I was sexually abused at my synagogue as a child. Here’s how our community can protect others from that horror
There are best practices that could have helped me — and should help many others
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This week, I settled a lawsuit that I filed nearly five years ago against the synagogue in New Jersey where I was sexually abused in the 1990s while learning to read Torah. The settlement agreement is significant because of its restorative focus, which I designed intentionally to help make my childhood community a safer place for children. Here is my full story.
I am glad to see these developments. But it should not have taken years of litigation to force a synagogue to implement protective measures that should be part of the work of every Jewish organization that counts children as part of its community.
My experience, and the enablement of my abuser by multiple Jewish institutions, fuels my passion to advocate for change in how Jewish institutions approach child safety.
Many Jewish institutions still struggle to follow basic policies and procedures for handling these kinds of incidents when they are put to the test — although, in recent years, more have proactively adopted policies and procedures and implemented training programs that help.
But safeguarding Jewish institutions from child predators requires more than a set of rules. It requires that Jewish leaders have an informed understanding of the topic, and more importantly, have the courage to speak up and make difficult decisions. The Jewish community desperately needs more of both.
Here’s what needs to be done.
Appreciate the danger within
Combating child sex abuse starts with understanding that 93% of sex crimes committed against children are perpetrated by someone the child knows and trusts. Jewish institutions must begin to reckon more thoroughly with that fact.
On a recent visit to a Jewish day school, an administrator told me that she runs background checks on everyone who enters campus, including every vendor and contractor, without fail. When I asked if she ran a background check on me, she demurred.
I understand why. But Jewish institutions need to find a way to effuse warmth and community without shortcutting safety.
Train kids and parents, not just teachers
One way to begin this work is to bring children and parents into abuse prevention training, in which teachers are already generally required to participate. This kind of training teaches us how to recognize grooming behavior, which is prevalent in most cases of child sex abuse.
Professional training also helps parents learn how to talk to their children about sensitive topics, which reduces a predator’s ability to prey on a child’s natural curiosity. My own children’s day school recently hired ChildUSA to audit its child safety policies. Later, it conducted age-appropriate student training, followed by an abuse prevention workshop for parents. It’s an easy but highly effective example that all day schools should follow, yet few do.
Draw clearer lines
Another way that we can reduce child sex abuse is by better defining red lines, and by proactively responding to inappropriate behavior.
A few years ago, I alerted a Chabad rebbetzin that a regular congregant watched pornography on his cell phone during Rosh Hashanah services. “It only happened once,” she said, and besides, “he has dementia — where’s your compassion!” Other colleagues breathed a sigh of relief — “at least he didn’t touch anyone.”
Our instinct is to try and explain malbehavior through an innocent lense, but when it comes to sexual boundaries, we should resist that urge. Sexual predators intentionally push both physical and conversational boundaries to normalize their behavior. We need to recognize boundary-pushing and appreciate its role as a grooming tactic.
Prioritize the safety and wellbeing of survivors
Yes, our tradition teaches us to be slow to judgment and quick to compassion. It’s a wise dictate, but not one appropriately applied to convicted child abusers, especially as data shows they often reoffend. The Orthodox community in Englewood, New Jersey allowed my abuser to fully participate in communal life long after discovering he had hidden multiple convictions. Some leaders admonished their community as insufficiently compassionate for having concerns about his involvement.
Their mistake: practicing more compassion for a child abuser than for his victims.
Predators tend to find many ways to get close to their victims, and often frequent multiple communities to maximize their pool of victims and to avoid detection of their behavior. These are both textbook characteristics of how my abuser has long operated. Jewish leaders need to speak up, both within their own communities, and when they know predators have moved to new ones.
Conduct transparent investigations
When faced with a case of suspected abuse, it’s imperative that institutions conduct a transparent, independent investigation, and disclose its entire contents, redacting only information that could identify a victim.
Too often, Jewish institutions conduct internal reviews, only disclosing a summary rather than exposing the entire process to public scrutiny. Such exercises often allow an institution to maintain legal privilege over the contents of the report, thus preventing its contents from being used against it.
These investigations are, therefore, largely performative. Putting children first means Jewish institutions should commit to complete transparency to allow the public to fully understand what occurred and how it was handled, and to ensure that conflicts are properly managed.
Prioritize accountability
Holding Jewish institutional leadership accountable for their actions — and inaction — is needed to ensure that child safety is handled professionally. Accountability means articulating standards of expected conduct, and taking remedial action — like relieving bad actors of their jobs — when conduct falls below the standard.
Community members, lay leadership, and the professional organizations that provide the backbone for institutional Jewish leadership — such as the Rabbinical Assembly — need to be more proactive in holding clergy accountable.
If you sit on the board of a day school, camp or synagogue, you must ask whether your institution is doing everything possible to create a safe environment for kids.
Do you have a child safety policy? Does your board include people with a background in child safety and abuse prevention? Have you participated in abuse prevention training?
If your institution is dealing with a sensitive matter, are you working with professionals who have experience in abuse prevention? If your institution mishandled a case, have you owned up to it?
And finally, if you’re reading this and survived being sexually abused as a child, I believe you and I support you. It’s not your fault. And you have the right to speak up and be heard at the time of your choosing.
