Nov 24, 2016
don't judge a book by its cover..
Feldheim is running a campaign promoting a new book for women called Parsha in Pink written by Rebetzin Mindy Bodner-Lankry.
The book is packaged in what might be called traditional stereotypical packaging for a woman.. a pink-trimmed book cover..
While some people have found that to be disparaging, as if they will buy the book because it is pink, I don't care about that and found a different aspect of the campaign interesting..
The Feldheim online campaign leads to a landing page that appears like this (I took a screenshot in case they change it):
"Finally something for you, Imahos of Klal Yisroel"
As if there have been no books about Torah topics published for women until now. And forget about the possibility that general Torah books might also be read and studied by women. Forget other publishers - has Feldheim never before published a book that was targeted towards women?
They presume that this is the first book of Torah topics targeted to women. I find that funny.
The book is packaged in what might be called traditional stereotypical packaging for a woman.. a pink-trimmed book cover..
While some people have found that to be disparaging, as if they will buy the book because it is pink, I don't care about that and found a different aspect of the campaign interesting..
The Feldheim online campaign leads to a landing page that appears like this (I took a screenshot in case they change it):
"Finally something for you, Imahos of Klal Yisroel"
As if there have been no books about Torah topics published for women until now. And forget about the possibility that general Torah books might also be read and studied by women. Forget other publishers - has Feldheim never before published a book that was targeted towards women?
They presume that this is the first book of Torah topics targeted to women. I find that funny.
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I imagine you don't care about that because you're not a woman who is subjected to this kind of infantilizing stuff all the time. I don't need my power tools to come in pink, I don't need my car to be pink, and I certainly don't need my Torah pinked up to encourage me. Out of all the things they've done, I think that this one is one of the worst yet, not the least because it screams of a man thinking it was a good idea.
ReplyDeletecould be, but please explain, if you would, why the pink on the book is different than the pink anywhere else, or the blues or any other color used in marketing and book covers and candy wrappers and toy boxes and food packaging and fashion accessories and anything else.
Deleteif the majority of women like pink, for whatever reason, this might speak to them, even if it doesn't speak to you personally.
rafi, ignore all the radical modern orthodox feminists criticisms of this
ReplyDeleteits called marketing - most anglo charedi women will enjoy the book, not take any offence at the coloour, title, advertising etc
let the intellectual heavyweights carry on reading whatever it is that gets them excited
First torah book for women - Tze'ena U're'ena, anyone?
ReplyDeleteFirst, I am not modern orthodox. Glad we dealt with that. G-d forbid.... I work in outreach, for the record. I actually don't know how many women favour pink over other colours, nor do I know how many men like the colour. My daughters have not particular connection to it, having not grown up with commercial marketing shoving it down their throats, so they have a full palette of colours that they enjoy... Again, I have no doubt that her Torah is very fine, but I have a problem with the idea that you need it to look cutesy and pink to make it attractive to a woman. I have frum colleagues who find it as deeply offensive as i do. Have you asked your wives what they think of it, BTW?
ReplyDeleteWhy G-d forbid, that you should be modern Orthodox> You have just slammed a whole community of shomrey mitzvot, whose only areiva is that we love Eretz yisrael and yes Mediant Yisrael too, and yes see it as a miracle, and a mitzva to go to the army, and I am proud yes PROUD PROUD PROUD TO BE MODERN ORTHODOX.
DeleteThat was sarcasm, based on the insult above. You read it totally wrong. I am a shomer mitzvah and the fact that I am a woman doesn't make me need pink, and the fact that I don't like a book from a frum publisher doesn't put me in a hashgafic box either - that was the point I was making.
DeleteMy daughter was also disgusted when her high school picked the latest topic-of-the-month: "women"
ReplyDeleteHave you ever heard of a boys' yeshiva that has "Men" as the topic of the month?!
When a book is marketed to women because they are "different" - or a school theme is to help women understand why they are "different" - it's going the wrong direction.
For the record, Reform and secular Jewish publishers have published a whole lot of volumes of Torah commentary for women.
ReplyDeleteWhy G-d forbid, that you should be modern Orthodox? You have just slammed a whole community of shomrey mitzvot, whose only areiva is that we love Eretz yisrael and yes Mediant Yisrael too, and yes see it as a miracle, and a mitzva to go to the army, and I am proud yes PROUD PROUD PROUD TO BE MODERN ORTHODOX.
ReplyDeleteReply
See above. I was making a reference to the person who insulted me as clearly being a radicalmodernothodoxfeminstintellectual - none of which I consider to be shameful - my point was that I don't have to be put into a box, just because I object to something from a mainstream frum publisher. Its was intended as sarcasm, and anyone who knows me wouldn't have thought for a minute I was being serious. Sorry that you misunderstood my comment.
DeleteShe's not the first (found this through google)
ReplyDeletehttps://www.facebook.com/unique.lovepink?fref=nf
lol
Delete