Kudos to The Partial View, who was able to give up his addiction to the Jewish weeklies.
While it may be a noble endeavor to revert to the days of yesteryear, when families interacted with each other face to face, rather than electronically, there nevertheless are many redeeming values to the keeping up with the weekly Jewish periodicals.
Jewish publishing has come a long way in the last few decades. Whereas years ago the yeshiva grad had to content himself with the weekly Jewish Press and the monthly JO (and Olomeinu for children), nowadays Hamodia publishes daily. Additionally, we have the Yated, Mishpacha, Ami, Binah etc.; in addition to every locale creating their own news print.
We also have countless online sites, vying for our attention.
This of course has it's pros and cons. I think that all would agree that now that we have our own media, we need rely less and less on secular magazines. Time, Newsweek and US News and World Report, which were a common staple in many Frum homes a decade or two ago, have slowly disappeared. Commuters now have alternatives to the NYT, The Daily News and the NY Post.
Of course there is some value to being part of the world, yet the decadence and news slant of the aforementioned newsprint justifies the expense of keeping up with the Jewish media, where one can find inspiration and Hashkofo more to one's liking.
This past week I read a story where a daughter goes on occasion to feed her elderly mother. The daughter contends with the applesauce dribbling down her mother's chin. When the mother notices the discomfort of the daughter, she ask her to bring her the mother's diary she wrote when she was a young mom. The daughter had not known about this diary, and could not contain her curiosity to read about her own childhood in the mother's eyes.
The mother asked her to turn to page 32. On page 32 the daughter started reading about how the young mother was experiencing the joy and pain of feeding applesauce to her young daughter for the first time. Full circle inspiration that one doesn't often find in the secular media.
No? This sounds like it was cribbed from a typical issue of Reader's Digest.
ReplyDeleteOr, actually, it sounds like the plot of "Love You Forever" by Robert Munsch, a tearjerker of a kid's book if there ever was one.
Oh, so that's where I read it the first time around some 30 years ago. :-)
ReplyDeleteMy point is that much hashkofo is absorbed directly and tvia osmosis by reading the Jewish periodicals.
While at one time if you did not read the secular periodicals mentioned above you would be in the dark. Today, you can get all the news you need and more by sticking totally to Jewish media sources.
And you might find inspiration and laughs in the RD, but not in Time, Newsweek and USN&WR.
Okay, I hear that.
ReplyDeleteBut of course the people involved in producing these publications actually have to read or go through the original media sources where they get this stuff, since they are not journalists.