Freedom forgotten?

We seem to no longer care about freedom in the Western World. To get on an airplane we happily undergo searches, nude photographing in full body cameras and general humiliation. Smoking is forbidden in bars (where people drink ethanol!!) and kindergarten kids are made to wear helmets in the park. Soon we all have to wear helmets go take a stroll in the city. Our e-mails are read by anonymous grey people and our wires are tapped, the books we borrow in the library registred, the sites we visit on the Internet. All in the interest of safety. Our safety. We want to be safe, safe, safe. But you can be safe in prison. Prison. Or 6 feet under. And do anyone truly believe that all these cowering safety measures will save us from the reaper?

We ALL owe God one death.
All of us. And I rather live free than in prison.

Anyone remember FREEDOM? Like that? In BOLD LETTERS? It wasn't that long ago, people. I remember.

Comments

What is the problem with men?

I'm in a bad mood. Fed up. With men. To be clear: I'm not a feminist, I don't believe men to have a rape gene or to be incapable of acting decently due to sociological constraints, general upbringing or an in general evil manhood into which we are socialised. Never the less, I'm truly fed up with the way certain men behave towards women. Part of the reasons are purely egoistic: I'm fed up with being treated like a potential moron, molester or rapist. I'm tired of noticing how women ahead start speeding up when I'm quietly walking home at night, and having too slow down or change sidewalks not to scare her. And a few months ago in New York City I was unable to get a girl to date me, to even meet me in a restaurant, partly because of her previous encounters with inconsiderate schmucks and madmen. Instead we talked on the phone for some 8 (!) hours, half of which was devoted to her interrogating me as to whether I was a stalker, madman, alcoholic or something o...

Shul behaviour and pot smoking

So how exactly should you behave in Shul? I mean on one hand it is fairly simple: Just pick up any standard “Judaism for dummies” book and it will tell you that during service s Shul is a house of prayer, period, and the only conversation that should be going on is the individuals and the congregations conversation with the Almighty. On the other hand we have the facts of reality, maybe best summoned up by the following comment: “Well....Feinstein goes to Shul to speak to God....me I go to Shul to speak to Feinstein.” I guess at least in small Diaspora communities, there is only so much you can do about it. We tend to have enough problems to get a Minyan together as it is. So as long as people don’t start babbling during the Amidah, babbling is more or less tolerated. Then again, severe conflicts of interest occur, specifically during High Holidays. Because then a lot of people who otherwise never attend Shul turns up, bumping into other more or less secular Jews who they only meet on...

Get smart or die trying...from slipping on the muddy tiles.

Some people in this building still manage to amaze me. When I went out for Shul , before sunrise, I saw one of the neighbors wet mopping the tile floor of the loft outside his door, apparently in an effort to get the sand away. I was about to ask him what the hell he was mopping away sand for, seeing as the darn sand storm had not yet subsided one iota, but then what could possible be the point of that, except to make him aware that I considered him an unbelievable Putz ? So sure enough, when I now 6 hours later came back from a diagnostic Hebrew test for another round of Ulpan, the plentiful water outside his door still hadn't dried up, seeing as Beer Sheva is not only windy, stormy and sandy, but also cold. What had happened though, obviously, was that more sand had blown in from the desert of our dreams and longings, turnings the 20 or so wet mopped meters outside his door into a bleeding, slippery mud swamp, part of which has by now entered all our apartments via our shoes. ...

Introducing the Hardline According To
...Ofer Maimon

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