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36 Under 36: CHANGING THE CULTURE OF DATING & MARRIAGE 
Chananya Weissman, 29 by Jewish Week special report Changing the culture of Orthodox shidduchim Rabbi Chananya Weissman had yet to start dating for marriage when he plastered the Yeshiva University campus five years ago with fliers bearing a simple message: EndTheMadness.org. (Stoptheinsanity.org was taken,” he says). Curious bystanders logged onto the site, where Weissman detailed the myriad problems with the shidduch system in the Orthodox community: the inappropriate questions, the labeling, the skewed values – all of which he believes have contributed to an ever-burgeoning number of religious singles and rising percentage of divorces. More than 1,000 people signed the 10-principled EndTheMadness “convenant,” vowing to end the “shtick” and “become an active part of the solution, not a passive part of the problem.” 
Since organizing one of the first symposiums openly addressing this issue in February 2004 at Yeshiva University, the volunteer grassroots organization has organized more than 20 shabbatonim and dozens of programs aimed at gradually rehabilitating the culture of shidduch dating by providing kosher venues for singles to meet one another naturally. “The events don’t cost a lot of money,” Weissman says. “So people who don’t meet anyone don’t go home in tears.” Many of the organization’s suggestions — such as bringing back mixed seating for singles at weddings and normalizing singles meeting on their own — are being seriously debated and adapted within segments of the Orthodox world. “EndTheMadness deserves much of the credit for how it has become mainstream for people to criticize the ‘crazy questions’ typically asked in the shidduch world,” Weissman says. Weissman is currently working on a sister site called HotKiddush.com, which he hopes will revolutionize the way people meet online. He describes it as “an online wedding meal where friends of friends meet each other” and a middle ground between the “Wild West of JDate” and the “brick wall of shadchanim” on SawYouAtSinai. Day job: Weissman runs an eBay drop-shipping business and has worked for several years in Jewish education. Dig sci-fi? Read Weissman’s “Journey Into Limbo,” a collection of Twilight Zone-ish sci-fi stories. —Tamar Snyder Joshua Ross, 26 Rallying on behalf of Agunot It began as an accident, Joshua Ross admits. As a student at Yeshiva University in 2002, Ross was asked to organize a rally in Brooklyn against a husband who refused his wife a get (Jewish divorce) for 11 years. “There was no money, no kids involved; it was pure spite,” he says. Three weeks later, the woman received her get and was finally able to remarry. Under the guidance of Rabbi Herschel Schachter, Ross and three other former Yeshiva University students (all men) have been rallying to help agunot (women whose husbands are refusing them a get) ever since. “It’s not the sexiest cause,” admits Ross, now an MBA student at Touro’s Graduate School of Business. “But it’s important.” Ross founded ORA (The Organization for the Resolution of Agunot; getora.com), a not-for-profit social service agency that has resolved more than 70 cases of contested Jewish divorce, the majority of which involve domestic abuse. In popularizing rallies against husbands who refuse their wives a get, ORA demonstrates that “this is a communal problem, not just an individual problem,” he says. Rallies aren’t always the best option. Ross spends several hours each day notifying rabbis, bosses and neighbors about men who are recalcitrant spouses. “You never know who has the right button to push,” he says. (It’s not always the man who’s at fault. A small percentage of the cases involve women who, for whatever reason, refuse to go to the beit din or accept a get). “After due process [in a Jewish court], we apply social pressure to educate the husband of his halachic and moral obligation to do the right thing,” Ross says. “We’re trying to create shalom (peace), which is sometimes accomplished through a get.” ORA also mediates between couples. “Our main focus is to open up the lines of communication and get both parties talking,” he says. The work is grueling and Ross prays that ORA will soon be put out of business. Until then, he hopes people will get involved. “It’s only your problem when it happens to someone you love and care for,” he says. “But it shouldn’t be that way.” Hobbies: Softball, sailing and day trading. Double digits: Ross carries around two cell phones, one for personal use, the other exclusively for ORA-related calls. —Tamar Snyder Jennie Rosenfeld, 27 Speaking out on sexuality in the context of Judaism The subject of sexuality was taboo in the Orthodox schools and synagogues Jennie Rosenfeld attended. “It was the one thing that wasn’t really talked about,” she says. “There was this sense that there was no one to speak to about the tensions and conflicts.” Rosenfeld set out to change that. After attending the 2001 Orthodox Forum, a Yeshiva University-run conference that brings together rabbis, educators, and mental health professionals to discuss pressing issues within the Orthodox community, Rosenfeld submitted a proposal for a conference dedicated to Orthodox singles and the struggles they face in navigating between their religious and sexual lives as they remain single for longer. It took some time (and persuading), but in 2005, she finally got her wish. That same year, she co-founded Tzelem, currently a special project of YU’s Center for the Jewish Future that provides educational resources about intimacy and sexuality to the Orthodox community. Tzelem has organized annual conferences for kallah and chatan teachers (premarital educators), and has implemented a pilot program entitled “Life Values and Intimacy Education” at two New York-based yeshiva day schools. “The curriculum is unique in that it situates sexual education within the Jewish context — the context of halacha and of Modern Orthodox Judaism — and within broader interpersonal context,” she says. What’s next? Rosenfeld plans to make aliyah this summer with her husband and newborn daughter. Though she will have to hand over the reigns of Tzelem, she hopes to continue working on a sexuality guide with frequently asked questions for newly married Orthodox couples to use as a resource. Mazel Tov: Recently earned her Ph.D.in English from the CUNY Graduate Center, entitled, “Talmudic Re-readings: Toward a Modern Orthodox Sexual Ethic.” Favored pastime: Cooking eclectic meals — without recipes. —Tamar Snyder |
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