Confront Teen Dating Abuse
Washington/JTA
A
few years ago, during an other-
wise innocuous conversation,
one of my oldest and dearest
friends relayed the following story about
her 17-year-old daughter:
"Sophie [not her real name] and her
boyfriend were at a party last weekend
and he got mad about something she said.
He literally picked her up by her shirt and
threw her against the wall."
While the incident was shocking, it was
Sophie's reaction — or lack thereof—
that horrified me. Being body-checked by
a boyfriend should have shaken her to the
core, but Sophie didn't seem to consider it
a big deal.
That's when I experienced That
Parenting Moment, the one that flings us
from the world in which we grew up into
the unrecognizable reality where our kids
are learning to live — and to love.
We want to believe that everyone who
comes to know our children will love
and respect them as much as we do.
Unfortunately, about one in three adoles-
cent girls in the United States is a victim
of physical, sexual, emotional or verbal
abuse from a dating partner.
You're thinking "Not my kid" — but
we're talking about one in three girls.
We're talking about every race, religion
and community (Even "nice Jewish kids:'
like Sophie and her boyfriend.) We're talk-
ing about a punch in the face
or erosion of self-esteem or
silent digital stalking that robs
a girl of her peace of mind.
The issue is bigger and
more pervasive than any of us
can fathom — even those of
us who fathom it for a living.
Do you honestly believe it will
never touch your child?
Young love was tough
enough before technology
took over; today it really is a
jungle out there. In a recent
Liz Claiborne study, 30 percent of teens in
relationships said they are text messaged
10, 20, 30 times an hour by their partners
asking where they are, what they're doing
or who they're with. Nearly a quarter of
teens in a relationship communicated with
their partner via cellphone or texting hourly
between midnight and 5 a.m.
Consider the "sexting" epidemic and it
looks even worse: One in five teen girls has
electronically sent or posted nude or semi-
nude photos or videos of herself. Sexually
suggestive text, e-mail or instant messages
are more prevalent at 37 percent.
And here's where it gets really scary:
Nearly one in five "sext" recipients admits
sharing the images and messages with
someone else — at least one person, but
usually more.
Technology's greatest trick is creating the
illusion of control: Teens can choose (and
unchoose) their "friends',' decide
who accesses which information
and magically conceal what they
don't want their parents to know.
But beneath the passwords and
preferences, our kids are surren-
dering their privacy. We are all, by
action or permission, forfeiting
our power.
What can we do, besides watch
privacy and common courtesy
circle the drain?
Start with communication: In
a 2009 survey of parents, three
in four said they had talked with their
teens about the meaning of a healthy rela-
tionship — but the majority of the teens
(three-quarters of sons and two-thirds of
daughters) said they had not discussed
dating abuse with a parent in the past year.
Only 32 percent of teens in abusive rela-
tionships confided in their parents about
their situations. And it's worth mentioning
that teen dating abuse most often happens
in one of the partners' homes.
In a 2009 Kaiser Family Foundation sur-
vey,"Generation M2: Media in the Lives of
8- to 18-Year-Olds:' only 14 percent of sev-
enth- through 12th-graders said their par-
ents had rules about how many text mes-
sages they could send. And while about 25
percent of the report's tweens and teens had
telephone time restrictions, with texting the
preferred means of communication, dating
abuse really has become more hidden — a
reclusive shadow over the lives of our kids.
We need to become advocates for man-
datory healthy relationship training in our
schools, religious institutions and sports
teams. It's at least as important as health
or gym class, which are non-academic and
required.
And we should educate ourselves.
Learn to spot the signs of an unhealthy
relationship: slipping grades; changes in
mood, activities or dress; withdrawal from
friends; making light of a boyfriend's or
girlfriend's violent behavior. These are all
possible (but not definite) indicators of
an unhealthy relationship. You know your
child; if you're paying attention, you'll
know if something is wrong.
Talk openly about abuse; remove the
taboo. Encourage your teenager to share
thoughts and experiences, and respect his
or her point of view. If you suspect your
teen is being abused, be sure she or he feels
safe and supported, not accused or blamed.
Plenty of free and qualified advice is avail-
able to get you started. Try thesafespace.org,
loveisrespect.org and jwi.org/parents.
And don't let the lines of communica-
tion end at your front door. Talk with other
parents in your children's social circles;
create a network of support that flows
from parent to parent, parent to teen, and
hopefully among the teens themselves. ❑
Lori Weinstein is executive director of Jewish
Women International.
Equal Rights For Israeli Women
Washington/JTA
L
ast April, two Israeli newspapers
doctored photographs of the new
Israeli Cabinet to remove the images
of two female ministers, Limor Livnat and
Sofa Landver. In one paper, the women's
faces were replaced with two male ministers;
in the other, they were blotted out.
The erasure of the women's faces was
in accordance with the ultra-Orthodox
view that it is immodest to print images
of women.
Freedom of the press dictates that such
editorial decisions are perfectly legal and
to be protected, but the incident highlights
contradictions facing women in Israel on
a daily basis.
It's time to admit that Israel faces an
emboldened movement against women's
equality, not a just a series of isolated
incidents.
For more than three years, Israeli femi-
nists have been campaigning to end gender
segregation on publicly funded
bus lines that serve the ultra-
Orthodox as well as the general
community. Bus segregation
has arisen only in the last 10
years. Women sitting where they
wished on such buses have been
subject to verbal and physical
harassment by male passengers,
with bus drivers doing nothing.
The Ministry of Transportation
and the Israeli Supreme Court
have been engaged in seem-
ingly endless consideration and
reconsideration as to what to do about the
women's complaints.
On Jan. 31, Transportation Minister
Yisrael Katz effectively rejected the recom-
mendation of his own ministry's com-
mittee that passengers may sit where they
wish, and that buses serving the Orthodox
population allow passengers to enter and
pay in the front or the rear if they want
to segregate themselves. Katz dismissed
allegations of violence against
women and advocated "behav-
ior-directing" signs asking
(though not mandating) that
passengers sit separately.
At Jerusalem's Western Wall,
the organization Women of
the Wall has been fighting
for equal rights to pray for 20
years. Women who chose to
wear a kippah and/or tallit, and
pray out loud and read from a
Torah scroll, have been given
a designated and many would
say, inferior place to worship near but not
at the Western Wall itself.
Harassment of women deemed by
bystanders to be immodestly dressed
and of female worshipers alleged to be
engaged in prayer in the wrong place or in
the wrong way has increased.
Last November, Nofrat Frenkel, a medi-
cal student and a Conservative Jew partici-
pating in a monthly Rosh Hodesh service
with Women of the Wall, was arrested at
the wall for wearing a tallit and reading
from the Torah. Along with others, the
National Council of Jewish Women called
for the charges to be dropped.
Despite the ensuing uproar, the police
have not backed down. In December, Anat
Hoffman, director of the Reform move-
ment's Israel Religious Action Center, was
questioned by police and told she might
be charged with a felony for violating rules
of conduct at the wall.
The authorities assert that they are
enforcing the 2003 Supreme Court deci-
sion that allowed arrests at the wall for
actions that are "offensive to public sen-
sibility." Israeli women today are asking if
their sensibilities matter.
The Israel Religious Action Center says
it will soon be releasing a study that has
found instances of medical clinics see-
ing male and female patients on separate
Equal Rights on page 28
March 4 • 2010
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