dutch admire the Jewish state), but on the fact that for many, Jews WERE Dutch, and ARE dead.
[And the dead are ALL Dutch, you know. Often more Dutch than the living.]
This is a generalization, of course.
There are many other factors in play, such as the perception of shared history and shared values, admiration for a plucky small country that repulsed its enemies and survived against horrific odds, the shared characteristics of stubbornness, brashness, chutzpah, the similarity of the wars of national survival (the Dutch eighty year war against Spain, during which time the rest of Europe either ignored the situation or actively collaborated with the Spanish, which compares with the Israeli resistence to the Paynim while the world apathetizes), and last but not least massive guilt over what had become of Dutch Jewry.
Insofar as the resident Maghrebis understand the significance of what happened to Dutch Jewry, what it means to them is that the Dutch are venerating the memory of a minority that they allowed to be slaughtered, while despising the minority that is there now.
One could argue that if the Dutch want the resident aliens to share their veneration of the Dutch past, they would do well to include them in the Dutch present, rather than sending a message of their eventual fate.
Tuesday, May 02, 2006
ANTHEM-THINGY, SHMANTHEM-THINGY!!!
Okay, so the bigot.., sorry, I mean 'patriotic Republicans and all right-thinking people' don't like the idea of a Spanish version of the national anthem.
I'm not too hep on it myself.
Reason being that I don't speak Spanish (not that there's anything wrong with that).
So I'll probably sing it in Yiddish.
Star spengld bener
fun Frensis Skat Ki
O zog! konstu zen in likht fun sof nakht,
Vos mir hobn bagrist in demer-shayn mit freyd?
Di shtrayfn, di shtern -- in flaker fun shlakht
Fun di shuts-vent mir hobn mit bang in blik bagleyt.
Un der blits fun raket, un der knal fun kanon
Durkh der nakht gerufn hobn zey: es lebt di fon.
O zog! di fon mit di shtern iz zi nokh tsehelt
Iber land fun fraye un iber heym fun held?
Afn breg, durkh neplen fun yam fartunklt,
Vu dem soynes makhne iz fartayet in shrek,
Vos iz es, in bloz fun laykhtn vintl fartunken,
Ot halb-farborgn, ot af a helft antplekt?
Es iz di fon mit di shtern, o, af lang zey tsehelt
Iber land fun fraye un der heym fun held.
O, azoy vet es tomed zayn, ven frayer mentsh mit gever in hant
Bashitsn vet zayn libe heym kegn farlend fun krig un zayn shnit!
Gebentsht mit zig un frid, zol dos land
Loybn di kraft, vos hot undz als folk farhit!
Undzer kamf iz a gerekhter -- undzer iz der nitsokhn,
Zol zayn undzer gebot: "In got iz undzer bitokhn!"
Un di fon mit di shtern, in zig vet zi zayn tsehelt
Iber land fun fraye un der heym fun held!
This blog gratefully acknowledges 'Conservative Apikoris', one of the regular commenters on Dovbear's site (http://dovbear.blogspot.com/ ), who appended the Yiddish version underneath this post (http://dovbear.blogspot.com/2006/05/star-spangled-banner-should-only-be.html ), from the comment thread of which I lifted it.
A fine blog. With many fine commenters.
I do not know if Conservative Apikoris has a blog.
If not, he should.
He got it from here:
http://shakti.trincoll.edu/~mendele/vol06/vol06.279
An intro to Mendele is here: http://www.ibiblio.org/yiddish/mendele.html
A fine site for Yiddishisten.
I'm not too hep on it myself.
Reason being that I don't speak Spanish (not that there's anything wrong with that).
So I'll probably sing it in Yiddish.
Star spengld bener
fun Frensis Skat Ki
O zog! konstu zen in likht fun sof nakht,
Vos mir hobn bagrist in demer-shayn mit freyd?
Di shtrayfn, di shtern -- in flaker fun shlakht
Fun di shuts-vent mir hobn mit bang in blik bagleyt.
Un der blits fun raket, un der knal fun kanon
Durkh der nakht gerufn hobn zey: es lebt di fon.
O zog! di fon mit di shtern iz zi nokh tsehelt
Iber land fun fraye un iber heym fun held?
Afn breg, durkh neplen fun yam fartunklt,
Vu dem soynes makhne iz fartayet in shrek,
Vos iz es, in bloz fun laykhtn vintl fartunken,
Ot halb-farborgn, ot af a helft antplekt?
Es iz di fon mit di shtern, o, af lang zey tsehelt
Iber land fun fraye un der heym fun held.
O, azoy vet es tomed zayn, ven frayer mentsh mit gever in hant
Bashitsn vet zayn libe heym kegn farlend fun krig un zayn shnit!
Gebentsht mit zig un frid, zol dos land
Loybn di kraft, vos hot undz als folk farhit!
Undzer kamf iz a gerekhter -- undzer iz der nitsokhn,
Zol zayn undzer gebot: "In got iz undzer bitokhn!"
Un di fon mit di shtern, in zig vet zi zayn tsehelt
Iber land fun fraye un der heym fun held!
--- - --- - --- - --- - ---
This blog gratefully acknowledges 'Conservative Apikoris', one of the regular commenters on Dovbear's site (http://dovbear.blogspot.com/ ), who appended the Yiddish version underneath this post (http://dovbear.blogspot.com/2006/05/star-spangled-banner-should-only-be.html ), from the comment thread of which I lifted it.
A fine blog. With many fine commenters.
I do not know if Conservative Apikoris has a blog.
If not, he should.
He got it from here:
http://shakti.trincoll.edu/~mendele/vol06/vol06.279
An intro to Mendele is here: http://www.ibiblio.org/yiddish/mendele.html
A fine site for Yiddishisten.
PRAMOEDYA ANANTA TOER, 1925 - 2006
Pramoedya Ananta Toer has passed away at age 81.
Probably the most important Indonesian writer of the 20th century, his oeuvre spanned the last years of Dutch colonial rule and the first generations of independence.
Much of his life was spent in custody, starting in 1947 when the Dutch imprisoned him for two years because of his role in the independence struggle. He was released in 1949.
After an scathing indictment of the Soekarno regime's treatment of the Chinese minority he was imprisoned again ten years later, spending a year in the slammer.
Following the alleged Communist coup in 1965 (almost certainly engineered by Suharto and the CIA to provide a pretext for the extermination of the Communists), he was sent into internal exile on the Island of Buru, a penal colony first employed by the Dutch to warehouse nationalists in the twenties and thirties.
Ironically, this period was to be one of his most productive; while confined, he wrote the Buru Quartet, which was published volume by volume after his release to house arrest in 1979, and, predictably, banned volume by volume shortly thereafter.
House arrest was finally lifted in 1992.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/4959488.stm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pramoedya_Ananta_Toer
Article from the NRC Handelsblad (in Dutch):
http://www.nrc.nl/kunst/article300365.ece
A list of his works is shown below. Please note that they are listed by their titles in Dutch (I believe most of them have also been translated into English).
De vluchteling (Publ. 1950)
Guerrillafamilie (Publ. 1950)
Een koude kermis (Publ. 1951)
In de fuik (Publ. 1951)
Wat verdwenen is: verhalen uit Blora (Publ. 1952)
Corruptie (Publ. 1954)
Midah, het liefje met de Gouden tand (Publ. 1955)
De stroom uit het Noorden (Publ. 1979)
Aarde der mensen (Publ. 1980)
Kind van alle volken (Publ. 1980)
Voetsporen (Publ. 1985)
Meisje van het strand (Publ. 1985)
Het glazen huis Publ. 1988)
Lied van een stomme. Gevangene op Buru (Publ. 1989)
Lied van een stomme: Brieven van Buru (Publ. 1991)
De onheilskomeet (Publ. 1998)
Arok (Publ. 2001)
Verhalen van Djakarta (Publ. 2002)
Probably the most important Indonesian writer of the 20th century, his oeuvre spanned the last years of Dutch colonial rule and the first generations of independence.
Much of his life was spent in custody, starting in 1947 when the Dutch imprisoned him for two years because of his role in the independence struggle. He was released in 1949.
After an scathing indictment of the Soekarno regime's treatment of the Chinese minority he was imprisoned again ten years later, spending a year in the slammer.
Following the alleged Communist coup in 1965 (almost certainly engineered by Suharto and the CIA to provide a pretext for the extermination of the Communists), he was sent into internal exile on the Island of Buru, a penal colony first employed by the Dutch to warehouse nationalists in the twenties and thirties.
Ironically, this period was to be one of his most productive; while confined, he wrote the Buru Quartet, which was published volume by volume after his release to house arrest in 1979, and, predictably, banned volume by volume shortly thereafter.
House arrest was finally lifted in 1992.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/4959488.stm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pramoedya_Ananta_Toer
Article from the NRC Handelsblad (in Dutch):
http://www.nrc.nl/kunst/article300365.ece
A list of his works is shown below. Please note that they are listed by their titles in Dutch (I believe most of them have also been translated into English).
De vluchteling (Publ. 1950)
Guerrillafamilie (Publ. 1950)
Een koude kermis (Publ. 1951)
In de fuik (Publ. 1951)
Wat verdwenen is: verhalen uit Blora (Publ. 1952)
Corruptie (Publ. 1954)
Midah, het liefje met de Gouden tand (Publ. 1955)
De stroom uit het Noorden (Publ. 1979)
Aarde der mensen (Publ. 1980)
Kind van alle volken (Publ. 1980)
Voetsporen (Publ. 1985)
Meisje van het strand (Publ. 1985)
Het glazen huis Publ. 1988)
Lied van een stomme. Gevangene op Buru (Publ. 1989)
Lied van een stomme: Brieven van Buru (Publ. 1991)
De onheilskomeet (Publ. 1998)
Arok (Publ. 2001)
Verhalen van Djakarta (Publ. 2002)
Monday, May 01, 2006
NATIONAL ANTHEM, EN ESPANYOL
I guess it was insanely optimistic to plan for a burrito today.
The taqueria were I usually go had a sign in the window apologizing for the inconvenience.
Why did I think they would be open?
Anyhow, the anthem.
Apparently many radio commentators and opinionists have bloviated outrage over the translation of our national anthem into Spanish.
Y'all might want to chill out, you poxy cretins.
Spanish has been spoken on this continent quite as long as English, and is just as American. Look at the map before you disagree. Our place-names, for large parts of the country, are in Spanish. I live in San Francisco, not Saint Francis town. The capitol of my state is Sacramento, not 'The Sacraments'. Those majestic mountains are the Sierras, not the 'Saws'.
And as a Dutch-speaking descendant of Dutchmen who were in New Amsterdam before the English seized the place, I am not particularly pleased with you lot. We were doing fine exploiting the natives, shooting up the local wildlife, and picking quarrels with the French further up the coast untill y'all stuck your big Anglo-Saxon noses into our affairs.
I guess I'll have to tolerate you - Lord knows I have no choice. You're here, and there are far too many of you to reverse the trend.
However, if you insist that the national anthem only be sung in English, I expect you'll have no objection to reading the Bible in Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek (I'm including that weird crap you insist on calling the new testament in the definition 'Bible').
If the subtle meaning of the anthem is lost by translation, how much more so the import of scripture?
If any of the noble sentiments are lessened by translation, then that much more for sacred writing.
If any sense of group identity is offended by a translated song, surely it is heresy to even consider reading holy writ in anything other than the original sacred languages.
Well, what about it?
For a nominal fee, I am willing to teach some of you how to read it in Hebrew.
I even promise that I'll stay at least one chapter ahead of you in the textbook (my Hebrew is not that good, but it is far, far better than most of you lot can manage).
For Aramaic and Greek, you are entirely on you own, though.
And count your lucky stars - you won't need to learn Dutch. Despite our having been here longer than most of you, we'd rather not have you butchering our language. We've seen what you did to English.
The taqueria were I usually go had a sign in the window apologizing for the inconvenience.
Why did I think they would be open?
--- --- --- --- --- --- --- ---
Anyhow, the anthem.
Apparently many radio commentators and opinionists have bloviated outrage over the translation of our national anthem into Spanish.
Y'all might want to chill out, you poxy cretins.
Spanish has been spoken on this continent quite as long as English, and is just as American. Look at the map before you disagree. Our place-names, for large parts of the country, are in Spanish. I live in San Francisco, not Saint Francis town. The capitol of my state is Sacramento, not 'The Sacraments'. Those majestic mountains are the Sierras, not the 'Saws'.
And as a Dutch-speaking descendant of Dutchmen who were in New Amsterdam before the English seized the place, I am not particularly pleased with you lot. We were doing fine exploiting the natives, shooting up the local wildlife, and picking quarrels with the French further up the coast untill y'all stuck your big Anglo-Saxon noses into our affairs.
I guess I'll have to tolerate you - Lord knows I have no choice. You're here, and there are far too many of you to reverse the trend.
However, if you insist that the national anthem only be sung in English, I expect you'll have no objection to reading the Bible in Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek (I'm including that weird crap you insist on calling the new testament in the definition 'Bible').
If the subtle meaning of the anthem is lost by translation, how much more so the import of scripture?
If any of the noble sentiments are lessened by translation, then that much more for sacred writing.
If any sense of group identity is offended by a translated song, surely it is heresy to even consider reading holy writ in anything other than the original sacred languages.
Well, what about it?
For a nominal fee, I am willing to teach some of you how to read it in Hebrew.
I even promise that I'll stay at least one chapter ahead of you in the textbook (my Hebrew is not that good, but it is far, far better than most of you lot can manage).
For Aramaic and Greek, you are entirely on you own, though.
And count your lucky stars - you won't need to learn Dutch. Despite our having been here longer than most of you, we'd rather not have you butchering our language. We've seen what you did to English.
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