quote:Originally posted by Armoth: Yea. The Maccabeats are all mulling over the article. Honestly, it's very weird to be the object of negative press, or even negative comments for that matter. I suppose its to be expected, but its really odd to find blogs or posts on twitter and facebook talking about you negatively. Obviously we get tons of positive feedback, so its really about keeping your head in the game and in perspective.
My take on this situation, for what its worth is that the criticism isn't really about the Maccabeats or your video at all.
As I understand it, the Maccabeats are part of a Jewish school that strives toward "Torah Umadda" which I understand to be a middle path between the purely secular and purely religious views. Middle paths are always going to be under attack from both sides. Those who reject secularism entirely will criticize you for being too liberal and those who embrace secularism will criticize you for not being liberal enough. As the Maccabeats becomes increasingly recognized, you become a lightening rod for criticism of the middle path from both sides. Because people are interested in talking about you, couching criticism of the middle path as criticism of your latest video, is a way to get people to listen to their objections to aspects of Torah Umadda.
Blitt and Feigleson aren't really criticising your video. They are using your video as a spring board to criticize Orthodox Jews (and Yeshiva University) for what they perceive as sexist practices.
The opposite side was doing a very similar thing with the criticism written about "Candlelight" that focused on the "filthy" nature of the original Dynamite video. They were using your video as a spring board to criticize the idea that Jews can embrace both secularism and strict Torah observance.
I don't know if it helps or not, but the criticism isn't really about the Maccabeats or your work. Its about your school of Judaism and I'm sure its nothing new to you that Jews both to the right and left of you are critical of what you are trying to do.
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I agree as well. I'd note to Lisa, that I think your facebook post was in some ways counter productive. Your first line:
quote:I think that it's ludicrous to criticize a men's a capella group for doing a video with only men.
Is the only argument you need. When you go on to say:
quote:But a significant group of Jews would have been alienated by the video including female performers.
Your essentially engaging Blitt and Feigelson with the argument they want to be having, which is not about the Maccabeats. Of course Orthodox Jews would be alienated. Blitt and Feigelson's point is that the issue is more important than the alienation of Orthodox Jews. The points of "um, dude, it's a male acappella group?" and "Creating an experience celebrating Purim that all Jews can appreciate is more important than addressing certain issues of Orthodox Judaism" are evidence for two separate arguments, and when used together I think they undermine each other.
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We're actually getting a lot of people emailing us their support - which we really appreciate. I'm glad people are seeing this for what it is.
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quote:Originally posted by Raymond Arnold: I agree as well. I'd note to Lisa, that I think your facebook post was in some ways counter productive. Your first line:
quote:I think that it's ludicrous to criticize a men's a capella group for doing a video with only men.
Is the only argument you need. When you go on to say:
quote:But a significant group of Jews would have been alienated by the video including female performers.
Your essentially engaging Blitt and Feigelson with the argument they want to be having, which is not about the Maccabeats. Of course Orthodox Jews would be alienated.
I wish you were right. That's exactly the problem. Feigelson is ostensibly an Orthodox rabbi. He was ordained by Yeshivat Chovevei Torah (YCT), which is a left-wing yeshiva created because YU (or the RIETS yeshiva there) was considered too right-wing by some of the extremely left-wing modern Orthodox folks.
There are a lot of people who have major problems with YCT, and I'm one of them. What he wrote sounds like it was written by a Conservative or Reform rabbi.
So yes, you're right that "Of course Orthodox Jews would be alienated." But not Orthodox Jews of Feigelson's stripe. I mean, I wouldn't have been offended, either. There are plenty of modern Orthodox Jews who aren't way to the left like Feigelson, but still wouldn't have a problem with it. But he knows full well that there are plenty of Orthodox Jews who would have been offended. He just doesn't care.
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quote:But he knows full well that there are plenty of Orthodox Jews who would have been offended. He just doesn't care.
Based on what he said, I think he cares very much. But what he cares about is changing the attitude of the those Jews rather than accommodating what he believes is active harmful to women. I suspect he sees the prohibitions against mixed gender performances as being cultural rather than authentically religious.
Its very rare for devout religious people to sincerely believe that their personal practices are either more or less strict than the ideal. They may give lip service to the acceptability of certain variations, but quietly (or sometimes not so quietly) look down on both the stricter and the more lenient. It's a widespread problem.
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