And David said to Gad; "I am exceedingly distressed; let us fall now into the hand of the L-rd; for His mercies are great; but into the hand of man let me not fall." -- 2 Shmuel 24:14

Rarely do I ever criticize or rant about anything in the charedi velt. I am unabashedly pro-charedi and pro-Torah almost to a fault. I consider my conversion to Judaism -- Orthodox, no, ultra-Orthodox Judaism -- to be the best decision I ever made, and my grandmother told me on her deathbed that she agreed. I never regret leaving my family and everything seven years ago to come to the shtetl in which I now live, I know that Torah -- as redacted by Chaza"l and practicalized in the Shulchan Aruch -- is the manifestation of the word of the Living G-d, the Creator Himself, in ink on parchment/laser toner on paper.

Which is why this kashrus thing keeps getting to me.

A person who calls out Reb Yankel in shul for not checking into the origin of his bottled water is often praised for his scrupulous observance of the laws of yayin nesech or other contaminant which could work its way into the water. Were the same person to stand up and call someone out for insulting someone, or spreading lies about someone -- both of which could, in certain circumstances, exclude someone from the entire Next World, they have "ba'al teshuva-itis", or are "frumyaks" or some other semi-insulting term for someone who, oh, takes these commandments to heart.

Things like mistreatment of workers, "shady" business deals ("fraud" b'la'az), manipulation of government resources -- these things not only raise anti-Semitism from non-Jews, but also make it impossible to turn Jews on (or back on) to Judaism. How can I tell you to let G-d into your life by following the laws that no one else takes seriously? Those are supposed to be the religious people! How can the yeshiva say "listen to the words of Rabbi X" when Rabbi X's gabbai is printing up newsletters with all sorts of BS in the name of Rabbi X? Or Rabbi X's words aren't even written down? Or no one listens to Rabbi X?

And this hurts, because I love the Torah. In this particular situation, no one's even discussing the Torah behind the issue.

So this is my contribution to the radicalization of religion.

I would love to see a Shulchan Aruch taken from block to block and all of these places with labor violations and unsafe environments and abuse being labeled for what they are, and I want to see the actual Torah Law win out. I want to see Choshen Mishpat given equal airtime as halachos of Shabbos, and words like shvartzer and shiksa treated as badly as Hebrew National hot dogs. I envision a world where learning about one's development as a Jew is given more time than one spends taking a dump, where Talmud is learned as if it is more than a collection of quotes from Roshei Yeshiva, and where one's connection to G-d is not measured by the number of microns in their water filter or number of lumens in their lettuce-checking lightbox. I want to see, once and for all, the bridge between "what's written" and "what's done", and making them into two different categories is what allows for 99.9% of the problems inside and with the religious communities.

As it is taught, the Jewish people must improve ourselves and unite before any time of redemption is supposed to happen. (And for what happens to those who aren't down, see makkas choshech.) The King won't sit on a broken chair, and if I have to bring new-school harbatzah or whatever is necessary to be the f**king krazy glue for whatever part of the nation I merit to bring together then so be it.

F**k the bullsh*t, the Nation which received the Torah should expect no less than Divinity in their lives. We can't let Judaism get treated like a Lexus in the Bronx:

Stolen by some dudes from a ghetto and chopped up. Ha'meivinim yavinu v'yaskilu.