Dear Heshy,
I loved your post yesterday about positive changes within the frum community. I find myself wondering why no one seems to focus on the positive changes that have taken place in frum society amidst all of the negativity. It is my opinion that we are better off now than we were ten years ago. Still, I took issue with one of your point and I may be the only dissenter, but I hope you print my letter so that dissenting opinions can be heard. I know you were trying to be funny when you wrote that frum people were becoming healthier by eating salad and adopting healthy lifestyles, but I think this is one of the reasons that there is so much promiscuity in the frum community nowadays. Not only does eating healthy lead to an utter lack of tznius, but it also leads to a greater emphasis on fancy food – something our ancestors greatly looked down upon.
When I was in shidduchim no one asked for a picture, no one cared about what size you wore, it wasn’t tznius. Nowadays, it’s next to impossible to find overweight girls who are married off to good guys. It’s not only the shidduch world that has placed an overemphasis on health and looks. The frum world in general is obsessed with gyms, zumba, power walking, and getting in shape. It was never like this, none of mine or my parents generation was so obsessed with salad. One didn’t eat salad because it was goyishe and you couldn’t get pre-checked lettuce anywhere. No one would trust themselves with bug checking and it was generally felt that heimishe food was the best for you.
Salads and healthy food have created a situation in which people don’t have proper yiras shamyim, they don’t trust in Hashem to take care of their health and seek outside, mostly unkosher ways to do it. I have to admit that I’m surprised you didn’t support the idea of Wallersteins on Zumba. If you look past his racist and ignorant delivery, you would see that our frum daughters have fallen for the yetzer harah who has told them to sacrifice their bas yisroel sensitivities in the name of health.
Heshy, I know you grew up modern and fail to seethe damage done by salads, I know you live in a place where lettuce is grown in hundreds of varieties, but do yourself a favor and look at the damage that this health craze has caused the frum community. It has harmed the parnasah of heimishe food establishments, it has caused the shidduch crisis, and it has allowed marriages to be torn apart because the women want to look better for people outside of their homes.
Shirah Brown
Can’t wait to see what feedback I get on this.
Shirah, let me add: we know that Sephardim aren’t Jewish because they use spices.
True dat, Michael.
If eating healthy is bad for frumkeit and my neshama. I quit. I used to think Jews were smart. No longer. This may be the most adenine thing I’ve read all month, including the NYPost article.
It’s satire!
asinine*
I’ll give her face a 7 and her asinine. She must eat salad or do Zumba to keep it so perk and taut.
This post gave me a real chuckle.
Heshy you are hilarious, thanks for the laugh
I am going to presume it’s satire and give it a good smile.
If it’s not, the writer is misguided.
“Salads and healthy food have created a situation in which people don’t have proper yiras shamyim, they don’t trust in Hashem to take care of their health and seek outside, mostly unkosher ways to do it.”
Hashem wants thou to take advantage of every opportunity to behave IN A HEALTHY MANNER, and exercise and carrying less weight means you live longer and can do more mitzvos.
Trust in Hashem, but tie up your camel.
I must be a total shegetz. I eat salad and floss every day.
Just to clarify, there are four salads that are ok: Cole slaw, Potato salad, Israeli salad and cucumber salad. Anything else is goyish.
This was brilliant, ohmygosh.
At my high school, my principal briefly wanted to create a zumba elective, but they were very careful to address it as “KOSHER zumba” at all times.
There was another time when they wanted to introduce a track running elective, but they pulled it because they consulted with a rav about it, and he said it wasn’t tznius. Or so says the urban legend.