Why I'm Not An Orthodox Jew

    In every culture around the world, the vast majority of people just live their lives and are able to go without thinking much about what else is out there. When things are comfortable there is no reason to look elsewhere. The Orthodox Jews are happy to be God's sheep. I resent being told whatever someone feels I need to hear in order to make me believe. While I was in such an environment the assumptions about life made me angry and frustrated. I am a strong individual who knows who I am and where I want to go. That kind of individual does not fit in line with what the Orthodox Jewish community values, which, is mainly obedience. I don’t like to be made to feel shamed, guilty,anxious when I could choose not to. 

    The Orthodox Jewish community has an underlying assumption of treating everyone as though they are superhuman. Bitul Torah(throwing away by not learning Torah) is yelled and screamed about with life or death importance which turns people off to it even more. Sometimes a person just needs time to relax or they are going through something. Shaming someone for not learning Torah in Yeshiva will just make them not want to be around those people who make them feel that way. As a response to a lack of people learning Torah due to the Reform and Conservative and lowered numbers, Ashkenazi and Sephardi customs only became stricter and more restrictive as a feature of following tradition. Not being interested in learning Gemarra(commentary on Jewish texts to determine law) for a male is tantamount to going OTD(Off-The-Derech,becoming non-religious) and will make it hard for someone to find a Shidduch(a marriage partner). It is not enough for someone to keep all the laws and learn other things, without Gemarra, they are viewed suspiciously. This goes the same for wanting to work instead of going to Yeshiva post high-school. There are Rabbis who will concede that for some people, learning Gemarra is bad for them. I have heard Rabbis say that there are secular Jews who are better people than some people that have sat and learned Gemara for 20 years. Baal Habeit(working Frum(religious) men) are viewed disparagingly by Beit-Midrash Yeshiva learners(post high-school full time Torah learners) and Kollel(married full-time Torah learners) learners. A general contempt for anyone not spending every waking free moment learning Torah exists. Sleep is viewed as something for those who hate life. There is a mushul(story) that is commonly told about how a guy is driving and once every minute the car in front of him rolls down the window and drops a dollar bill out the window which anyone would say is ridiculous. This is used to say that this is what people do with their time and Torah.

     I and many OTDers want to focus on the worthwhile things in our lives that we choose as meaningful and matter other than Torah and not to feel bad for it. The fact that someone has to lie to me, manipulate me, and instill in me modes of behavior in order to believe something, that’s not a system I want to be part of. I know often I’ll have to do things I don’t want and continue to suffer through things but there are some things that are arbitrary. About 99% of the people who are davening don’t get anything out of it other than feeling good about themselves for doing it. If it helps them with self-confidence and maybe not making the world that much worse in the meanwhile, it’s not bad. I recognized it was not making me and the people around me better people. The Rabbis consistently prod this point to get people to try to bring more energy to prayer which is self-judgement. The Rabbis were teaching me beliefs that were alienating me from my fellow non-Jewish humans. Non-Jews are viewed as automaton NPCs who just exist to learn from Jews. That is not for me. 

    I get why people want to be sheep; some people don’t realize they are sheep, some people do and find it comfortable, some people do and are afraid to consider what it would be like to not be a sheep, and some like me don’t want to be a sheep so we separate from the herd. Raised as a  Secular or Religious person, most people are sheep and don’t know why they believe what they believe other than it is good for them. It keeps things simple. It is only once you venture outwards and discover there is this thing called outside of the herd, you come to recognize the nature of the herd and yourself. 

     The majority of the people who realize they don't want to be part of the herd are exceptional in some quality. Rabbis even realize it, whether it be in a mocking tone. The Rabbis believe that if they can just channel your passion and drive for something "non-Kosher" into something kosher, then maybe you could achieve so much. This follows from the line of Yaakov being more powerful than Esav but didn't channel his power into the correct source. 

    The community creates systems that are not befitting of a group of people that claim to work on themselves. The Yeshivish community is ripe with hypocrisy. When a married OTD guy raising a normal family is worse than a Rosh Yeshiva or Rebbe raping a child, I can't get on board. Then the community will help with only warnings and victim blaming. The more outstanding or different someone is, the more ostracized they get from the community. If they are creative, intellectual, scientific, mathematical, good at sports, philosophical, etc...  the more they are rejected.

    The community has many things that if it weren't for the Rabbinic decrees, many more people would accept the community. Let the women ride bikes, let them go to college, who says wigs are required, let boys and girls talk, let a man touch his wife while on her period, don't shame them for not wearing a suit, accept that not everyone is built to be a Talmedei Chacham(Great Torah scholar). If God wanted a bunch of Torah scholars, he would have made them. Issachar-Zevulun relationships(worker-learner, one works to support the other learning) exist if not for any other reason than acknowledging that people have different natures.

    The ideals of the community(not just the religion) are making people feel discarded and unwanted. There's no way us OTD can make the walk back on the path, we can't even see it anymore. Some of us even wish we could because it was a simpler time. The coping mechanism of humanity to deal with our very existence has dissolved and we realize we can live our lives how we choose and still find meaning and keep our priorities in check as best as we can.