Opinion
A painful bus ride
Sarah Shein
Published: 03.03.08, 18:31
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1. my resprect for religious grew!
Eitan ,   Israel   (03.03.08)
Eventhough it's a critical article about some religious men, it's one of the few here that actually makes me look at the religious with sympathy and admiration. I am talking about the author of course. Not merely because she is critical of other religious people, but due to her wit, independant thinking, humour, personal dignity and courage to stand for what she personally believes. So there are religious people out there that don't just automatically follow the crowd, conform, and protect anything their system says! This makes me have a second look at the religious with hope for finding expression of real individual freedom and humanity. Unfortunatelly the normal reaction of slamming any questioning of established practices is likely to follow, including the usual accusations of forgery. But I salut the brave author of this piece, again, not because she is critical of some religious, but because she thinks by herself, she stands for respectful and humane treatment of women like her, and she does it gracefuly and sensibly. By writing this you actually bring honour to the religious society, not shame!
2. Introducing the new "bus police"
Jake   (03.03.08)
with an Ultra-new line of uniforms specially designed by the 'Artisti Talibani' fashion company.
3. Disgusting Behavior - Nothing to do with Jewish Law
Skavanagila ,   Israel   (03.03.08)
Any truly learned Jew will tell you that the segregation of men and women has NOTHING TO DO WITH JEWISH LAW. It is 100% Minhag - custom. There should be a public campain to boycott Egged buses until they disallow this on their buses. If the Haredim want segregated buses, they should run them themselves with NO PUBLIC FUNDING. These people are an embarrassment to the entire nation.
4. If the author
Andras Bereny ,   Kfar Tapuah, Ephraim   (03.03.08)
If the author were religious she wouldn't have written this piece: The usual propaganda against the Torah-true comunity.
5. They're as far from torah as, well the Taliban.
(03.03.08)
6. I am proud of you
David ,   Rehovot   (03.03.08)
For not letting a fanatically ignorant minority force you down to their abysmal standard. They wish us to be Iran. They're sad, ill educated, misogynists, and everyone should stand up to them as often as possible.
7. We don't need...
Micha   (03.03.08)
"religious" people forcing women to do this or that. The torah was written long ago, by men, to keep men in power. Same holds true for the rest of the religions. Enough trying to compete with Islam for backwards type behavior. Jews need to lead the world in progressive thinking and equality amongst the sexes.
8. YOU'RE NOT AN ORTHODOX WOMAN!
bill handel ,   brooklyn, usa   (03.03.08)
A REAL Orthodox woman shows more respect for Rabbis than you do. You would beter be described as a LIBERATED ORTHODOX WOMAN!
9. ...I am so disgusted my these so called Jews
rachel ,   usa   (03.03.08)
they are about the same as the Muslim fundamentalists . Shame on them .....If they think we women are going to take this bull .....hahahahahahahhah
10. Impure thoughts
Chrisona ,   Chicago.IL   (03.03.08)
You're causing them to have impure thoughts? LOL. Their thoughts would be just as impure if you never existed. At least you had no impure thoughts about them!! LOL
11. To the Back of the Bus
Fred ,   Highland Park USA   (03.03.08)
As a religious (male) Jew I say: G-d bless this wonderful woman. Not because she is some kind of liberated feminist but because the way she acted and wrote are a kidush Hashem. Shame on the men who fail to learn from a women the requirement of the Mishnah "Where there is no man, strive to be one." Apparently the requirement to "learn the truth regardless of it's source." is also missing from their curriculum. Mostly, shame on Egged. Drivers should be instructed to stop the bus and even call the police in the face of such disgraceful behavior.
12. Israel is burning and all you can post is this crap
Al   (03.03.08)
I give up on you dimwits..You arre just too stupid for words.
13. it is very hard to be the dissenting view even when right.
truth strikes again   (03.03.08)
stay strong...
14. i think she is misrepresenting herself
david ,   new york   (03.03.08)
when i google "Sarah Shein", it turns up a lady who belongs to an egalitarian conservartive synagogue. perhaps that is not her, but i suspect it is. there is clearly a "bug up the behind" of this lady and she tries to strengthen her case by claiming to be a simple "religious" woman (note she never said "orthodox"). i hate people who lie and mislead.
15. Andreas
charles ,   petach tikva   (03.03.08)
My answer to you ? LIARS don't believe other people .
16. Sarah Shein
charles ,   petach tikva   (03.03.08)
A nice pseudonim . In Yddish it means Beutyfull . Well your behaviour was so . Kol Hakavod Lach .
17. PLEASE! just sit in the back!!! whats the big deal??
Shimshon ,   Jerusalem   (03.03.08)
this women who wrote this article is clearly an idiot! whats the BIG deal, go sit in the back if it makes such a difference to others!! i doubt, strongly, her level of "frumness" if she couldn't understand "the men on the bus" view and that she was SO stubborn not to move! maybe these men weren't correct and insensensitive but the point is you(woman) who "knows better" should've done whats "right" learn more torah before you start thinking you know whats right and what torah is!!!
18. My experience in Mea Shearim
Leah ,   USA   (03.03.08)
I was in Jerusalem a few weeks ago and visited Mea Shearim. I boarded the bus on King George St. and rode all the way up to Geula. Men and women were sitting together! I strolled through Mea Shearim, and nobody threw anything at me or yelled at me, in fact I was completely ignored. How did this happen? I was wearing jeans!!! I got on another bus to ride to the Kotel--Men & women sitting together!! I looked for these horrible buses where the "Jewish Mutaween" yell at women--didn't see any! It was raining anyway and I didn't feel like waiting for bus after bus just to have a "feminist experience" on the segregated bus, so I just took the regular old non-segregated bus where Haredi men & Haredi women sat wherever they felt like. So I am very disappointed that I can't write a column for YNet and get a bunch of attention.
19. No Andras, she's full within her rights
Jacob Blues ,   New York City   (03.03.08)
To stand up to a bully. The man in her face was nothing more than that. There's no Halacha I know of that supports berating and threating a grandmother. If someone is so threatened by women sitting on a bus, then one should go into the hospital themselves for insanity. There are too many women in the world for one to avert one's eyes (I'll pass on the argument that one is supposed to say a bracha when one sees a beutiful person, including women). Indeed, if viewing women is so horrible, then one can easily go out and buy a set of blackout eyepatches. It certainly would fit the mindset.
20. 14 david
Uday   (03.03.08)
thats ok I hate people who dont read the whole article. On the bottom she says it is a psuedonym, and explains why.
21. No, Bereny, behavior of ultras is not "Torah-true"
Raymond from DC ,   Washington, DC USA   (03.03.08)
I commend the author for standing up against the brain dead, sexually obsessed, gender police. The ultra-Orthodox in London, Antwerp and New York ride the gender mixed buses and subways every day, and they wouldn't *dare* demand gender segregation in those locales. Those pushing gender segregation are, in fact, bringing disrepute to Torah and observance, as they make it look ridiculous. They need to be reminded that such separation has *never* been a part of Jewish public life, that Israel is not Saudi Arabia or Afghanistan, and that the Jewish public will resist this new Jewish Taliban. If they can't learn to behave more civily, perhaps some civil disobedience will be necessary.
22. Welcome to the "NEW SOUTH"
Robert Goldman ,   cooper city Florida   (03.03.08)
To think that Jews are turning into foaming at the mouth "REDNECKS" is beyond me! Next thing you know they will have lynch mobs for all who defy the edicts,,,,,, Wonder how Biscuts gravy and grits would go over up in them thar hills!
23. This is nothing compared to the separation of white German
Rivkah   (03.03.08)
descent Mennonite women in Belize. Their husband accompany them when they leave the home and the women are not allowed to speak to mullatos or blacks or other Belizians since eye contact and conversations can lead to moral corruption. They have those customs because they have found that separation works for them. The German Mennonites in Belize are prosperous farmers and ranchers, mostly. There prosperity would not continue long if they became corrupted because God would take away their blessings in a couple of generations. They guard those blessings as best they can, as the Haredim try to do, too. The umbrella of the personal righteousness of a few can protect many. God would not have destroyed Sodom if ten righteous men lived there. As it was, He got Lot out before the destruction. The city Lot first fled to was spared destruction because Lot was there. A lovely woman named Ronit took me to Natanya to meet her parents after we shopped at Gali Center in Ramat Gan in 2006. She instinctively guided me to the back of the buses in a show of respect to others, letting them take the forward seats. She was so sweet and wanted the people of the world to get along, suspecting but not knowing I was Messianic. I told her there will not be peace until the Jewish Messiah comes. There is no hope of a lasting peace before that. I had a lot of interesting conversations with Haredim women on public buses in Israel. The big question I got was did I think it was better to live in Israel or in America. I said Israel is better because they have the protection of a Saturday Shabbat that pleases the Lord. My personal preference on where to sit when riding on a bus is as close to the driver as possible because of bad experiences on American buses as a teenager traveling alone to Grandma's house in another State. Women can be prey on buses but I did not have problem of being molested or robbed on public buses in Israel.
24. They soar to new heights of disgust
Talula ,   Israel   (03.03.08)
She should have flashed her boobies at them then spat at them. Send the Haredim to Gaza. You know it makes sense.
25. #17
Talula ,   Israel   (03.03.08)
You are absolutely disgusting!!!!! Women are equal to men, like it or not. NO WOMAN needs to sit at the back of a bus because some FREAK tells her to. You make me so sick.
26. It's the bobbing/bouncing breasts thing
manana ,   Israel   (03.03.08)
keeping the view *clear* from that and also to avoid touching in any way shape of form. As a woman, Torah observing at that, I find it EXTREMELY uncomfortable sitting next to a male passenger. If the issue is one of being demeaned by having to sit in the back, the rabbis need to re-examine this issue and perhaps consider moving the men to the back so that the women can sit comfortably in the front. That should resolve the issue.
27. re: #20 my opinion still holds
david ,   new york   (03.03.08)
i did get a case of "MEGO" (my eyes glaze over) reading her ranting and missed that parenthetical remark at the end. but don't you think this article speaks more about her than about any of the subjects of her attacks? i would have a lot more respect for her if she would try to pull off a similar prank with moslems and see the results. instead she pats herself on her back and says she is a wonderful martyr. all she is interested in is stroking her own (sizeable) ego.
28. 25 Talula: Women and men are NOT equal and I will
Rivkah   (03.03.08)
tell you why. God made Adam from the earth, Genesis in the Bible says, from the EARTH made He man AND woman. The name of Adam's first wife was not given, but Rabbis think it was Lillith because of a verse in Isaiah with her name. Lillith would not be subject to Adam and Adam would not accept her as an equal. So Lillith left and became a demonic spirit that causes women to become manish or whorish or to abort or kill their babies, in revenge for Adam not accepting her as an equal. So AFTER Lillith left Adam, God formed EVE from Adam's rib, so she would be subject to Adam and not his equal since equality between the first male and female did not work. There was an excellent History Channel program that mentioned this yesterday. Men and women are different because they have different roles in life for mankind to continue. The Bible calls a manish woman "kine of Bashan". My mother had a spirit of Lillith demonic spirit that afflicted her and made her manish in a lot of ways, hateful toward the authority of her husband and males in general. The consequence of that was that her GRANDCHILDREN became infected with the demonic spirit of Lillith and did not marry or have children. Her only grand daughter to marry and have children had no contact with the grandmother for 26 years, so she did not become infected with that.
29. back of the bus ?
serfati ,   paris france   (03.03.08)
Why back ? why not middle or front ? Whats the big deal ? ...all that isnt religious at all... its ridiculous . Shame.
30. Religion creates war, all kinds of war
Sophie ,   Israel   (03.03.08)
Religion is the core source of all problems in this world. People use it to justify aggression. Why should it matter where a person sits, I don't even notice who's around me when I go on a bus, and frankly don't care. Women have been fighting so hard for equal rights around the world since the early 1900s, they have died to have rights! Look at all the conflicts in this world, if you truly look at them they are all related to religion, to pointless and needless religion. Believe me, you don't nee religion to live a happy and fullfilling life.
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