Hilary Clinton photoshopped out of situation room picture

Interestingly -- and ironically -- both headlines sort of "wipe out" Tomason.  Why do the headlines only mention Clinton?

Actually I find misogyny is not better when it springs from a religious source it is still vile.

However as to modesty and the right to reproductive health and anything else involving the person those are things that only the women herself has the right to decide.  Free will is always the key.  The real hard part is figuring where free will ends and societal pressure begins.  Overt societal pressure like that present in most fundamentalist sects is IMO incompatible with true free will.

What are you calling misogyny? The burka or the paper's policy? I'm not Muslim and can't really speak to their religion and values but I've spent enough time in the Chasidic communities to know that there's certainly nothing misogynistic about that culture and their values.

Part of living in a multicultural society means that there are going to be people doing things differently than you do and with different values from yours. If they're not trying to impose their values on me, it's not my concern. If a Muslim wants to wear a burka and never touch alcohol, they can be my guest as long as they don't want to put a burka on my wife and daughter and take my beer away. I can certainly assure you that the Chasidic community has no interest in forcing you to grow a long beard or wear a big hat or in taking your bacon away or in prohibiting you from working on the Sabbath. They're a small community, who largely stick to themselves and, for the most part, just wish to be left to live their lives and practice their faith in peace.

Your point is well taken to a dgree. Yes, in Israel where there are massive numbers of ultra-orthodox Jews and in a land that they consider a Jewish state which should be governed by Jewish law, yes, they attempt to impose their values on others in many areas.

However, in Canada or in Brooklyn where that paper is based, it's not the case. They have no interest in forcing their beleifs on you or me or on anyone else, just be left alone in peace. I don't see why they shouldn't be and why the editorial decision of a tiny newspaper written in a language very few people speak, suddenly deserves all of this attention. I think there's a degree of xenophobia and just mean spirited snickering at those people who are different from us. They didn't honour kill a girl for dressing a certain way. They didn't fly planes into buildings. They didn't bomb an abortion clinic. They photoshopped a picture. Why is it a story?

No, just because they're not particularly significant.

I don't agree with the photoshopping but I wouldn't go so far as to say that it "alters the truth". The main point of the story was that a U.S. Navy SEAL team killed bin Laden. That's the story. And that the president and other administration officials were watching it unfold in the situation room. The "main thurst" of the story wasn't that there were two women in the room at the time. Shopping them out of the story doesn't change the story -bin Laden dead - anymore so than if they had photoshopped the colour of Obama's tie or had inserted a digital hat onto his head. Those are little details which are tangential to the overall story.

She wasn't removed by "fundamentalist Israelis"! She was removed by a newspaper based in Brooklyn, New York. But, hey, way to use a decision by one group of people to demonize people an ocean away because they share the same religion. It would be like attacking Quebec over a decision made by a newspaper in Paris because, hey, both groups speak French!

And some wonder why people worry that those constantly attacking Israel may be anti-Semitic.

Norther Shoveler, to be honest with you, I hadn't heard of this newspaper until this story broke. They dont have much of a website and I assume the paper is only available in New York and even if I could get my hands on a copy, my Yiddish language comprehension probably wouldn't suffice.

All I know is that it's a Chasidic newspaper based in Brooklyn. Btooklyn is home to several different Chasidic groups, almost all of whom are staunchly anti-zionist for religious reasons. The most favourable group to zionism would be Lubavitch but there's now way that this paper is affiliated with them cause they all speak and write in English and wouldn't have a problem with a woman's pic. The largest Chasidic group in Brooklyn is Satmar and I would assume this paper is probably affiliated with them since they're perhaps the strictest in terms of modesty and communicate in Yiddish. Satmar is vehemetly anti-zionist, including those Satmar members who live in Israel. They refuse to accept money from the state, don't vote in Israeli elections and won't even ride on public transit since it would be a tacit legitimization of the state.

Dodger718 wrote:

This is standard practice among many Chasidic publications. It has to do with the concept of "tznius", meaning "modesty." My wife's parents live in Israel and I remember one of the papers there airbrushing female cabinet ministers out of a picture of the incoming cabinet. They also have a policy of not using a woman's first name. So a sentence might read:"There was a meeting today between Benjamin Netanyahu and Ms. Livni" (referring to Kadima party leader Tzipi Livni).

I'm a graphic designer / art director and I remember being at a conference where someone from my agency's Tel Aviv office was talking about the challenges of making ads there because certain orthodox publications will not accept ads featuring women.

If you don't think this is misogyny, then you don't know the meaning of the word.

You seem to think that as long as the Chasidic Jews don't force their twisted view of women on others outside their own community, that means they aren't misogynistic.

What an interesting thread.

One interesting aspect is the reflex of some babblers to connect Jews with Israel.

This is the purest anti-semitism (Jingles - hear me? - and I respect your views all the time), and it should be banished from here. I'll put it down to gross ignorance and a vulnerability to Zionist and imperialist propaganda, rather than any ill-will. Jews have nothing to do with Israel - no more than Muslims have to do with Al Qaeda. Got it? Thanks.

The other interesting aspect is the total inability to understand an alien culture. Orthodox Jews (depending on which of a myriad of sects and traditions you're talking about) "protect" women in a myriad of ways. The [i]Shulchan Arukh[/i] details many of these. It considers them unclean when they're menstruating. They mustn't be alone with a man who is not an immediate family member. Married women shave their heads and wear wigs. It doesn't stop. Of course it's fucking misogyny of patriarchal cultures - just as foot-binding was in China - just as covering women's faces is in many societies today.

Just as our own society, which treats women like commodities, cheap labour, objects of sexual gratification and titillation, and the rest.

Dodger's dodgy efforts to paint it as "tsnius" (in modern Hebrew that would be "tsniut") is typical of every apologist. It's powerfully reminiscent of those who rationalize women covering their faces in front of men as "modesty" or "personal choice" or whatever else.

The trouble is, these are not issues for our society to get worked up over right now. We commit far bigger sins against women than airbrushing Clinton out of a photo. We need to ensure that our society, as a whole, tolerates no inequality or humiliation of women. If the sects want to carry on with their non-legalized hiding and shaving and polygamizing of women, their time will come. What we need to ensure is that we give no official or legal recognition to such practices, and are vigilant to intervene whenever any individual is being coerced.

Milo, people who believe differently than you do aren't necessarily "insane" or "wackos". They may just think differently than you do. And since there's nothing preventing you from choosing to get your news from thousands of other media outlets, I don't see the point in making such a big deal over what a tiny, obscure publication may have done. Live and let live.

I also would suggest that your use of terms like "wacko" are demeaning to people who suffer from mental illness through no fault of their own and is far more offensive than altering a photograph.

it's not people who believe things that are different than me--i can disagree with them without resorting to ridicule. but there is no rational argument that can be made to defend editing a woman out of a picture simply for being a woman.

There's plenty of non ridiculous things they could have done--like print the article without the picture, use a different picture...but to do what they did for the reasons they did it is just so outside the bounds of any rational thinking being that i have to think they are actually insane.  Not as an insult, but in the actual medical sense.

as for wacko, you're right that probably is a derogatory term for mental illness, i'm gonna look it up.

It's offensive milo, thanks for your understanding.