The blog has been getting kind of intense and serious as of late. So, to lighten the mood a bit, some updates as to what’s been going on at the glorious U of C.
As it turns out the Talent Show will be held on a Friday night. Considering that 58% of you voted that I should “Maintain Dignity (i.e. nothing)” then I suppose it’s all for the best.
Here are the rest of the results:

11% – Beatnik Poetry (2 votes)
26% – Interpretive Dance (5 votes)
5% – Stand-up Comedy (1 vote)

Apparently, no one liked my cover of Rockin’ in the Free World last year…
Before vacation, I went to see The One-Man Star Wars Trilogy. How geek-centric was this evening?

• I first heard of this performance from Slashdot. When you get your social events from Slashdot, you know you’re in trouble.
• I went with two astro-physics PhD. students.
• The ushers dressed up as Stormtroopers, and EVERY person¹ went up to one of them and asked, “Aren’t you a little short for a Stormtooper?” Believe it or not, the usher did not in fact kill everyone in the theater.² She must have been strong in the force…

At any rate, the guy was spectacular. In roughly one hour, he basically performed the entire trilogy (with sound effects) minus the boring scenes.³ His impersonation of Admiral Ackbar was just fantastic.
Um…yeah.
In other areas of obscure geekdom, since my vacation started I caught up on Homestarrunner and Red vs. Blue, and read Alan Moore’s Watchmen.
All worthwhile, in their own ways.
Pathetic you say? Perhaps. But this is what happens with a T1 line, no classes, and more importantly, no car. Anyway, I have a class on “Theology and Mythology of Evil” in a bit, so I’ll just end this before it gets worse,
Excelsior, True Believers!
Damn.

1. Although the thought did cross my mind, I decided to have mercy on the poor usher.
2. Bad for repeat business.
3. It should be mentioned that the audience did in fact notice when he did not recite the EXACT dialogue from the movie.

Thanks to everyone who commented on The GNU Testament. People made some really thoughtful points to which I’ll respond after I get back to Chicago.
Surprisingly busy yet restful vacation. Met many old freinds, made some new ones, and haven’t lost any that I know of. Spent enough time in the heights to remember how much fun it was, but not enough time to remind myself why it’s better that I left when I did. At any rate, it’s time to get back to “normal.”
One last tidbit while I’m still in NJ:
Life imitates The Simpsons

Those wacky UC’ers are at it again.

Do you have a talent you’d like to show off? Can you sing, dance, recite
poetry, juggle, eat fire, etc., etc.? If so, come be in the MAPSS Winter
Talent Show sponsored by your MAPSS social committee!!

One would think that people wouldn’t have that much time on their hands to plan or participate in this thing. I barely knew we even had a social committee. But I do have to admit, I am intrigued.
Poll Closed
Of course if this thing is on a Friday night or Shabbat, all bets are off.

About a week ago, someone sent me an e-mail of a “shidduch meeting” form. For those who don’t know, a shidduch meeting is when a group of (usually) women get together and see who knows whom and if there could be any possible set ups from that group.¹ Since everyone knows different people from their various circles, it’s reasonable that two compatible people would never have met nor would they even have people in common who could get them together.

The organizer wrote up a form with “basic” information. I don’t know how seriously the participants used the forms – it’s possible they just used the names had the “sponsors” describe the singles – but disliked several of the questions asked. Independently, each question provides some information about a person and perhaps indicate if X would be shayachet for Y. As a unit, many of these questions are insufficient or inappropriate to describe the entirety of a person.
For example, here are the 10 questions from the form (in addition to personal background info like occupation, school, etc) with my comments. I copied the questions as they appeared on the form and as you will see, many are horribly phrased. Also, the questions are presented in the order in which they were received, but order should not be confused with importance.

1. Do you/are you looking for someone who intends to cover her hair?
Some may consider hair covering as merely a religious barometer, like a guy wearing a black hat (see below). The major difference is that there are actual halakhot of married women covering their hair. Consequently, if a woman does not plan to cover her hair, or she plans to cover her hair not in accordance with Jewish law,² then she would not be appropriate for a significant population of the Orthodox dating pool.

2. Do you/are you comfortable with (a girl) wearing pants?
Awkwardly phrased. The gist is if you’re a girl, do you wear pants, if you’re a guy, do you care? This infers from the culture religious issues of modesty, but the halakha is not as clear cut as the hair covering. As phrased, this promotes stereotypes of what modesty is halakhic or socially acceptable. Some context would help, as there are many times when pants would actually be more modest than a skirt. At any rate, whether or not one agrees with the implications of women wearing pants, it’s a practical question for determining if two people from the vast modern orthodox community would be appropriate.

3. Do you/are you comfortable with (a boy) wearing jeans?
I don’t understand this one at all. Maybe on some level wearing jeans has some religious implications and indicate where someone is “holding” religiously. It might be a factor for some people, but in my opinion, not enough to make a top 10.

4. Do you/are you looking for (a boy) who intends to wear a hat?
Like #3 this one is directed to the right end of modern orthodoxy. Depending on the people involved, this may or may not make a top 10.

5. Do you plan on having a television in your home?
Interesting idea, but horrible presentation. It’s a religious indicator, but I don’t think television should be reduced to a simple yes/no, good/bad dichotomy. Instead, I suggest the following scale (work in progress):

1. I tape the weather channel to see what I missed.
2. I talk about Rachel, Ross, and Joey like they’re real people.
3. Just give me Law and Order and the Simpson’s.
4. Nothing but PBS and the History Channel.
5. I need it for the VCR…and the news.
6. Box of Satan.

This way you find out not only religious beliefs, but some degree of personality (or lack thereof)

6. Do you plan on attending movies with your spouse?
This one is even more vague than the TV question. What type of movies are we talking about? Finding Nemo? Yentl? Sallah? School of Rock? Blazing Saddles? Lord of the Rings? The Big Lebowski? Dogma? Sound of Music? Rocky Horror Picture Show?³ Furthermore, you could plan on sneaking out to see the movies by yourself without your spouse, or even rent them.

7. Do you/are you looking for someone who will be learning or engaged in a profession?
Is this a choice? My spouse can either be learning or engaged in a profession? Do I want a stay at home wife? Kollel husband? Applicable to a small percentage of modern orthodoxy, this question might be more of a personality indicator than a religious one.

8. Do you/are you looking for someone who will learn on a regular basis?
Regularly setting aside for learning establishes Torah as an important part of Jewish life. Children who see their parents learning may come to value Torah more themselves, or minimally not get as cynical at a society which asserts the importance of Torah and then promptly neglects it.
I just wonder if this applies to women learning too.

9. Do you/are you looking for someone who will attend minyan on a daily basis?
Yet another religious indicator (noticing a pattern?), but practically useless for a marriage, especially once kids come.

10. Are you a Kohen?
According to halakha, a Kohen cannot marry a divorce or a convert and the convention is not to set up kohanim with people who have questionable Jewish lineage. Very important question.
Most of these questions attempted get a religious sense of a person. While society is obviously important in a modern orthodox society, many of the questions are irrelevant to having a successful marriage. Several questions merely reinforce harmful stereotypes of what is and what isn’t religious. On the other hand, if people think in these stereotypes then these questions may be useful. So my question is, for men and women, what are the top 10 questions you think would be most applicable to the most people in the modern orthodox community? What questions would best define you as a man or woman?

The goal here is not to tell everything about a person, but to have a sense if two people would be compatible. Also, the questions have to be phrased in such a way that they will be useful. People don’t always like thinking about themselves, or would just lose patience with a long survey. More questions would help, and so would asking how important an issue is to someone. For example, I may not want a TV, but I won’t care if my spouse does.

Grayson Levy does a great job of this with Frumster. He asks a nice mix of religious and personal questions, and he forces members to express themselves beyond simple multiple choice questions.

I also acknowledge that most of the forms tell more about the person who constructs them than it does about the singles.
Anyone else have suggestions?

1. Not to be confused with kiddush or shabbat lunch. This at least has no pretense of being anything else but a shmooze fest.
2. Or at least the “Jewish law” as understood by the guy, or more realistically the guy’s rabbi. I’m not going to discuss here the laws of hair covering and what is “real” halakha and what is custom. My point is that if a guy thinks that what a woman plans to do is forbidden, don’t set up those two people.
3. My personal opinion is that some of these movies are assur to see, others are mehuyav on everyone. No, I will not say which is which. My father likes to tell following story from R. Faur’s shiur. One day R. Faur said the only movies which are mutar are cartoons and westerns. After naively seeing Fritz the Cat (or part of it at least), he then told his shiur that cartoons are also assur.

I’ve been working on two final essays for the quarter, so I’ve been slacking in blogging.
Really funny article on yahoo news. The Israeli Post office has been opening letters addressed to God and publishing excerpts of them on their website, sparking outrage from rights groups as a “violation of basic privacy laws.”
No mention if these rights would apply to the prayers people put in the Western Wall (“direct to the source”) or if herem D’R. Gershom applies to God’s mail.
Ok, back to work…

For the second consecutive year, I spent thanksgiving out of NY and thrown into someone else’s family dynamic. Wild and crazy family politics never tasted so good.
Actually, I enjoy the holidays more when the people are not so uptight and are just free to be their ususal wacky selves instead of putting on a show. There is no such thing as a “normal” family. Every one has their share of insane members. If a family seems perfect, that just means they bury the bodies in the basement.
Ever since the laptop has gone to meet its maker, I’ve been going through withdrawal. Hopefully I can get it back fixed soon, and I can finally get some work done (and stop my whining about it).
In other news…
Since I’ve been “elected” to the Yavneh board at Hillel I’ve been writing weekly divrei torah for the e-mail updates. Assuming I get it done early enough in the week, I may start posting some of the better ones. I will also be restarting the classes in rabbinic thought next quarter. Until I get suggestions or something comes up, I don’t expect to do any new ones right now. However, while I review the old sources, I’d like to finally write up the shiurim in (hopefully) intelligent essays.
Happy Holiday¹ and Shabbat Shalom.

1. I suppose I could use “Hag Sameach” too. While Thanksgiving might not be a Jewish holiday, it does have the requisite sacrificial offering.

My previous post “The Harm In Being Nice” generated a great deal of feedback. Thanks to everyone who posted, IMed, e-mailed, voted, and threatened. Although some people missed the point, just about everyone contributed something positive to the discussion.

I’d like to address some of the issues raised in the subsequent correspondence. I tried to address the phenomenon of why women would want nice guys as “just friends” as opposed to a more serious relationship. I argued that when a guy is loyal, considerate, emotionally sensitive etc. the woman would have the primary effect of a relationship without the commitment, employing the metaphor of “why buy the cow when you can get the milk for free.”

This was just my attempt at explaining a phenomenon. Obviously, relationships are as complicated as the participants. Many people suggested contributing factors as “two sides of the same coin,” but the complexities more closely resemble AD&D dice. However, I couldn’t very well write about relationships with disclaimers every five sentences.¹ That’s what followups are for.

Most people responded to the following scenario: woman breaks up with guy using the ever popular “you’re really nice, but…” line. Most of the time, this completely ends the relationship. My theory applies more to women who don’t want to date someone, but still want to maintain some friendship with the guy. I’m not saying that women should just continue dating someone just because. It’s possible the woman has her own legitimate reasons for not wanting to marry a guy, and she has her own reasons for not articulating them. I was taking the woman at face value: 1. that she thinks the guy is nice and 2. she just doesn’t “feel” it or see it going anywhere and that is why she is ending the relationship.

There could be any number of reasons why a woman wouldn’t want to continue dating a particular nice guy. She might not like the way he looks, they could have incompatible career goals, etc. Sometimes men come on way too strong which is also a turnoff. I also must stress that “niceness” is not a substitute for “personality.” Simply going through the motions of politeness just means you’ve been trained well – but it doesn’t say anything about who you are.² Niceness might not cause a breakup, but niceness alone will not lead to marriage. If I may get biblical, sur mera must be followed by ase’ tov.

Can mixed friendships exist as healthy relationships? I think so under certain circumstances.³ Being able to talk to the other gender is not only useful for advice or different perspectives, but it also trains people to view the other gender as “people.” As early as high-school (perhaps earlier) the Orthodox world indoctrinates men and women about the dangers of temptation.⁴ The intent is admirable – to prevent rampant immorality and various other forms of sinning – and for the most part it succeeds (or at least better than the alternative). There is however an unintended consequence. By constantly emphasizing the avoidance of temptation, one is in fact placing temptation at the forefront. If every time I look at a woman I think, “must…avoid…temptation,” then I am really looking at the woman as a sex object to be avoided, rather than as a person.⁵

On the other hand, there can be downsides as well (aren’t there always). The hurt of the rejection will be proportional to the feelings felt by the rejected person. If these feelings are too strong, then a person might not be able to “get over” the rejection while maintaining a friendship. To use another personal example, there was a woman whom I liked and dated, and we broke up in the typical fashion. When I found that maintaining contact was too difficult for me emotionally, I withdrew. Recently, I was able to speak to her about a personal event,⁶ and she provided very useful insights.

As I mentioned, relationships are complicated and no single theory will account for all cases. However, this doesn’t mean we shouldn’t think about it and see what patterns have effected our own personal lives. For yet another perspective, see this salon article which comes courtesy of Dr. Manhattan.⁷

On that note, the poll results are in. With a whopping 68 people voting:
49% – Stay nice – just stop being such a wimp (33 votes)
43% – Stay nice – Something good will turn up eventually (29 votes)
6% – Get a complete attitude adjustment – might require mental reprogramming and/or lobotomy (4 votes)
3% – Stay nice – might not work for you, but why should everyone else lose out? (2 votes)

The clear majority says I should stay nice, with some discrepancy as to how or why. Some are pure optimists, while most voted that I should develop some sort of spine. I will start by not letting a silly internet poll determine my behavior. (I’ve been getting better at being nice without becoming a doormat and I will continue to do so).

I’ve also tracked down one of the people who suggested the lobotomy, and I’m looking for the others.

The final 3% of you are just selfish bastards.

1. And really, who reads footnotes?
2. Ignoring for now how long someone should give as a chance to “be him/herself”
3. Yes, I have seen When Harry Met Sally.
4. For more details and what some people are doing about it see End The Madness.
5. Before people start yelling at me about this, I’m not saying that we should let everything go. I’m just saying that there can be unintended consequences. When I was in Gruss a few years ago, R. Miller gave us mussar that married couples were too friendly with other’s spouses. He did not elaborate as to what “too friendly” meant, but I can assure nothing major happened. I think that this mentality reinforces how the people were raised in treating interactions with women as primarily being sexual.
6. The “.5” from the last post found this website.
7. Who ironically lives in the Bronx now.