Secular In a Frum World

I used to use this as a place to vent. Now I use it to vent and blog things that I find relevant.

[cred-deactivated20161202]

women grow hair on their boobs and their butts and their legs and their arms and their stomachs and their face and really anywhere their genetics decides to have hair and it is perfectly normal what isnt normal is men who have never touched a razor trying to shame women for not looking like a hairless baby

[whentherestrouble]

important

[tree-stump-palace]

shout this loud.

[mykicks]

When you’re at the pool lounging on a beach chair and some little kids are running and the lifeguard screams out “no running” do you respond “excuse, not all of us are running”? No, you don’t. The lifeguard didn’t have to specifically state who they were talking to because you’re intelligent enough to comprehend that the comment wasn’t being directed at you.

Found a quote that shuts down that “not all men” argument pretty well. (via mykicks)

AHaha. haaaa. hh.

(via thefeministbookclub)

[secularinafrumworld-blog]

Also, I noticed that sometimes, when frum people ask questions about Judaism, the questions are asked without really expecting an answer. Ultimately, if there is no logical explanation, it is god’s will therefore no reason is necessary.

Why ask in the first place? Or rather, why not dig deeper? There’s so much more to the discussion than “because I said so.”

[secularinafrumworld-blog]

The stories of Noach and of the Tower of Bavel from the Torah start to make more sense when you think of them as parables.

[jewishatheist]

A Full Circle Rainbow over Australia Image Credit & Copyright: Colin Leonhardt (Birdseye View Photography)

Explanation: Have you ever seen an entire rainbow? From the ground, typically, only the top portion of a rainbow is visible because directions toward the ground have fewer raindrops. From the air, though, the entire 360 degree circle of a rainbow is more commonly visible. Pictured here, a full circle rainbow was captured over Cottesloe Beach near Perth, Australia last year by a helicopter flying between a setting sun and a downpour. An observer-dependent phenomenon primarily caused by the internal reflection of sunlight by raindrops, the 84-degree diameter rainbow followed the helicopter, intact, for about 5 kilometers. As a bonus, a second rainbow that was more faint and color-reversed was visible outside the first.

My friend sent me a link to the above (x) just cause it’s cool, but it got me thinking…

The word for rainbow in hebrew is keshet, which is also the word for the bow in a bow-and-arrow. The reason is somewhat obvious: Rainbows typically look like bows! (hmmm… I wonder if the rain would count as tiny arrows for the flood narrative… anyways…)

But the interesting thing is that rainbows aren’t actually bow-shaped - they only look that way from a ground-based perspective. A high-flying bird or a god from above would actually see the full circle in the picture above.

Kind of makes “god’s” repeated usage of the word “keshet” for rainbow in Gen 9 (x) seem kind of like the invention of a grounded creature.

Cheers

[cindymayweather-deactivated2019]

[obsessingmuch]

[vaginal-erection]

[scorpioqueenphoenix]

oh my fucking god

[klefable]

shoutout to girlcode for being fabulous 

[sanrio-rem]

Be prepared to participate in no dick december

[klefable]

be prepared to be told that no one wants your misogynistic dick anyway you arrogant shit

[jamborii-blog]

I love it when guys use sex as a bartering tool like IF YOU DON’T LOOK PERFECT AND SPARKLY ALL THE TIME I’M NOT GOING TO PLEASE MYSELF WITH YOU like BITCH THEY LITERALLY SELL DICKS BIGGER THAN YOURS I DON’T NEED SHIT FROM YOU

[alsedes]

[letteratura-litterature-deactiv]

If a poem hasn’t ripped apart your soul; you haven’t experienced poetry.

Edgar Allan Poe (via farr0h)

[catchmyvibes]

People say to you, ‘you’ve changed’, or something like that, well, I hope, for the sake of God that you have changed, because I don’t want to be the same person all my life. I want to be growing, I want to be expanding. I want to be changing. Because animate things change, inanimate things don’t change. Dead things don’t change. And the heart should be alive, it should be changing, it should be moving, it should be growing, its knowledge should be expanding.

Shaykh Hamza Yusuf   (via fridafox)

[fuckyeahfeminist]

A woman should not have to act like a man in order to receive respect. Just because I am petite, soft-spoken, and actually care about you, does not mean I am weak… Just because I give you the respect I think you deserve simply because you exist, doesn’t mean I am a pushover. I teach with love, not fear— which makes me strong, not weak.

On teaching feminism in school (via Nails on a Chalkboard)

[manofprose]

[secularinafrumworld-blog]

"I long so much to make beautiful things. But beautiful things require effort and disappointment and perseverance."

Vincent van Gogh

[hallucination]

Lost in the space

[luvvdivine]

[mooneyedandglowing]

You’re running through the woods, screaming because you’re being chased, but then they just stop coming after you. This isn’t how the story happens or is supposed to happen or how anyone expects it to happen— your killer too tired to kill you. You want to show yourself but you never wanted to have to ask for it, never wanted to beg to have your heart cut open just to be sure of what it’s made of.

Moriah Pearson, to want to learn yourself through the violence of other hands (via mooneyedandglowing)

________

Shit. I can relate. 

[secularinafrumworld-blog]

caffeineandcartridges said: Are people really going to give you shit? I HATE how judgmental everyone is. As many aveiros as you want just so long as it’s behind closed doors…

My family would be uncomfortable and my parents would not appreciate it to say the least. I still live at home so that's the way it is. (The haircut I have in mind is pretty different than my current style so it would come off like I'm being disrespectful that I couldn't "just wait another week".) 

Personally, I don't care what people think, but reputation is hugely emphasized in Orthodox Jewish communities and when I do something sorta "against" Judaism, it tends to become about that.  My family cares so I do too. It's bullshit hypocrisy yes, but that's the situation at the moment. It's a hopefully short lived situation so I'm able to handle it; there's just these moments.