I was sitting on the couch Friday night when my brother approached me with the NASI ad. As I read it I began shaking and sat there trying to gather my emotions. First I was filled with anger. Game changing?! THIS IS NOT A GAME!! These are the lives of beautiful, talented, smart and kind-hearted girls whose only “crime” is that they have been unable to find their basherts. These girls have endured enough hurt and pain with each passing year and have already been subject to a tremendous amount of rejection; their spirits have been wounded and they have felt the pangs of loneliness in their search for their zivug.
To lay out the ad with a $1,000 increase per age for everyone to see must make these girls feel even more dejected, helpless and crestfallen. You are blatantly telling these singles that their worth, their value as a person, decreases with each passing birthday. My emotions slowly changed from anger to sadness. Have we become so low as a society that the only incentive to help each other out in times of hardship is through exorbitant sums of money? What lesson are we teaching our children? We are a people that prides ourselves on chessed and on feeling the pain of others. We should be ashamed that the only way we can think of to change this shidduch system is by adding a high monetary incentive.
Has anyone taken into account the feelings of these girls and their parents? We are talking about this as if they are not human beings with feelings and sensitivities. Just because a girl does not get married at 20 doesn’t take away from her character, her accomplishments and the fact that imy”H she will make an amazing wife/mother one day. It just might be a little later than our society has almost “demanded” we should. A girl should not feel she is old and almost passé at the age of 22! She should not feel that she can’t walk in the streets without the barrage of comments and looks of pity from others. A girl should not feel that her worth is compromised and almost gone by the time she reaches the age of 26. What about being sensitive to these girls struggles? What about providing them with chizuk or being nosei beol chaveiro?
Please take a step back and think for a second how you would feel being that 28 year old reading the ad. How would you feel if it was your 30 year old daughter you had to face, your daughter you had to try to comfort and your daughter that you had to convince to remain positive in a society in which she is no longer desirable because of her age? What words can you comfort her with – that if she puts a high “pricetag” on herself and pays a lot of money – then maybe people will start paying attention to her and her phone will start ringing?
I don’t have all the answers and I am sure that a lot of thought went into creating this “initiative”; but I truly feel we have missed the mark. This can’t be the solution.
YWN Coffee Room » Shidduchim
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Response to NASI Ad
(2 posts)-
Posted 6 months ago #
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Agreed! Lo Zu Haderech! We dont want to further wound the already wounded. Yes, we ought to help, but not involving further pain and public embarassment. We have to rethink this, with a public apology, because otherwise Nasi will have lost its respect in the public eye (this is coming from a hard-working Shadchan, btw).
Yes, and please continue on the other thread.
Posted 6 months ago #
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