Let’s encourage conversation. Have you ever thought stereotypes about a certain population, and then met a person of that population, and realized, duh, they’re not all like that, or even like that at all? Or they’re not so bad? Not what we had thought?

Let the rats of the charedi community stay in their holes and the ones who care about humanity – who already do good for communities and already have an inkling of care for Jews of all types – stand side-by-side with LGBT community members at a soup kitchen, a Sderot drive, and have a valuable conversation.

In my opinion, getting to know people is always better for the long term than a mass showing of solidarity – which yes, is important as well – but now, no one seems to worry about the personal side of dialogue, the dialogue that hits home stronger. Parades are important, but they’re not human, and are they so worth it when it’s going to cost the dialogue side of things, or have people ignore the dialogue side in favor of the publicity? Wouldn’t freedom of speech be more valuable if it was face to face with the person who thinks s/he hates you?

I think that would spread a stronger message over time – it would seep through the ranks of Jewry, and while extremists stay extremists, the ones who question will get their answers.

The Charedi side is less vehement then last year as well- most of the Rabbis went public with opinions and Halachaic verdicts against rioting and even against public protests, holding that the “protest” should be by prayer etc., to the extent they published a joint call in one of the major Charedi newspapers “Yated Ne’eman” that placed the burden of keeping Yeshiva students out of the streets on the Yeshiva head.The only ones arranging protests and rioting are the extremists of the “Eda Charedi”.OTOH hate speech still flourishes quite well on that side(comparing LGBT people to beasts for example) and much of the “against protest” crowd are against simply because they fear that it will cause more awareness in the younger generation.

charedi: Ultra Orthodox observant Jew
Anglo: English-speaking
dati leumi: national religious
olim: Jewish immigrants to Israel
payot: hair grown below the jawbone on men, usually noticeable on charedis
derech eretz: literally, ‘the way of the land’, meaning, acting on values (“derech eretz comes before Torah” is a Hebrew-Jewish phrase meaning, acts of kindness and good come before study)
Torah: Jewish bible

More background: The Gay Pride Parade that is annually scheduled for Jerusalem is always clashing with the charedi and much of the Jerusalem community; it is believed not to be in the taste of Jerusalem and therefore should occur in other cities. The LGBT community obviously wishes to promote its free speech abilities and rights in their identities and tolerance. It is scheduled this year for this upcoming Thursday, and so far has not been canceled. I guess we’ll see…