This is nuts, absolutely nuts.
I care about shemiras einayim and hilchos tznius. I am personally bothered when people are lax with these halachos. But these protesters are so warped in their actions that I can’t believe anyone here is attempting to mount a defense for them.
Let’s not even get into the spitting on an 8-year old yet. That’s in a league of its own. Why are these protesters even there? If what “Health” says is true, that they can see immodestly dressed women from their windows due to this school, how on earth can they justify running up to the school to get a closer look (while yelling at them of course)? Would a person concerned about exposure to radiation protest a nuclear power plant being built across the street from his house by running into the radioactive core? Pure shemiras einayim cannot be their motivation, because if it were, it would be their WIVES out there protesting. The men would stay as far away from the school as they could, choosing instead to complain through other channels. My wife would never want me to place myself in a situation where it would be certain that I would see pritzus. In fact, to do that is a violation of halacha.
Now for the spitting. Some (or one) here have attempted to say, “the MO started it, so they have the blame for inflaming the crazies.” Excuse me? That’s an argument little children use. Real adults take responsibility for their actions, no matter what instigated the situation. If I assault a guy who cut me off in traffic, do you think the cops will excuse me if I said, “but he started it, he had it coming! He shoulda known that there are crazy people around!” Another argument made here to defend these men is “maybe the children are dressed ok, but the problem is the mothers walking the children to school are immodest…” Well then, why was it the 8-year old girl who got spit on? Did the monster miss the mother and hit the girl by mistake? Maybe he was accidentally facing children when hurling epithets and meant to face the mothers? I don’t think so.
Unfortunately we do have a tznius problem, and I think some people here are afraid that if they fully condemned the spitter, they would somehow be yielding ground in their argument. But this crime was not about tznius. If we allow tznius to be co-opted by sheer perversion, to be used as a weapon by debauched individuals to violate women with the veneer of “holiness”, then we lose everything.
Misogyny is not a mitzvah.