THE RELIGIOUS PROTECTION RACKET is torn down again, this time the ultra-Orthodox Jewish community is the target, in a story by the New York Times today.
The first shock came when Mordechai Jungreis learned that his mentally disabled teenage son was being molested in a Jewish ritual bathhouse in Brooklyn. The second came after Mr. Jungreis complained, and the man accused of the abuse was arrested.
Old friends started walking stonily past him and his family on the streets of Williamsburg. Their landlord kicked them out of their apartment. Anonymous messages filled their answering machine, cursing Mr. Jungreis for turning in a fellow Jew. And, he said, the mother of a child in a wheelchair confronted Mr. Jungreis’s mother-in-law, saying the same man had molested her son, and she “did not report this crime, so why did your son-in-law have to?”
… The small cadre of ultra-Orthodox Jews who have tried to call attention to the community’s lack of support for sexual abuse victims have often been targeted with the same forms of intimidation as the victims themselves.
There is nothing more worthy of criminal prosecution than the molestation of a child.
That this heinous act is being perpetrated by men masquerading as religiously pious likely doesn’t surprise anyone at this point.
The woman of the child in a wheelchair mentioned above is not fit to call herself mother.
That the disabled are involved in the molestations should bring the wrath of society down on the ultra-Orthodox community and shame them into dislodging their cozy protection racket that has turned a synagogue into a molesters’ refuge.
The Times cites Our Place, in Brooklyn, as a place that discovered abuse, but then they, too, “received threats” for trying to bring child molesters to justice.
Sigh Taylor,
This does not surprise me in the least. There is something just patently awful always lurking in the Ultra-Orthodox and it seems to always default to perversion of some sort. Bottling up and then tamping down sexual energy via Puritanism and sexual phobia seems to warp one’s soul in truly awful and hideous ways. And because these people are a tight-knit community they tend to circle the wagon in ways that make less dedicated people shake their heads.
The twisted logic of the one woman, who could not even protect her wheelchair-bound child from a sexual predator; and then justified her negligence is stomach churning. Unfortunately in the twisted and rigid minds of these true believers it all make sense. They have abandoned agency for absolute certainty; no thinking allow.
As long as there are authoritarian personalities their will be cultish authoritarian religions to service them. The only real check on this kind of awfulness is a rigidly secular state that takes a dim view of any and all claims of religious exceptionalism.
I teach at an Orthodox Jewish Girls High School. In the office there is a white board in which announcements concerning the accomplishments of graduates are posted. Specifically, updates on our graduates are posted when they “accomplish”
1. Getting engaged
2. Getting married
3. Having children.
Period. That’s it. We are never updated when they get college degrees, become doctors or other professionals, etc. Just when they fulfill their “proper function” as females, according to the institution in which I work.
BTW, most of my students get married within 3 years of leaving High School and do not graduate college. Some do, but the attitude seems to be “who cares? Here’s how many kids they have….”
Religion poisons everything.
1000% with you on this one. If you want to see just how morally debased and twisted humans can become give some of them the power of GAWD over children, women and young people.
Were is Christopher Hitchens when you need him? One of his best lines was ” Mr. President, build up that wall” Religion continues to hold back the advancement of the human race..
Indeed, angels. I try to keep the line going on honor of Hitch and his wisdom.
I disagree. Religion can be a force for good. The civil rights movement came out of the churches in this country. The thing is though fundamentalism certainly ruins religion and everything it touches.
Ain’t it the truth, Ga6thDem.
I’d say, history does not support the “religion is a force for good’. The civil rights movement was a mish mass for religious and non-religious people who came together. Some of Kings closets supporters were non-believers and did what they had to do because it was the right thing to do, not because some God told them. Every time religion gets involved, things seem to go sideways.
When humans start doing things for their fellow human beings because its the right thing to do, religion will fade away and the human race will be better off for it.
It ended up drawing in the nonreligious but it was begun in the churches and led by a minister unless you have forgotten.
You should review the reasons why there are “Southern” Baptists in the first place. The religious were happy to support slavery and segregation when it suited them.
Another lovely data point: frequent church-goers are more likely to support torture.
Would there have been a need for a civil rights movement were it not for religion?
Probably because the nonreligious have been just as bad at times as the religious.
Evidence?
Meh, not really Ga6th, a long perusal of history ( and heavens knows I have wasted a goodly portion of my time/life on such endeavors) will show you that it takes a radical and unbounded religion to really get your slaughter on. Granted the odd megalomaniacal oddity could do a very plausible job of mass murder (Timur The Lame, come on down!) but to keep the butchering going on to the next generation you really need a all in-composing religion to get the job done.
The Civil Right Movement “started” with the NAACP, a totally secular institution. The mass movement portion of the Civil Rights Movement did begin in the Black Church because that is the only broad-based institution Blacks had. Even then secular agitators had to find a way to get the fractured and fractious Black Church singing from the same Choir book as it were, The Secular Civil Rights agitators and community organizers had to find a way for the Black Preachers to work for a common goal, instead of their own self aggrandizement.
Also remember that for all MLK’s “Christian” bona fides that are so stressed today, it did not prevent good Bible believing Christians of his day from calling King a Commie.
Look at the Muslim religion, they allow old men to marry and have sex with children.
Another example of fundamentalism. The fundamentalists believe that those girls are nothing more than chattel much like a lot of christian fundamentalists here in the US. The evangelicals here have these creepy father/daughter dances.
Oh please, you say that as though the Catholic Church or the Mormans are any different. EVERY SINGLE RELIGION that has a fundie segment is rift with this, every one. To try to single out Muslims when the article is about Jews….
I’m trying to wrap my head around the idea of a fundie Taoist; not really working Sec. Is that the definition of an oxymoron?
And DAT’S vhy you don find no fundie Taoists!
Whatever religion it is if it has strict rules involving sex, you can bet there will be perversion.
Rick Roberts for an example look at Rome and throwing people in the lion’s den. I hardly think the people doing that were Christians. People are capable of doing some pretty evil thinks in the name of religion but a lot of them like Stalin didn’t even have any religion yet tortured a ton of people. So things like this are not the sole province of religion.
Marxism and especially Marxism/Leninism was a faith, it was a religion for its adherents Ga6th. It was a secular religion to be sure, but a religion none the less.
They didn’t do those things in the name of religion.
Missed the point RR; Marxist/ Leninist/Stalinist thought had all the landmarks of a fundamentalist cult religion. Even the weird, over-the-top, atheism it espoused was part of the cult. *
Tell me honestly, is there any difference between the veneration of saint’s tomb and how Lenin remains were treated? Part of it was cynically thought out by Central Committee, but then they really did not how close they really came to the mark. Lenin and Mao were living gods in their time, and both were and are venerated as Saints after their demise.
* this is not to say all atheism is weird or over-the-top, just that the Marxist version of atheism was weirdly un self aware.
Cujo don’t confuse me with the Southern Baptists. Southern Baptists are probably one of the most hateful Christian denominations that currently exists. I have lived with these nuts my entire life and yeah, they teach some very bad things in their churches for one that black people are the spawn of Satan not children of God therefore dehumanizing a whole group of people.But according to them I’m not a real “christian? anyway.
A tad touchy there, yes?
Ga6th, Cujo359 was making a point. That point being that Religion cut both ways in the days of slavery and in the days of the Civil Rights movement.
As for the Sudden Baptists, meh, they’re an odd bunch to begin with. That two dispirit personalities like Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton could share the same church was always disconcerting to me. Fortunately, the Peanut Farmer bailed on the Southern Baptist and I think the Big Dog also left that church for greener pastures.
Frankly, I would wear their disapproval as a badge of honor if I were you Ga6th. And if they insist on telling you what great follows of Christ they are; just tell them, “real Christians don’t need to advertise,” and then walk away.
Isn’t that Mormons?
Works for the magic underwear set too; I guess. Still, I would just have a super-soaker for that lot though; but then I’m a bit of a jerk.
And then there is this:
http://huff.to/JjyLZ3
ELLICOTT CITY, Md. — The Episcopal Diocese of Maryland is offering forgiveness and a funeral service for a homeless man who killed himself after fatally shooting a priest and church secretary last week.
Bishop Eugene Taylor Sutton and an academic expert on forgiveness likened the diocese’s attitude to that of an Amish community in Lancaster County, Pa., that forgave the man who fatally shot five school girls there in 2006.
[Break]
Religion does not have to be evil; it chooses to be evil. More to the point, it’s parishioners make the choice for hate vice love, for conformity vice independence, for a permanent form of childhood vice becoming fully realized adults.