Shunning By Jewish Community
As the pimps prospered, the Argentinian Jewish community rejected them. Articles condemning the rufianes appeared in the local press, and in 1885, the community established the Jewish Association for the Protection of Women and Girls. Notices posted on the walls of the Jewish quarter warned locals not to rent to the rufianes. Nevertheless, the pimps aspired to be part of the community. The wealthiest were patrons of the Jewish theater, which was the center of Jewish cultural life in Buenos Aires. Despite their trade, Zwi Migdal members donated funds for the construction of synagogues and other community buildings. Community leaders were divided on whether to accept these donations, some fearing that accepting "dirty" money would legitimize the exploitation of women. Later the "tmeyim" (unclean), as they were known, were banned from synagogues and refused burial in the local Jewish cemetery.
Read more about this topic: Zwi Migdal
Famous quotes containing the words shunning, jewish and/or community:
“In a few days I’ll have lived one score and three days in this vale of tears. On I plod—always bored, often drunk, doing no penance for my faults—rather do I become more tolerant of myself from day to day, hardening my crystal heart with blasphemous humor and shunning only toothpicks, pathos, and poverty as being the three unforgivable things in life.”
—F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896–1940)
“It is most important that we should keep in this country a certain leisured class.... I am of the opinion of the ancient Jewish book which says “there is no wisdom without leisure.””
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)
“The community and family networks which helped sustain earlier generations have become scarcer for growing numbers of young parents. Those who lack links to these traditional sources of support are hard-pressed to find other resources, given the emphasis in our society on providing treatment services, rather than preventive services and support for health maintenance and well-being.”
—Bernice Weissbourd (20th century)