"Every frum Jew has to realize that he’s not Donald Trump and the media is not his enemy. Being belligerent is wasting an opportunity"
We are called an am chacham v’navon in the Torah, a wise and perceptive people. There’s nothing wise about pretending COVID doesn’t exist and denying that vaccines can help. Sharing conspiracy theories isn’t a sign of great wisdom. But what has happened is that because of certain government policies to address the pandemic that threaten our right and ability to live — like closing chadarim, for example — we fell into this “us versus them” mindset, and in some cases, the rhetoric on both sides spiraled out of control.
I hear a lot of concerns in the course of a day, some of which seem legitimate and some that seem silly, so I make sure to sit with dayanim, people who actually know halachah, before issuing any sort of statement or reacting. What’s the halachah? What’s negotiable and what is a line we absolutely won’t cross? Once the rabbanim tell me where we stand, I can try to work with the authorities and media toward that goal. But when people emotionally react to the issues they perceive as problems, that hurts us.
We have to accept that things have changed, and it’s a mistake to ignore that. We are a visible minority. A generation ago, many of our fathers wore caps in public, but now, we’re confident enough to announce our difference. It’s a good thing, perhaps, but it comes with a cost. Our behavior has to be even more exemplary.
In recent years, social media arrived, so every bad decision or silly blunder is blown up out of proportion, seen as a statement rather than a mistake made by a lone individual.
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