I’ve had plenty of Jews hurt me, sadly, but the fact that we’re called am kshe oref hu doesn’t change the fact that we still have the most reasonable monotheistic faith. Nobody should judge Judaism based on the Jews, because as we know from the Pew report released today, most Jews in America (At least) are very secular and do terrible things, generally of a perverse and immoral sexual nature. Lots of Orthodox Jews do unethical things, too, sadly.
It’s silly to judge a religion based on the way its adherents behave.
And as far as “choice” goes, God gave us the Torah and mitzvot for rational, protective reasons. We’ve been keeping shabbat for centuries, whereas the progressive movement and the UN just a few decades ago began extolling the virtues and morality of a day off for workers. Non Jews even realize and acknowledge the beauty of Jewish values, such as filial piety/kibud av v’em, the importance of being shomer negiah/encouraging chastity before marriage, restrictions on eating, fasting, prayer, repentance, charity, modesty, etc. It just seems so rational and right to me. I don’t see how others can’t live this way. A good friend of mine recently underwent halakhic conversion and spent yontiff with our community. A congregant asked him, “why did you convert?” and his answer was, “how can you not?”
I also think that the Pew report shows that Orthodoxy is in the best demographic position to advance Jewish life in this country. I think that there should be a halakhic Judaism that allows innovation, but sadly, the Conservative movement dropped the ball, with most of its members not keeping shabbat, kashrut, or taharat hamishpacha, which is a shame. Addressing issues such as electricity on shabbat, a triennial cycle of torah reading (Which was used in Israeli communities well through the 11th century), egalitarianism, etc. from an honest perspective, amid a backdrop of strong committment to the mitzvot, would be a dream to me, but there’s been little effort towards this.