Proposed Law: gender-segregated tiyulim

MK Moshe Gafni (UTJ) has proposed, along with the other members of UTJ, a law that would set separate hours for male and female access to nature sites and natural springs of the Nature and Parks Authority.

According to the proposed law, 15% of the hours of permitted bathing should be designated for gender-segregated access.

The response to this proposal has been harsh, accusing Gafni and Netanyahu of pushing Israel to becoming a halachic state. I suspect Netanyahu will choose to tell Gafni to cool it and stop proposing all these religious laws. He doesnt like them and worse his voters mostly dont like them either. Gafni might have to wait until after Netanyahu leaves the political scene and the "full right" coalition becomes a full religious coalition.

According to Gafni, in the proposal, Israel has at least 20% of the population not going into the springs and rivers because of religious reasons, of all the various religions found in Israel. These populations are discriminated against, these are State-run sites, operating in a way that causes many people to be unable to benefit from them.

1. I wonder where he came up with 20%. It might be accurate, it might be low, it might be high. I have no idea. I wonder how he got to that number. When we go on tiyulim and to water hikes and stuff, we see plenty of religious and Haredi people enjoying the springs and rivers despite the lack of segregation. I am sure many avoid it, but how do you figure out how many?

2. I think we have to define discrimination. If someone chooses to not use a service because they dont like it (for whatever reason) are they being discriminated against? If I and 50,000 other people dont like the way Bituach Leumi offers a service so we dont take advantage of it, is that discrimination or is that my own problem? If we dont like the service open to the public as it is, is it discrimination? I am not so sure it always is. That being said, it is a shame that many religious people dont have a way to benefit form the springs and rivers around the country. Knowing how tiyulim work though, I am not sure how realistic it is to come upon a river while hikling and say right now only the men can go in, it will be open for women in two hours, and the women, or men, have to wait, and when they get their turn, then it takes longer for the tiyul to get on tis way... and vice versa. this just doesnt seem practical.

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