A green tax imposed on single-use plastic four years ago — and later repealed — led to a long-term drop in support for environmental issues among ultra-Orthodox Jews, a new study shows.
The ultra-Orthodox community viewed this as a direct attack upon its way of life. Israel is one of the world’s leading per capita users of single-use plastics, partly due to the Haredi community, which uses more single-use plastics than any other demographic.
In November 2021, the government coalition headed by prime minister Naftali Bennett introduced a tax on disposable plastic plates, bowls, cups, and straws. The environment minister at the time, Tamar Zandberg, predicted that it would reduce purchases of plastic items by 40%.
This became a major political issue, including during the national election. The Haredim joined the coalition headed by Benjamin Netanyahu. The repeal of the plastics taxes were the first decision by new Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich of the far-right Religious Zionism Party.
orthodox jews tend to be very religious and don’t usually believe in environmentalism.
they go by the philosophy that “בשבילי נברא העולם” (the world was made for me). meaning that they can do whatever they want because God made the world for them specifically.
The ultra-Orthodox community … use disproportionate amounts of disposable kitchenware
Is this because it’s kosher? I remember once a family member was going to host an ultra-orthodox person and had to figure how to cook for them. Everything got cooked in tin foil because that’s fresh and new and won’t be contaminated. I wonder if the disposable kitchenware is the same thing.
I’m don’t know any ultra-Orthodox but do have several friends/family that keep kosher, and all of them are satisfied with just keeping two sets of dishes (although some just have one set and are satisfied that washing them count).
The disposal dishes, cooking in foil, and such comes up when they visit someone like me who does not maintain a kosher kitchen (and even then, only one family actualy cares enough; but, as I said, they are not ultra Orthodox)
How can it be, it’s millions of microplastic particles. Am I wrong? Those single use plastics produce a ton of microplastics, right?
Have microplastics been declared non-kosher?
They’re everywhere, i’m not sure that’s even physically possible.
Maybe the Ultra ortodox want to have not one but TWO credit cards embedded in their grey matter.
banningslightly increasing the price of plastic forks is anti-semiticIt’s not really a question of antisemitism - this is a kerfuffle between Jewish groups.
The ultra orthodox in Israel are on a whole new level of Judaism with prescribed clothing, hairstyles, foods, language, sabbath rules, and marriage practices. Many in-groups around the world insulate themselves by creating all these little divides with the out-group. “Oh no, you can’t eat with them - their food is contaminated and dirty. Of course you can’t marry one of them!”
So there’s quite a cultural divide between them and every other Jewish person there, many of whom are devout but live a modern lifestyle, and many of whom are just cultural members of Judaism, citizens of Israel, and not religious at all.
The reason disposable cookware is a division point has to do, I expect, with keeping kosher / observing the sabbath. Kosher isn’t just for food - a plate or spoon can be kosher to use or not, depending on whether it has ever touched anything “unclean.” Single-use plastics new from the box have never touched anything. And washing dishes counts as doing work (a sabbath tabboo) but dropping a plastic plate in the trash might not count. Hence: anything that affects single-use plastics may have an acute impact on the orthodox because they believe they need these things to adhere to their religious and cultural prohibitions.
I’m not justifying, just explaining. I think this shit is cuckoo.
The community is more highly affected by poverty,
Durable reusable utensils are wayyyy cheaper in the long run than disposable. So, bullshit. Poverty has absolutely nothing to do with this.
and families are often large, making affordable disposable kitchenware useful in easing the heavy burden of housework.
Wut? With that many people you can very efficiently distribute the work load and get things done a lot faster than one person living alone can do the equivalent amount of housework. So, again, utter bullshit.
This just sounds like self-righteous laziness.
Durable reusable utensils are wayyyy cheaper in the long run than disposable.
For real, I could go get a basic stamped set of metal utensils from Walmart for less than 50¢ each. They would look like cheap diner utensils, but I’d never need to spend that money again. And besides, if I’m using plastic utensils, I’m probably not worried about my stuff looking like it came from a diner. Instead of spending $10 on a pack of single use plastic utensils, I could get a full set of silverware.
Wut? With that many people you can very efficiently distribute the work load and get things done a lot faster than one person living alone can do the equivalent amount of housework.
While I agree, this is orthodoxy we’re talking about. I can almost guarantee that the mother and daughters are the ones who default to doing all the housework and homemaking. Orthodox Judaism doesn’t enforce straight up tradwife roles, but it often sits across the table and swaps notes.
$10 says the “disproportional usage” is largely tied to them not “working” on the Sabbath and using disposable utensils as a loophole.
See, this is how I know religious people are full of shit. “God is all-seeing, all-knowing, and all-powerful! Anyway here’s one of a couple simple tricks we do to get around his rules.”
They believe that the loopholes around the rules make the lifestyle that God intended for them.
Don’t forget the eruv circling Manhattan so they can ignore other Sabbath rules wholesale while going about their days.
“There’a a warmth in the house the minute you light the candles,” she says, “because you’re rushing, rushing, rushing, making sure all the lights are on, making sure the candles are in there, making sure all the food is cooked. … Then you just light the candles and just like let go of everything.”
This reads like the compulsion of the Godspoken on Path from Xenocide.
Yeah, that’s dumber than magic underwear. That might be the dumbest religious thing (with the exception of, you know, wars) that I’ve seen. Calling all of Manhattan your (and specifically your) domicile doesn’t stretch the meaning of domicile, it completely ignores it.
Just pile them in the sink like a normal roommate!
clearing the table is work, tossing trash is not
You can get a family pack of metal utensils at the dollar store for like $5
Orthodox Jewish families managed to do just fine without plastic for thousands of years.
These ones think they need to destroy the environment instead of learning to wash.
Your religion is a choice. If single-use plastics make it more convenient for you to practice your chosen religion, to the detriment of everyone, go fuck yourself.
You don’t get to make the whole world pay for your choice.
Religion is not so much a choice, it is a conviction. If you believe in God and his laws, then you have to observe them as good as possible.
That is also not the point here. Jews did just fine without single use plastic for thousands of years. There is no religious reason as to why they need that stuff. I am not familiar enough with the specifics of Judaism to say for sure, but i would expect that the preparation for and work that is left over after the Sabbath is part of the concept.
So just leave the dishes and clean them the next day.
The research concludes that policymakers need to better explain the purposes of environmental legislation in culturally sensitive ways
I am so sick of the willfully ignorant expecting society to repeatedly bend over backwards to slowly drag them out of the dark ages without hurting their feelings. Fuck!
Ultra-orthodox anything is going to be filled with nutjobs like this. They feel anything that slightly inconveniences their chosen brand of religion is an attack on religion itself. They want to have their stupidly large families but don’t want to pay for it themselves, either through work to wash dishes or through the tiny tax on their plastic forks. Same shit happens with Christians here in the US.
super concerned about cross-continuation in kosher context
wears mask below nose. And mouth.
There should probably be a tax on anything that can be described as “ultra-orthodox” of any kind. I’m not a theologian but I’m pretty sure the concept of “plastic” isn’t banned in any faith tradition’s holy book.
Well maybe stereotypes exist for a reason, quitting being one is a quicker way to cut down bigotry than stopping people from noticing things,
