Frum Follies Back Online

Starting yesterday(5/31/16) around noon, my readers could not access this blog. The techies at WordPress restored server performance in the last hour (~4 p.m., EST). I await word from them of the source of the problem. But my account was not hacked and contents were not endangered. I was able to see all the content through the back-end.

I have and  will continue to use strong passwords which are frequently changed along with other security precautions.

Several of my readers contacted me privately or via FB because they were afraid I was hacked. It is a sad statement that the protectors of corruption and abusers continue to hack and otherwise disrupt the dissemination of the truth. It is also sad that so many people concerned about abuse also have to worry about these slimy tactics. But then, one should hardly be surprised that the defenders of the indefensible don’t relish the spotlight.

Novominsker Rebbe – Yaakov Perlow

While I was waiting for the restoration of the server, I chanced on a sort of compliment to the efforts of all of us who blog about abuse. The Novominsker Rebbe (Yaakov Perlow), Head of the Council of Torah Sages (Moetzet) of Agudath Israel of America spoke at a recent meeting of Torah Umesorah (TU)Torah Umesorah (TU). I watched a video segment and most of it was the usual nonsense. You know, we care, we have many meetings, we educate kids and parents, etc, etc, etc.

He avoided saying you have to ask a rabbi to go to the police. But he used the code phrase, raglayim lidavar, which Agudah insists can only be assessed by a rabbi. The Agudah is so aware that many rabbis engage in obstruction of justice, that it refuses to name which rabbis to consult. They are afraid this will help law enforcement target rabbis for obstruction of justice. And naturally R. Perlow also denied that the Agudah and TU opposition to SOL reform reflected a lack of concern. Like their booster, Rabbi Yakov Horowitz, and like the Roman Catholic Church, he expressed deep passion and emotion for the protection of yeshiva assets.

But there was also a defiant counter attack. He declared that those who claim that the moetzes does not care are this generation’s mockers (“leitzanei hador, the bloggers”)  who spread lies (sheker ve-kozev) and are wreckers (mazikim).

I do mock them because they deserve it for protecting abusers while professing concern for victims. I started Frum Follies with a satire about a speech by the moetzes and I deconstructed another of Perlow’s speeches on abuse in 2010 (Agudah on Pedophilia: Too Little, Too Late!).

I have been tracking the responses of the Agudah for seven years of the same old, same old! They keep on telling us they have so many meetings. Yet noting gets accomplished. Yet they have the chutzpah to call us layabouts, leitzim!