So, I’ve been thinking about my experience is that gender issues household and my feelings on the gender issues in the past week. Unfortunately, in Orthodox society, the gender roles have become for women to do everything and the men to do nothing but go and “learn.” The reality is that what the men call “learning” is really all about a good old boys club. They enjoy arguing with each other. The problem is that this is against the very Torah they claim to be learning.
The Talmud says very clearly that if a man does not teach his son a trade, it is as though he teaches him to steal. In today’s society, this means going to college. Yet we have little children 7 and 8 years old who scoff that they won’t go to college. The mother clearly didn’t like my comment about them going to college. They are not the only little boys being taught that they, as men, do not work, they sit and learn.
How do these people expect that all of Orthodoxy should support themselves with only the woman’s salary. Let’s be realistic, “woman” jobs pay less than “man” jobs. The higher $70,000 a year that a therapist might make is not very much money when you have to pay for a nanny, vehicles, gas, tuition, camp and so on and so forth, especially when you have a large family. At least in the scenario where a woman is staying home and the man is working, you are not paying for a nanny.
I’m not even touching on the quality of the nannies that Orthodox women are hiring. They think their nannies are great but, really the woman leaves the baby home alone. I’ve seen it firsthand.
At this point, this arrangement is still working for people because most people have parents who pay for things even after their married. However, logically, I don’t see that happening in the next generation when the parents of grown children become a mother who works as a teacher or therapist and the father doesn’t work and doesn’t have any skills. Also, nowadays, the parents who are supporting their kids often don’t have as many children as the young parents nowadays are having. How is one supposed to support 5 married children and put their grandchildren through school and still retire without starving?
You are correct about those who insist on long-term kollel; however, most frum men do work.
ReplyDeleteYou wrote: "The Talmud says very clearly that if a man does not teach his son a trade, it is as though he teaches him to steal. In today’s society, this means going to college."
ReplyDeleteI don't agree. Not going to college doesn't make you a criminal. You can have an honest, steady, viable income without a college degree.
As far as the survival of families, I don't see why it matters. It will either work for each individual, in which case great. Or, it will not work for some (or all people) in which case they'll go get jobs. When people need money they can be quite resourceful.
"When people need money they can be quite resourceful."
ReplyDeleteYes, but unfortunately, that "resourcefulness" can include things that are unethical, illegal, or both. Hence the Talmud's observation.
I don't know how they survive when their wives have to take maternity leave. My husband can't stand this mentality, nor can several of the Charedi I know...but you and I both know I know unusual Charedim. One Charedim I know has to help his daughter pay all the bills and this causes a lot of tension for him with his son in law. He can't understand how people have this mentality...and he's FFB. By contrast he has a few nephews that work and learn also because they don't expect their wives to support them and one of them said "What happens when my wife is pregnant and can't work".
ReplyDelete"I don't agree. Not going to college doesn't make you a criminal. You can have an honest, steady, viable income without a college degree."
ReplyDeleteMaybe in some places, but in many you really can't! And the bigger problem is the attitude that education itself is bad, contaminated or otherwise some kind of curse....instead of part of the path to being a knowledgeable and decent human being.
(Of course the idea of being "a knowledgeable and decent human being" isn't necessarily a respected one everywhere...)
Sure, some people will make it without serious education....but many already don't. And that's a problem that's clearly getting worse.
" When people need money they can be quite resourceful."
Which is part of the problem. Necessity is the mother of invention....including the invention of unethical or illegal -- but highly creative! -- schemes to obtain money. Schemes that are driven by the desperation of a person who has no money but needs it.... which is exactly what the Talmud understands and is warning against.
Doesn't it say somewhere in Pirkei Avos that if there is no flour there is no Torah? While men are obligated to learn, there are many ways to do. There are shiurim before and after work, Torah tapes, CDs and podcasts, and more seforim than most of our ancestors would have dreamed of.
ReplyDeleteOne should also remind those who are sitting in yeshiva and forcing their wives and in-laws to pay for their lives (which can include $800 strollers, the latest cell phones, thousands of dollars in school and camp tuitions, expensive shaitels and designer clothes...I'd continue, but I'm getting ill) that Rashi and the Rambam both had JOBS! That's right, folks, Rashi was a wine merchant and the Rambam was a doctor.
However, college is not the only road to financial success. Particularly for men, the skilled trades can be more lucrative thana position which requires a basic BA.