Monday, February 13, 2006

Teach Your Children How Evil They Are

Arutz Sheva reports:

Education and Transportation Minister Meir Sheetrit (Kadima, formerly of Likud), told students on a visit to a school in Beit El yesterday that the residents of Amona and their supporters were evil.

Sheetrit responded to a girl who read him a letter relating to the events at Amona. The girl asserted that “G-d punishes evil doers.”

Sheetrit interrupted the girl and exclaimed angrily, “To whom exactly are you referring to by the word ‘evil’?”

“Who settled illegally in Amona? Who’s evil?” continued Shitrit. “In other words, you’re the evil one,” Israel’s Education Minister proclaimed to the young girl.
Permalink here.

Now that's how to educate the youth.

6 Comments:

Blogger gogalucky said...

okay, but why was she implying that he was evil and that he should be punished? because her parents are miseducating her. his statements are a red flag to her parents--why is their child saying these things?

who can think themselves so pious as to tell other people that they will be punished by g-d???

it was childish, for sure, but i worry about the actual child in this situation more than anything..

Mon Feb 13, 06:37:00 PM 2006  
Blogger G-D SQUAD said...

ACTUALLY, rakdannit, NOT cropped. That is the whole article, thank you very much (which, I admit, says something about the depth of the article itself). You can click on either of the links I provided to view the article in its original.

As far as G-d taking sides, it's pretty clear as daylight from last week's Torah portion that G-d definitely takes sides. And G-d has a plan. Now, many people have a hunch that G-d wants Jewish people living in Eretz Yisroel right now, which in some opinions means that G-d wants Jews living in places like Amona and Gush Katif and Jerusalem. According to others, not so. And, sadly, I have to admit, lately it's looked like the latter might be right (except about Jerusalem, until terrorists say they want it).

I know I don't live in Jerusalem anymore, but I'm still convinced that the education system over there is pretty horrible. That was the focus of this post, not so much the settlement part.

Mon Feb 13, 10:05:00 PM 2006  
Blogger gogalucky said...

do you mean that the education minister was horrible or that the girl was horribly miseducated..?

Mon Feb 13, 11:42:00 PM 2006  
Blogger G-D SQUAD said...

ohhh... snap! good one. First of all, in the quote from the girl, as far as I can tell, she's got her head on straight. She said "G-d punishes evil doers." Is that wrong? Are her parents misinforming her? I think not. But that the Education Minister should tell a young girl that she is evil, that's straight up MESSED. UP. And this is who is in charge of the education of the youth in Israel?

Mon Feb 13, 11:57:00 PM 2006  
Blogger gogalucky said...

i agree with talia.

and she didn't just say that g-d punishes evil doers. that's watering it down... she "read him a letter relating to the events at amona" and "aserted that 'G-d punishes evil doers.'" (a liiittle different..)

so i think she may have been horribly miseducated... first of all, who says that kind of a thing? so g-d punishes evil doers. that doesn't mean we should go around parading our knowledge of this fact and inform everyone that does anything we don't agree with that this is the case, suggesting that they are, in fact, evil, and that we are completely clear of any misdoings.

i think some things are clear cut, like... oh... murder? but unfortunately we don't have anything as obvious to fall back on for this situation in terms of how g-d might judge us. so it's a pretty crazy thing to go around absolutely positive of the evilness and non-evilness of specific people. that's for g-d to decide; not our job.

Tue Feb 14, 10:20:00 AM 2006  
Blogger G-D SQUAD said...

rakdannit, um, ok i'm about to say something which i don't think is an, em... er... "ad hominem attack," but just some of my personal insight. so i myself usually don't use gender-specific pronouns when conversing about G-d (although, of course, in prayer and in Torah G-d is almost exclusively refered to in the masculine e.g. הוא אלוקינו, הוא אבינו. but obviously, like there are different attributes of the revealed state of G-dliness in this world, there are also different "gender" aspects of G-d's attributes revealed in this world. It's a whole kabbalistic thing, which is way above me, so i won't go in-depth. but the same way "elokim" and "hashem" are used to denote different of G-d's qualities, (namely strict judgement and compassion), so are masculine and feminine pronouns used to denote different attributes, which reflect masculinity and femininity in our world, but obviously, as you duly and most studiously noted, G-d does transcend gender ;P But i agree with fedora that calling G-d "It" is a diss, like it was for this kid.

Wed Feb 15, 01:15:00 PM 2006  

Post a Comment

<< Home