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Featured Post


ET TU, OU? AND AFTER YOU SAID YOU NEVER ERASE WOMEN…

When the Orthodox Union's Torah Tidbits keeps women off its covers and can't
reach its ideal female/male-writers ratio, we have little hope of a healthy
Orthodoxy
Nov 21, 2024, 1:45 PM
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Please note that the posts on The Blogs are contributed by third parties. The
opinions, facts and any media content in them are presented solely by the
authors, and neither The Times of Israel nor its partners assume any
responsibility for them. Please contact us in case of abuse. In case of abuse,
Report this post.
Recent issues of Torah Tidbits. (courtesy)


This is a post I’d hoped not to write. It was drafted before the war, but even
then, I’d hoped not to need to post it. I ignored it for the past year, and I
truly wish I had no reason to write it now.

But I can’t push it off any longer. I owe it to everyone who has followed me and
my organization, Chochmat Nashim, over the past many years and contributed to
the efforts against the erasure of women’s faces and voices in the Orthodox
world. Despite having written so many posts about this worrying trend, this one
is particularly difficult to write. Because while in some ways it is about a
win, it is also a reflection of just how entrenched this practice has become.

I first wrote about the erasure and marginalization of women in Orthodoxy more
than a decade ago. Since then, I have been told over and over again that the
erasure of women is a “Haredi thing” and “it would never happen in the Modern
Orthodox world!” And consistently, we, Chochmat Nashim, have responded that,
unless we actively and regularly speak out against it as a community, it will
absolutely come to us too. And so it has. And from a flagship mainstream
Orthodox institution, no less.

Specifically, the Orthodox Union. 

Et tu, OU?! The OU, erasing women!? The organization whose Jewish Action
magazine contains images of both men and women!? The organization that told me
that they had no need to issue a statement against erasing women, since their
actions — publishing images of women — speak louder than any statement!? That
OU? Yes.

Here’s what has happened:

Two years ago, a woman wrote to tell Chochmat Nashim that she tried to place an
advertisement for a Yom Iyun (a day of study) on the back page of the Orthodox
Union’s Torah Tidbits. (Torah Tidbits is a weekly booklet, distributed to
synagogues in Israel with a critical mass (however that is determined) of
English speakers. It contains divrei Torah, words on the parsha, and many ads.)
She said her request was denied because her ad included a picture of a woman and
they did not show images of women on the back page.

Torah Tidbits is an old friend, a staple of Orthodox Anglo Israeli Jewry. For
decades, it has been distributed to nearly all Orthodox Anglo shuls and many
Anglo homes each week. From their site: “Torah Tidbits is the largest weekly
English language Torah publication in Israel, reaching over 400,000 readers
country-wide.” Was it possible that they were intentionally blocking images of
women from the booklet’s covers?

The woman’s conversation had taken place over the phone, and we needed to be
sure that excluding women from the back page was actually policy and not just a
misunderstanding.

Chochmat Nashim therefore submitted an ad for the back page — including
photographs of modestly dressed women. The ad was declined — we were told the
page was booked for weeks (totally possible). When we asked for the next open
date, however, we were first offered other pages and then stopped receiving
responses to our emails. Eventually, I received a phone call from an executive
inviting me to the office to discuss “things you and I understand” (Reader, I
did not understand.)

We spoke (over WhatsApp, in the end) for more than 45 minutes. The executive
explained that he had decided to remove women from the back page after feedback
from a man who claimed that the women on the back cover distracted him from his
prayers when he saw the publication in shul (the images of columnists on the
front cover are tiny, and so presumably less distracting). The executive  wanted
to bring “OU Torah” to as many communities as possible, and removing women from
the back cover was a “sacrifice he was willing to make,” towards that goal.

I observed that the Orthodox Union is a mainstream Orthodox institution, indeed
supported by women via their shopping! Moreover, the OU is meant to represent
the women of the mainstream congregations — women like me — and that the OU had
never before taken the position that women’s images should not be seen. It
seemed, I said, that he was going against the values of the OU and sacrificing
those of us in his base in his attempt to reach those who were not his base.


I explained that the erasure of women and girls is a demeaning and dangerous
trend, one we need to stand against, rather than join and justify. When he
insisted that not having women on the back page was not the same as erasing
women, I noted that it was exactly the same, that his line was simply at a
slightly different place in the sand. As he was not inclined to rethink his
approach to the back cover, I requested that Torah Tidbits, at the least, keep
all images of people off the back cover — a difficult approach in advertising,
perhaps, but equitable (or equally inequitable) for men and women.

In that same conversation, I noted the dearth of women writers in Torah Tidbits:
columns by men far outnumbered those by women. He responded that he wanted more
women writers, but they had not found suitable candidates, as the writing would
be held to a high standard, with no monetary compensation (I do not know if they
pay any columnists). 

And so Chochmat Nashim began a long and detailed investigation into (some of)
the publishing practices of Torah Tidbits.

Tracking both the appearance of women’s images on the front and back covers, as
well as the number of divrei Torah authored by women per issue, we discovered
that, over time, women’s visibility had declined, as had the percentage of women
writers (one regular female columnist does not allow her image to be printed
anywhere). 

Chochmat Nashim reached out to some of the most accomplished and suitable female
Torah scholars who had written for our long-running “parsha initiative” (with
the Orthodox Leadership Project/OLP), published on the Blogs of The Times of
Israel, to ask if they would be willing to write for Torah Tidbits, and if so,
to be in touch with the OU office. Seven wrote to the OU to offer their divrei
Torah services, and each was told that Torah Tidbits was not looking for more
writers.

Hoping to resolve this disparity “offline” and amicably, Chochmat Nashim turned
to the NY office of the OU. An OU executive there was happy to speak with us,
surprised by the statistics we supplied, displeased by them, and appreciative
that we had reached out. He said they would look into it.

Soon afterwards, the parity we had suggested for the back cover (no images of
people, rather than no women only) was implemented. Better, I received word that
a new weekly dvar Torah by a woman would be added. A few weeks later, a new
column by Rebbetzin Dr. Adina Shmidman, head of the OU Women’s Initiative, was
added. An email from the OU hinted at more changes to come.



Text sent to us of a letter a reader sent to the OU

But, despite these positive trends, we continued to receive multiple messages
asking about Torah Tidbit’s policy regarding women’s images and Torah. Posts in
women’s Facebook groups asked if Torah Tidbits erases women. In further
conversations in 2023, executives at the OU in NY explained to us that they were
aiming for 30% of the columns to be written by women, but that, since they
prefer writers from within the ranks of the OU (a largely male rabbinic
organization), it is difficult to find appropriate female writers…

In the end, thanks to this work, there has been improvement, with images of
women on the front cover and a policy of no people, male or female on the back
(this is not necessarily positive, but it is at least consistent).

However, women continue to be underrepresented in divrei Torah, with the average
being 78% men and 22% women — and seemingly only because we have pushed the
issue. Which brings me to why I write this post.

 

 

 



The Table of Contents from a recent Torah Tidbits. Note the three women and teen
column, in contrast to 14 adult men. (courtesy)

The above illustrates that when we speak out change can happen. But without us,
it surely won’t.

Some of the data.

If we want Modern Orthodoxy to retain its values, if we want women to be
represented properly and fairly, we need to hold our institutions to these
standards. And Chochmat Nashim cannot do it alone. Your voices need to be heard;
you need to bring your opinions to the attention of the leaders who set policy.

You who care about Judaism and Torah, as well as the health of the community,
need to decide if this erasure and marginalization of women is part of the
Judaism you want. Whether this messaging is what you want to hear (and see) from
the institutions you support. Perhaps most importantly, is this the kind of
Orthodox Judaism you want for the next generation?

Unless you speak up wherever you see this erasure and make your voices heard —
in shul, among your friends, at your Shabbat table, and with your hard-earned
cash — the erasure of women’s faces and voices will continue in our community. 

We are at a tipping point. An entire generation has grown up thinking that
censoring images of women is normal — or at least justifiable. It is now all too
common to see men-only shul directories, dinner invitations picturing only the
husband of a couple being honored, and ads for all kinds of products that women
buy bereft of the women and girls whose images should logically be there.

There is nothing to stop this trend but we the people. For your daughters and
your sons, for your sisters and your brothers, for the women who came before you
and those who will come after you — for the integrity of Torah itself, it is
time to speak out against the phenomenon of erasing women in the Orthodox
community.

About the Author
Shoshanna Keats Jaskoll is a writer and an activist. Cofounder of
chochmatnashim.org She loves her people enough to call out the nonsense. See her
work at skjaskoll.com
Related Topics
 * Journalism
 * Leadership
 * Modern Orthodoxy
 * Orthodox Judaism
 * Women & Judaism

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