JDate, I'd Like You to Meet Gender Equity...Gender Equity, Meet JDate
July 21, 2008
Community
(2 comments)
By JanetheWriter
One night last week, a friend and I spent a little more than an hour in a room full of Jews. Everyone was dressed up, on his or her best behavior and appeared to be trying really hard to listen to what was being said. No, it wasn't Kol Nidre; it was a JDate mixer for the 40-plus crowd. And, as in synagogues and Jewish communal life in general, there were many, many more women than men involved--nearly a 9:1 ratio, Amy and I guesstimated.
As seasoned JDaters, neither of us was surprised. In fact, standing around, drink in hand, in the sea of date-seeking compatriots, I was reminded of the recently published Hadassah-Brandeis Institute study that had crossed my desk just a few days earlier, "Matrilineal Ascent/Patrilineal Descent: Gender Imbalance in American Jewish Life."
The study's overall findings--that non-Orthodox Jewish men have fewer connections to Jewish life, at home, in the synagogue, and in the community, and "invest less of their human capital into Jewishness"--come as no surprise to anyone who's even remotely involved in the Jewish world. Nor does the fact that Jewish organizations--whose leadership ranks, ironically, continue to be dominated by men--are responding to this trend with various programs.
One such group is Moving Traditions, which has developed "Where Have all the Young Men Gone?" a campaign to raise awareness of this gender imbalance and promote best practices to engage boys and young men in Jewish life, particularly after bar mitzvah. Our own Movement's Men of Reform Judaism, too, has implemented several initiatives, including men's worship services at Biennial conventions, and published a "Men's Haggadah."
And yet, much work remains to be done.
So, after milling about among the women for a bit longer, my friend and I finally approached a pair of men talking to each other. After introductions all around and the briefest of exchanges, Moshe and Yossi kept right on talking to each other. Amy and I, seizing the moment, nodded, smiled and bee-lined right for the door. If we ever sign up for another JDate mixer, it won't be before there's a shift back to some semblance of gender equity, at least in this facet of liberal Jewish life.
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Yes, I know the contexts are entirely different -- but won't my Man from Mars go planetary when he juxtaposes dcc's Where are all the women? with Jane's Where are all the men?