Haredi Women Are Like Slaves, Haredi Female Politician Reportedly Says
“There are a vast number of different population sectors who have representation in the Knesset, Arabs, Jews, Sephardim, Ashkenazim, haredim and so on. But haredi women have no representation at all. There are male haredi representatives but they do not address the needs and concerns of haredi women."
Above: Ruth Colian
The chairwoman of new all female haredi B’Zhutan Party, Ruth Colian, said today that haredi women are in a position of ‘slavery,’ Arutz Sheva reported.
“There are a vast number of different population sectors who have representation in the Knesset, Arabs, Jews, Sephardim, Ashkenazim, haredim and so on. But haredi women have no representation at all. There are male haredi representatives but they do not address the needs and concerns of haredi women,” Colian noted.
Like their haredi counterparts, the right-wing Zionist Orthodox rabbis who control Arutz Sheva generally oppose women serving in positions of communal leadership – including as Members of Knesset.
It is unclear from the Arutz Sheva report whether Colian actually used the world “slavery.”
Update 4:16 pm CST – The Jerusalem Post has a much more complete report, and it appears Arutz Sheva basically excerpted a small part of it without crediting the Post.
What Colian actually said was, "…Well we are slaves, we are invisible…"
In the Post's report, Colian (whose name is spelled "Kolian," just like in Arutz Sheva) also says this:
…Kolian noted that the Knesset Committee for the Advancement of the Status of Women had held a hearing in November to discuss worrying findings about women’s health in the haredi sector, including a thirty percent higher rate of breast cancer mortality and that haredi women have one of the lowest levels of life expectancy in the country.
“Not one of the haredi MKs showed up to the hearing,” said Kolian. “Haredi women are ranked eighth in Israel for life expectancy, while haredi men are ranked second. This is an unbelievable gap,” she continued.
“The burden and division of labor within a haredi family is completely lop-sided. Women have to bring in an income to support the family financially, take care of the children, cook, and perform other family requirements. Some men are now working but many still go to study all day and this burden on women has a toll.”
Kolian also said that the social stigmatism attached to being a divorced, single woman in haredi society was so intense that many haredi women would not even contemplate filing for divorce from an unpleasant marriage or an abusive husband unless they were in a life-threatening situation.
“Single divorced women are seen as shameful in the haredi community, they are seen as being failures, as not being good enough, and so many choose to suffer in silence,” she said.
“Politicians are talking today about the weaker sectors of society and the invisible people. Well we are slaves, we are invisible, we are the weaker sector. Haredi women are a group of people together and we need to gain Knesset representation as a people and take care of ourselves by ourselves.”…
Colian also says that her new party hopes to represent (and get the votes of) haredi men who left yeshiva and joined the workforce and addresses claims from haredim who use the No True Scotsman Fallacy to try to prove that she really isn't haredi – a claim Colian rejects.
" Women have to bring in an income to support the family financially, take care of the children, cook, and perform other family requirements."
O.K., so you now realize what an oppressive culture Haredi orthodoxy is for women.
Representation is not needed, because the rabbis will not alter their culture for some disgruntled rebels in their midst.
Leave the culture. Be grateful that the Haredim are not as violent as the fundamentalist Islamists, you need not to fear for life and limb. Reach out to footsteps and other organizations to help ease the transition.
Why would any woman who finally sees the light, and understands here horrible lot in life want to remain a slave?
Does she want the Government to dismantle the culture? It will never happen.
Toss the wig, join the modern human race, and enjoy the rest of your life as a free human being.
Posted by: Account Deleted | January 21, 2015 at 04:48 PM
Pard, the problem is that for most of them, by the time they're mature enough to realize what they've been thrust into, it's already too late. They're stuck with a brood of children to take care of and a husband who sits on his ass in kollel all day.
The only answer IS to have the government dismantle it, or at least to force them to hire teachers who will give both genders a secular education, in the hope that some of them will realize there is more to life than fighting over the rebbe's table scraps.
Posted by: Jeff | January 21, 2015 at 04:57 PM
Right. So then stop being one, lady.
Posted by: Jessica40 | January 21, 2015 at 05:45 PM
Ruth!! Get a new conditioner....you're ends are totally split!
Posted by: Gay Frum Jew | January 21, 2015 at 06:17 PM
@Jeff ----> Directly on point, as usual.
@Pard -----> Very well stated.
Posted by: Robert J. Barron, Attorney-at-Law | January 21, 2015 at 09:33 PM
Haredi women have a lower life expectancy because their skirts are not long enough and their sheitels are too long...just look at the head of their party. Obviously violating the laws of tznius and offending God by having a wig that is tooo long. I bet her stockings are also too transparent...whore! How dare she go against the holy "gedolim". Only they know the will of God whose number one concern is tznius.
Posted by: Lamed Vovnik | January 22, 2015 at 09:07 AM
Pathetic. Walk around flatbush look how haredi woman dress .go into pizza ships and cafeterias ; they're all dressed fashionably and up to date .
The only slaves are the man that provide for them !
Posted by: Miami rocks | January 22, 2015 at 10:44 AM
Posted by: Miami rocks
A slave can dress fashionably.
Posted by: milhouse | January 22, 2015 at 11:20 AM
It was the custom among southerners to dress up the house slaves in better clothing before emancipation. Romans dressed their concubines in the finest clothing.
My recommendation is that Haredim had better get ready for the sea-change. Their women are tired of having to do it all after their fathers sell them into slavery as a cullah.
Posted by: Alter Kocker | January 22, 2015 at 12:22 PM
Post by Milhouse ...
Hats of you sir ! Your right on the money ! They all look and behave like slaves for they dress fashionably. You make no sense.
Bashing haredim is your choice but lying about them is wrong .
Grow up .leave the bashing to someone whose much better at it than you ;shamraya
Posted by: Miami rocks | January 22, 2015 at 06:16 PM
Haredim like Islamic fundamentalists enslave themselves, enslave the secular society around them, enslave everyone.
This is how cults are structured
Go read expert descriptions of what defines a cult ... Read something conpletely not related to Judaism ... Just a university study on cults
Read the top 10 characteristics and ask yourself "how is it that haredim aren't a cult"
Bc they are
Posted by: d | January 22, 2015 at 09:47 PM
"Leave the culture. Be grateful that the Haredim are not as violent as the fundamentalist Islamists, you need not to fear for life and limb. Reach out to footsteps and other organizations to help ease the transition.
Why would any woman who finally sees the light, and understands here horrible lot in life want to remain a slave?
Does she want the Government to dismantle the culture? It will never happen.
Toss the wig, join the modern human race, and enjoy the rest of your life as a free human being."
You make these women sound stupid. They are not stupid. They are stuck. If they try leaving, the men, with their resources (which women don't have) will remove their children from them - using the legal system and the teachings the kids have been fed from early childhood that the males are always the boss. The woman stands to lose her children. Very few mothers will make this choice.
The government needs to empower these women to stick together and make demands *as a group*. They need to be the ones to make the change from within, but they need resources to do it. They need free legal representation if they need it in a child custody dispute. They need mobile phones and access to the internet, so that they can connect to each other and organise discreetly. On their poverty incomes, they need to be given access to these resources on loan or previous versions of smartphones. These are just some ideas.
Posted by: Refugee from Boro Park | January 23, 2015 at 08:05 PM
"
Pard, the problem is that for most of them, by the time they're mature enough to realize what they've been thrust into, it's already too late. They're stuck with a brood of children to take care of and a husband who sits on his ass in kollel all day.
The only answer IS to have the government dismantle it, or at least to force them to hire teachers who will give both genders a secular education, in the hope that some of them will realize there is more to life than fighting over the rebbe's table scraps."
Dude, Jeff, do you even know how much more favorable (secular) courts are to women in divorce cases compared to men? Plus, even if her ex-husband did get full custody, well, it's not as if she was actually raising her kids in the first place (the rabbis were doing most of the raising, she was just a nanny who inexplicably gave birth to her own charges). Frankly, I find your near unshakable faith in the kind of over sized government that would police peoples religion to be almost as despicable as the Ultra-Orthodox faith in their rebbies.
Posted by: Audrey the Liberal | March 23, 2015 at 09:15 AM