Female Judge Strikes Blow Against Orthodox Jewish Male Privilege: Empowers Black and Brown Parents on East Ramapo School Board

"Hoisted by your own petard":

"Hoist with his own petard" is a phrase from a speech in William Shakespeare's play Hamlet that has become proverbial. The phrase's meaning is literally that a bomb-maker is blown up by his own bomb, and indicates an ironic reversal, or poetic justice.

For more than a decade, most of the school board members have been strictly Orthodox Jewish men. They steered more money to school buses, textbooks and special education services for private yeshivas. All the while, the board made drastic cuts to public schools - from laying off teachers and social workers to reducing kindergarten hours and gutting school supplies. “It got so bad, at one point, children were coming home—little girls were coming home, saying ‘I don't go to the bathroom because there's no toilet paper,’" said Willie Trotman, president of the NAACP’s Spring Valley chapter.

“It’s not because we don’t like these people,” said Luis Nivelo, a public school parent, referring to the Orthodox communityJews. But he said it’s people on the board “who destroy our schools.”  And he said extra state funds that were allocated in recent years weren’t sufficient. “They give us a piece of cookies,” he said, adding “we deserve equality in education, because we are human beings.”

Full article available: here.