Black and White Irony

Not sure if the people at Haaretz are aware of this, but it is sort of ironic to feature the following two stories on your website at the same time.

One story (picture to the left) opens:

[New York C]ity's ultra-Orthodox Jews took the Pennsylvania Amish on a walking tour of their world Tuesday, saying their communities are naturally drawn to each other with a commitment to simpler lifestyles.

The article (from the AP and not Haaretz's own writers) is a feature on the Lancaster County Amish's (my parents' neighbors) visit to Crown Heights and their superficial interactions with their chareidi hosts.

The other article, announcing a new initiative by the New York City D.A. to combat sexual abuse in the chareidi community, includes the following quotations:

Currently, the DA's office is prosecuting 19 suspected felony cases of sexual abuse in the Orthodox Jewish community in Brooklyn, said Rhonnie Jaus, chief of the district attorney's sex crimes bureau. It's also prosecuting six misdemeanor cases, she said.

and

Prosecutors have blamed stigma, shame and cultural isolation for victims'
reluctance to come forward with their claims.

I am making no claims of sexual abuse in Amish communities, or of a greater incidence of sexual abuse in the chareidi world than in the rest of Orthodox Judaism, or in fervent segments of religious communities more so than in the more acculturated (and assimilated) masses of Western liberals.

I am, however, suggesting that "simpler lifestyles" are not necessarily devoid of "complex lifestyles'" vices, and also that the "cultural isolation" of such "simpler lifestyles" (by definition, I think) is likely to create communities where "stigma" and "shame" more powerfully rear their ugly heads.