Using Lies and Deception to Make Your Point

Leapa reports that a pashkevil hanging up around Boro Park (pictured at right) states:

The fact is: Eighty percent (80%) of Gitin (Jewish Divorces) .... are products of a computer at home, or a cellphone or i-pod in a pocket.

This is the dry fact. It is attested to by all Rabbonim which do Gitin.

Dear Young Person (Yingerman): If you do not want this device to throw you out of your house, throw it out first!!!

(Note: My Yiddish skills are minimal. The translation is Leapa's. However, from what little I do know, it looks reasonably accurate. If it's not, please let me know and I'll modify the translation accordingly.)

To be perfectly honest, I'm not an expert in the field of divorce, so I'll be the first to admit that I could be wrong. However, I *highly* doubt that 80% of all divorces among Orthodox Jews are because of a computer in the home (it doesn't even mention the Internet), an Ipod or a cellphone. Unless, of course, "being caused by" equates to "owning one," in which case, I'd say that over 99% of all divorces are caused by telephones and electricity.

Now, if someone wants to start a crusade against computers, cellphones and Ipods, I don't have a problem with it (as long as there is no coercion involved). I have no problem with someone asking me to get rid of my computer, my TV or my MP3 player (which isn't an Ipod), as long as they don't get involved in coercion or deception.

It's when people start using deception and make up facts that I start to get annoyed and begin to "push back." The best example from my experience, I suppose, is that I have no beef with Christian missionaries, whereas I have nothing but utter contempt for Jews for Jesus -- specifically because the former is simply advancing their ideas in a straightforward manner and the latter are being deceptive to accomplish their goals.

It's when someone starts to use deception that my sympathies for their goal start to go downhill. For example, a few weeks ago, the President of a shul in my neighborhood got up on Friday night after davening and asked the congregants to contact their representatives (or was it the president?) about Jonathan Pollard. In his little speech, he said that the Pollard incident was "the Dreyfus Affair all over again." Now, we can argue whether or not Pollard deserved his life sentence; we can debate whether or not he should still be in prison; but one thing is clear -- Alfred Dreyfus was framed and innocent of all the charges against him. Jonathan Pollard, on the other hand, broke the law -- a fact that no one denies. Comparing him to Dreyfus completely destroyed his case, in my opinion. I have little tolerance for deception in rhetoric -- and yes, exaggeration is a form of deception. Are there divorces caused by computers (i.e. the Internet)? No doubt there are -- but 80%?

You often here this from members of our community regarding things that they want to do away with. Invariably, someone will get up and state that [fill in the blank] is the "greatest danger to K'lal Yisroel" today. It could be television, movies, cell phones, computers, DVDs, Ipods, mixed seating, college education, or whatever. If I had a dime for every time I heard something was the "greatest danger..., " well, I wouldn't be a millionaire, but I'd probably have at least two bucks. By definition, there can only be one "greatest danger" and yet it shifts every time to be whatever the particular speaker is talking about.

Is it possible to have an argument using just plain old simple facts? If you think that computers, cellphones and Ipods are deleterious to a marriage, then please make a cogent case for it. But don't pull numbers out of thin air. If you think that Pollard should be out of prison, then make a case for it; but don't compare him to an innocent man. And the next time someone thinks that some product or service is bad for the Jewish community, let him say so without shouting that it's the "greatest danger to K'lal Yisroel." Just make a good case using simple facts and reasoning.

The Wolf

Conditional Divorces?

I came across this rather disparagingly-titled article in Ha'aretz. It discusses the case of a woman in Israel who received her get several years earlier, with a condition attached that stated that any issues that had been discussed at the outset in the beis din (rabbinical court) have to be continued there. Recently, a dispute broke out over the education of their children (which was not discussed in the beis din, according to a representative for the woman) and the woman went to the (secular) Family Court to have the problem adjudicated. The man claimed that this was a violation of the agreement and went to a Tel Aviv beis din who ruled that by going to the secular courts, she may have violated the condition and invalidated her get.

The big problem here is that the woman has since remarried and had a child. If the get in invalidated, then she would have to divorce her (second) husband and her child could be declared a mamzer. She appealed to the Supreme Rabbinical Court, but the case has been delayed for a year already.

As the article states:

The delay also puts the woman in an impossible situation: If it is eventually decided that the get is invalid, she is already forbidden to have conjugal relations with her present husband.

The rest of the article goes on to describe (unflatteringly) some of the edicts that R. Eliyashiv has decreed in the past few years. I don't really wish to discuss that... my feelings about both the edicts and the disparaging of a talmid chochom (even if you disagree with him) are well known. What I do want to discuss is the very idea of a conditional divorce itself.

Now, I'll be the first to admit that I am no expert in Hilchos Gittin. You certainly won't find me sitting on a beis din that terminates marriages - I am certainly not learned enough, nor am I particularly anxious to take on the responsibility. However, one thing which I am pretty sure that I remember learning is that a conditional divorce can only be valid if the condition is limited. The classic case is someone issuing a divorce on condition that the woman never drink wine or never visits her father's house is null and void, because it is not a document of separation -- she is still bound to him forever by the condition. However, a temporary condition is valid (i.e. she not drink wine for thirty days), since at the end of the condition period, she is fully separated from him.

Now, I don't know if the condition in the get mentioned at the start of this post was only temporary -- I'd have to assume that it was (and that the members of the beis din know halacha better than I do). But, to be honest, I find the whole idea of allowing conditional gittin to begin with to be bad public policy. The situation that the woman now finds herself in is surely an untenable situation -- she doesn't have her first marriage, she doesn't really have her second marriage either and is simply stuck until the Supreme Court hears her case (why does it take a year, anyway?!). It's bad enough when there are situations when a husband will not give a get to begin with, but it's even worse when he gives a conditional get and can trap her ex post facto on a real or imagined violation of a condition.

I certainly don't have a problem with a husband having a say in where his children are educated. If there is a dispute as to where the child should go to school, it certainly should be adjudicated in the agreed upon manner -- and there should be penalties that can be applied to those who break the agreements, but invalidating a get should not be one of them. The potential for damage to not only the woman but to her new husband and any children born of the marriage is just simply too great.

In short, let's leave a get to what it should be - a davar hakores (a thing that separates) - and not something that leaves the woman still bound to her first husband and the potential for multiple ruined lives down the road.

The Wolf