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"Luke Ford reports all of the 'juicy' quotes, and has been doing it for years." (Marc B. Shapiro)
"This guy knows all the gossip, the ins and outs, the lashon hara of the Orthodox world. He’s an [expert] in... all the inner workings of the Orthodox world." (Rabbi Aaron Rakeffet-Rothkoff) LATEST POSTS:
- Jim Goad (1961-2026)
- Moira Greyland
- Robert Oscar Lopez: The Inconvenient Witness
- Two Ledgers: Decoding the Gurus and the Price of Talk
- The Pervert’s Progress: Costin Vlad Alamariu and the Making of Bronze Age Pervert
- Curtis Yarvin: A Life Against Democracy
- Mark Helprin: Against the Current
- Mark Brandt: The Man Who Asked Who Else Is Prejudiced
- John T. Jost: The Psychologist of Acquiescence
- Strange Bedfellows in the Academy: Alliance Theory and the Straussian Schism
- Tournier on Desmond Ford
- The Fence and the Blessing: How Jews Have Thought About Gentiles
- Tournier on Luke Ford
- Tournier on The Nostradamus Kid
- An Alliance Theory of Antisemitism
- Tournier on Cinema Paradiso and Desmond Ford
- The Self-Hating Jew
- The Alliance Theory in the Academy
- The Borrowed Robe: How Antisemitism Dresses in Each Age’s Virtue
- A Place For You
BEST POSTS:
- * The Enlightenment Wasn’t Enlightened (6-23-26)
* Mr. Burge Draws The Line (6-23-26)
* 'Improving on Democracy' (6-17-26)
* People Leak To People Who Are Fun (6-11-26)
* Why Does Australia Produce So Many Great Journalists? (6-11-26)
* Steve Wynn and the Press: Power, Litigation, and the Contest Over Las Vegas (6-3-26)
* Sheldon Adelson and the Journalists (6-3-26)
* The Vigilant Animal: Thinkers Who Reject the Myth of Human Gullibility (6-2-26)
* The Cost of Refusing the Misunderstanding Myth (6-2-26)
* Show Me How It Travels (6-2-26)
* The Norm Explainers (6-2-26)
* Centering Marginalized Voices (6-1-26)
* What would it look like if the Washington Post put its reader first? (6-1-26)
* What would it look like if the Financial Times put its reader first? (6-1-26)
* What It Would Mean for the Los Angeles Times to Put the Reader First? (6-1-26)
* What It Would Mean for The New York Times to Put the Reader First? (6-1-26)
* Why Wembanyama Lives on the Perimeter (5-31-26)
* The Emotional Palettes Of San Diego, Los Angeles, San Francisco & Sacramento (5-27-26)
* The Administrative Capital: Sacramento Legal Culture (5-27-26)
* San Diego - The Quiet Republic (5-27-26)
* The Quiet Bar: San Diego Legal Culture (5-27-26)
* SF v LA Legal Culture (5-27-26)
* Why Talent Travels Poorly Between San Francisco and Los Angeles (5-27-26)
* San Francisco and Los Angeles as Rival Models of Urban Access (5-27-26)
* Social Cliques in New York, 2026 (5-25-26)
* Social Cliques in San Francisco, 2026 (5-25-26)
* The Rival Courts of Washington (5-25-26)
* The City of Private Rooms (5-25-26)
Category Archives: Conversion
Prominent Jews Who Married Converts
David Brooks (b. 1961) married Jane Hughes in 1986. She converted to Judaism, took the Hebrew name Sarah, and ended up more Orthodox than him before they divorced in 2013. Brooks then married Anne Snyder, a Christian, and has since … Continue reading
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Marc Shapiro: ‘Abraham Rosenberg, R. Chaim Heller, R. Shlomo Zalman Auerbach on Conversion, Abortion, Mercy Killings, and new pictures and videos of R. Jehiel Jacob Weinberg’
March Shapiro writes May 8, 2024: I discussed the enigmatic plagiarizer Abraham Rosenberg. As we saw, in 1923 and 1924 Rosenberg published articles on the Jerusalem Talmud in the Orthodox journal Jeschurun, and he later published Al Devar Tikunei Nushaot … Continue reading
Posted in Conversion, Israel, Marc B. Shapiro
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Entry, Sorting, Reproduction: The Three Control Points of Orthodox Authority
The previous essays in this series examined two disputes. The Lakewood beit din boycott showed how a marriage ruling triggered jurisdictional warfare. The Haredi draft crisis showed how conscription policy threatened the economic and status architecture of an entire community. … Continue reading
Posted in Conversion, Israel, Marc B. Shapiro, Orthodoxy
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Decoding The Convert
Alliance Theory says people signal loyalty to attract and retain allies. Religion is one of the oldest and most powerful alliance systems. Orthodox Judaism is a high-cost, high-demand alliance. A convert who completes an Orthodox conversion has run a gauntlet … Continue reading
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Decoding Rabbi Joseph Telushkin
Written with AI: Rabbi Joseph Telushkin is a norm translator and moral ambassador rather than a boundary enforcer or institutional governor. Telushkin’s power does not come from controlling entry, legitimacy, or halachic process. It comes from shaping how Jews explain … Continue reading
Posted in Alliance Theory, Ben Shapiro, Conversion, Dennis Prager, Guru, Marc B. Shapiro, R. J. B. Soloveitchik, R. Jonathan Sacks, R. Joseph Telushkin
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Why Do Apparently Sincere Converts Sometimes Give Up?
Converting to Judaism is the most serious commitment of my life and I cannot imagine giving it up, but I know people who convert and then give it all up. Why? Incentives shift behavior. When people experience strong incentives against … Continue reading
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Status Closure In Orthodox Judaism
My 25 years in Orthodox Judaism has been intense — both intensely challenging and intensely rewarding and intensely painful (usually caused by my compulsion to isolate and aggrandize myself). For people like me who’ve had a taste, no other way … Continue reading
Posted in Abuse, Conversion, Orthodoxy
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Victory Over Sin! (7-7-25)
Where does the host lack self-awareness? Grok says: Overdramatizing Personal Slights and Misinterpreting Social Cues: Luke Ford recounts an episode where he felt excluded and tearful for days because he believed he wasn’t invited to a Shabbat dinner, only to … Continue reading
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Leaving The Fold
I just renewed my subscription to NYBooks. It is such a gorgeous publication. From NYBooks.com: All religious autobiography hinges on a drama of escape. The convert speaks from a vantage of liberation, having been freed from the shackles of sin, … Continue reading
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Sad Converts Need To Get Reflexive (11-21-23)
I notice that converts (to a religion or to another hero system) often become disillusioned and then describe themselves as sad at discovering the flaws of their compatriots. It seems to rarely occur to converts that their primary source of … Continue reading
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