Nashim tzidkanios letter in Binah

Jewishmom8

Wed, Oct 19 2022, 10:29 pm

amother Pistachio wrote:

I think that a discerning woman can see hear the Rebbetzin’s point. No one is saying that their music is wrong or that they shouldn’t be wearing glamorous clothing. What we ARE saying is that social media is kind of the antithesis of tznius (if you think that broadcasting your life to the world is tzniusdik, please explain your logic to me). Therefore, the movement to “bring the Geulah” via heavy social media use is by definition NOT in consonance with the modesty of previous generations of nashim tzidkaniyos, who did in fact bring the geulah in their time.

so YOU dont do it.
its not the first movement or the thousands that you and I dont agree with or we think its a horrible idea. I personally don't want my girls on you tube or social media. we agree. lets us not do that. lets go to asifas and read articles why that is wrong.
to call out publicly specific people is wrong. there are not that many names there. Did she call them first on the phone? are we going to now call out by name all the other wrongs things people do each week? Child molesters? thieves? big yentas who speak loshon hara? people who wear lace or short skirts? will the rebitzen write a letter each week humiliating a frum person who made a big mistake?
is this frum cancel culture?

#BestBubby

Wed, Oct 19 2022, 10:30 pm

amother Seablue wrote:

Has she bashed every other women's cd that came out in the past?

I don't think the author's problem was with a women's cd, but that the music was being
promoted and viewed online, when non-business online activities are to be avoided.

Also had an issue that these videos are accessible to men.

That would be a problem with cd's as well - that men could listen.

But online videos are more accessible to men than a cd that you have to buy.

amother

Olive

Thu, Oct 20 2022, 12:39 am

Mayflower wrote:

I didn't read all the pages so maybe this was brought up.. But I don't understand the criticism of using social media to promote their music. Jewish media refuse to give any platform to women, so where else can they turn to? This is what happens when women are silenced - they find another way to have their voices heard.

Yup. And, notwithstanding having the platform of frum media, tons of Jewish men promote content on social media anyway. Torah content, podcasts, music.

dancingqueen

Thu, Oct 20 2022, 5:06 am

amother Snapdragon wrote:

This. I don’t know if this was said already. But in the preface of the album they say that bzchus Nashim tzidkonios we were let out of mitztriam and specifically through the songs. The ironic part it that they didn’t sing for tznious purposes, they only played instruments. I found it so off putting. I usually don’t care about these things. …

Miriam singing with the women is literally in the pshat of the Torah during the actual geulah from Mitzrayim.

PinkFridge

Thu, Oct 20 2022, 5:35 am

amother White wrote:

K, so if the ad was the issue,

Does the rebetzin (who gave her that title anyway?) also comment on the hundreds of other tongue in cheek ads? Like a lulav made out of candy, or a new sofa bringing a chag someach? Etc etc….

Or does the rebetzin only bring out the nasty juices when it’s woman against woman…?

Did you see my post about how easily you can google her? She is a rebbetzin. She's married to a chashuv rav/RY and has taught for years herself. They've done a lot of chessed too.

amother

Oldlace

Thu, Oct 20 2022, 5:46 am

PinkFridge wrote:

You're correct. I also posted links about her for anyone who was ~~intellectually honest enough to read them~~ curious.

Why assume people don't know who she is? Or label those of us who disagree with her approach as lazy thinkers or not intellectual.

I'm quite aware, I know who's who in the yeshiva (Agudah) world. I certainly know who her husband is. I'm not just a basher. I'm just tired of this old, worn out approach that guilts people. It's not productive and it disenfranchises people. It's not the 1990s anymore.

amother

Chartreuse

Thu, Oct 20 2022, 5:54 am

Good morning ladies!

This letter has been on my mind. I just reread it with a fresh brain.

Seems to me that Reb. Reizman's chief complaint is that by using social media to disseminate their music, these singers are going against gedoli yisroel and no matter what their music is like (she says she didn't listen to it), their method of producing and promoting it makes it intrinsically bad and dangerous. Notice the words used: the internet is 'seductive'. The videos these women post are 'luring' bnos yisroel into danger. Words that evoke s-xual predators, cunning, devious, underhanded, extreme danger. Strong words. Clearly the author feels that having frum woman singers making their music on social media can lead to bigger, far more terrible things. I know that this is a belief held by many in the yeshivish world. I'd argue that this ship has sailed, and that there's no calling it back. No one I know listens to CDs, or even owns a CD player. Music is promoted, listened to, purchased, online. This has been true of male artists for years. These woman are not creating a movement, their copying an established way of doing business in this field. The same teen girls that are watching women singing and dancing online have been watching men singing and dancing online for years. No one is being 'lured' anywhere. They're already there. There's nothing really new happening here.

There are a few other critiques/insults- long wigs, heavy make-up, 'gyrating', too much 'glitz' 'glamour' and 'ego'. But the use of social media is the biggest offense. These side criticisms actually bother me more than her main point, because they are personal attacks, personal insults. Reb. Reizman accused the singers of being immodest, 'shallow ', 'superficial', all without the author ever having heard the music!

These women are creating entertainment. Their goal is to be entertaining. Pretty gowns, pretty makeup, pretty dances are entertaining. Beautiful music, sang 'soulfully' (Reb Reizman used the word mockingly, I think, but I think the music really is soulful, heartfelt), is entertaining. Stepping away from the 'evil internet' aspect of the argument, if these songs and performances were, let's say, a live performance, what would be wrong with them? Where are our girls supposed to go for entertainment? Does Reb Reizman think that school kumzitses and mom's singing lullabies at home are adequately meeting the need for most girls?

amother

Olive

Thu, Oct 20 2022, 5:59 am

I look forward to the rebbetzin's chashuv husband publishing a letter condemning a certain very popular and theatrical video daf yomi shiur, which is all over YouTube and has a Twitter profile as well, for flouting the gedolim.

<crickets>

Edit: to be clear, I don't actually look forward to that because I think the daf yomi shiur is great and many people are benefiting from it. These women's content, what I've seen anyway, is also great. My young girls enjoy it very much and I believe they benefit. The only chinuch problem I see is that the author of this article is teaching impressionable young girls.

PinkFridge

Thu, Oct 20 2022, 6:12 am

amother Oldlace wrote:

I'm assuming that because some people are saying who is she?

amother

Oldlace

Thu, Oct 20 2022, 6:12 am

amother Chartreuse wrote:

Where are our girls supposed to go for entertainment? Does Reb Reizman think that school kumzitses and mom's singing lullabies at home are adequately meeting the need for most girls?

This, exactly. It's not like she suggests a viable alternative. The utopian musical night of Bais Yaakov singing in heartfelt voices she describes in her letter just isn't going to cut it. It was adequate years ago when girls could be guilted and shamed into subduing their true inner selves (as I described when my BY teacher disparaged Miami Boys Choir and those girls who liked their music as "trash") but not anymore. It's wrong and it's old fashioned and it's going to backfire.

watergirl

Thu, Oct 20 2022, 6:22 am

PinkFridge wrote:

I'm assuming that because some people are saying who is she?

I’m one of them (I didn’t ask “who is she”, I stated I have no idea who she is, meaning she is not a name I’ve heard before). My point in saying so is that she is not a rebbitzen in my sphere who I had heard of before, nor is her husband a rav in my sphere. He is not my posek and I will go out on a limb and presume he is also not the posek of the women on the album - who we have to assume have consulted with their own poskim before they participated in this project.

Of course I can google (and I did). I’m sure she has her role in her kehilla and clearly she is valued and chashuv to them. Not to me, and not to others - we have our own rebbitzens and Daas Torah - and that’s how it should be.

We each have our own derech. The people who make one psak or statement for their kehilla - fine! Good! Those who make a statement for all - they can do what they want but their psak is not mine and I am not beholden to it.

amother

Olive

Thu, Oct 20 2022, 6:25 am

amother Oldlace wrote:

Not to mention that people want recordings to play music over and over again, and they like to see who's singing. My DDs play their favorite Thank You Hashem songs over and over. How often do women get together for a big musical evening, especially as adults? Maybe once or twice a year, if they're lucky.

watergirl

Thu, Oct 20 2022, 6:34 am

amother Oldlace wrote:

Right.

Also, taking away something (for those who are part of the circles who hold by this rebbitzen) from someone without offering a replacement is begging for them to leave all together.

This reminds me of when my step-kids were young and LOOOOOVED the Moshav Band and a few other bands that by no coincidences, their father (my husband) likes. Their mother only wanted music we call "Shiny Shoe" music - you know the type, where the male singer wears shiny shoes... at the time it was Avraham Fried and few others. She went to her rav asking if she should allow the kids to listen to the music they liked - all frum male singers. He said no, there is no Yirei Shamayim in that music. I'm not sure how he even could claim to know what these singers hold in their hearts... but whatever. Very shortly thereafter, all but one of the kids went to non-Jewish music all together. The last one continued to listen to this kind of music in secret. Today, the one who continued to listen to the music is very frum and learning in the mir. The others are not frum in any way.

watergirl

Thu, Oct 20 2022, 6:41 am

As a side note, I always felt weird when these male frum superstars sing to all girl audiences, like when they go to camps. All the girls being entertained by a man, in a society where we separate the genders to such a degree. My daughter's friends all have the same "I once accidentally bumped into XYZ singer when he came to my camp as he was singing in the middle of us" story to tell.

Bringing a women singer to an all female audience feels MORE tzanuah to me. The girls can DANCE! They can SING! You can't do that when you are at a male singer's show.

I remember as a young NCSYer going to these mixed concerts with all Shiny Shoe singers (see my previous post) and the guys could dance... when we did, we either had to stop or go behind a mechitza that no one thought to put up for us, so we had to wait like dummies while they found a screen of some sort and threw it up. Because otherwise, the other men in the audience would see the public schoolers (us) in pants with little exposure to yiddishkeit being moved to dance by this music, the likes of which most of us have never seen.

I can only imagine what it would have been like had we had a female singer superstar! All of us who thought we had to leave that part of ourselves behind... how many more girls would have been inspired to learn about yiddishkeit had they had the chance to see this?

One women advisor we had, she had been a professional flautist before she became a BT. She gave it all up when she became frum, as she did not feel it was tzanuah to continue. She had no place to continue. Is that the message we should be sending out to the girls? To give up this part of yourself because there is no kosher alternative?

amother

Oldlace

Thu, Oct 20 2022, 6:42 am

watergirl wrote:

I know. I'd forgotten about the MBC trashing from my youth but their resurgence brought it back and even though it was a couple of decades ago I can't help but feel a tiny spark of, well, vindication.
I said previously these female singers aren't my cup of tea personally but if that's what many frum girls enjoy and find inspiring maybe we should acknowledge that it fills a genuine need and that it's a good thing, not something to denigrate.
All due respect to the rebbetzin but her letter is very out of touch. I know she meant it well, but we need people who are more in touch to be addressing these sorts of issues, frum entertainment as well as social media and the internet.
We mostly agree the old method of teaching tznius would not be effective nowadays, younger, more attuned teachers are needed. This is no different.