Reading Radloh's rant against Chabad shluchim timed, I suppose, to coincide with the International Conference of Chabad Emissaries (shluchim) which ended Monday morning, brought to mind my only attendance at one of those conferences.
As I walked down Eastern Parkway to convention, which was then small enough to be held in Crown Heights, a cab pulled to the curb in front of me, about 40 feet from the entrance to the convention. As I got closer to the cab I watched an elderly man trying with difficulty to get out of the back seat. Perhaps two dozen Chabad rabbis passed him by as they hurried to enter, some glancing at him as they walked but none stopping to offer assistance.
I stopped and helped the man out of the cab, and then walked after him into the convention.
Who was this man?
I saw similar scenes in 770 over the years with Rabbi Shmaryahu Gourary, the Rebbe's elder brother-in-law and the man who for many years ran and sustained Chabad's yeshivas.
And here in Minnesota I also saw the same thing, with a friend's elderly mother and with others.
Why are things this way? I really do not know. But if ever God gave me a sign to get out of Chabad, it was that day on the streets of Crown Heights.