Williamsburg/Borough Park, NY – New York City authorities said they will shut down a city bus service run by Orthodox Jews if the group doesn’t stop making women sit at the back of the bus.
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New York City’s Department of Transportation spokesman Scott Gastel said the agency’s executive director Anne Koenig has asked the company to respond to the allegations and was waiting to hear back.
“Please be advised that a practice of requiring women to ride in the back … would constitute a direct violation of your franchise agreement and may lead to termination of that agreement,” Koenig wrote.
If such a violation is found, the franchise could be revoked, the DOT said in a statement.
The Private Transportation Corp declined comment.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg told a news conference on Wednesday that if Orthodox Jews want to segregate men and women, they should get their own bus. Segregation is “obviously not permitted” on public buses, Bloomberg said, adding, “Private people: you can have a private bus. Go rent a bus, and do what you want on it.”
Deborah Lauter, director of Civil Rights for the Anti-Defamation League, said in an e-mail to Reuters: “We oppose the practice of gender-segregation on public buses as discriminatory and unlawful. If a community feels it needs gender-segregated buses, then they should not involve the city.”
This is good. Nobody is above the law. And the law is clear. Discrimination on the basis of gender is a crime.
I am a chassidic Jew. Unfortunately I feel the City and Bloomberg are correct. Mosheach has not come as yet. We live in a “free” society B”H. However, if you want public funding, they must abide by the public laws of discrimination. We sometims want the cake and eat it. It doesn’t work that way.
I am waiting for the pin brains who hate Bloomberg to explain why he is an anti-semite and hates yidden. We should learn to fight the battles where we are correct and should try to win those.
makes sense,
if it is a city franchise one must follow the city rules.
Bloomberg is correct.
Nobody is telling the frum community they cannot have a bus service with woman sitting in the back, just do it with a completely private non franchised bus service.
amazing that they got away with this all this years.
why don’t the men sit in the back, make the men pay then get off the bus and enter the back?
I wonder if the men would say ok it is our way to separate the sexes? It is easy for the men to say that as long as you have the better seat,
As far as men not allowed to sit behind woman , just make the back seats facing the rear and that problem will be solved.
wonder if the men would comply?
That’s exactly what we need, more buses on Lee Avenue.
as a frum person myself,i must admit that Bloomberg is 1000% right,we must once and for all stop these criminaly insane sex obsessed crazies from turning frum orthodox judaism into a mirror image of the taliban or the jihadist’s in Iran.these insane crazies are causing a CHILLUL HASHEM all over the world,and giving judaism a black eye
we need a jewish rosa parks
A legal way to resolve this is for the bus company to hang up signs in the buses that all seats are first come first serve. In any case 99% of the passengers would adhere to the seperated seating arrangement. If a wise guy (or gal) gets on and want to deliberately sit in a mixed fashion, the men could simply leave that area. It might not be fun on a packed bus, but it would be a very rare occurance.
I might agree with bloomberg, but who the hell asked the ADL their opinion?
And comment #1 , the way you make your point, shows who you are!!
The facts are and will come out as: no one is forcing anyone to sit any where, there is no sign posted etc. We are tzinusdik folks so we sit our selfs separately. Any one that will come onto bus and wants sit else where will be accommodated. Making a big to do from nothing. A gezinteh winter to all.
This company doesn’t get a green nickle or a red dime from the city, & commenter #1 , don’t tell anybody that you are frum cuz u kill the whole comment afterthere…
As the NY Post story wrote Wednesday, no one told the Post reporter “she had to move to the back” nor did the driver in the NY World incident take a stand one way or another. Both instances show that this policy is not forced on by the company nor by those riding. Instead, it is a self imposed and self accepted policy by the 99% members riding this route.
For those who wonder why the riders have this rule? Well, the high marriage rate in our community is in part due to men and women intermingling less, and as such a there is reduced enticement for people to wonder outside their marriage vows.
As for the sign on the bus encouraging men and women to sit separately: It is passengers who decided to do so, and since 99% using this route don’t mind this type of seating, it indeed does not bother the owner or the drivers that sign is up there.
Two things:
1. The ADL doesn’t exactly like religious people, especially Chasidim, finding them “backwards” in today’s world, so naturally, they’re going to stab their Jewish brethren in the back instead of bothering to find out why they “segregate.”
2. Speaking of which, what this is is simple: sexual sensitivity. The big idea here is to reserve all of it for your wife (or husband). This is a community in which everyone subscribes to this idea. And, by the way, women attract men far more than men attract women–so the men sit with backs to the women so as to not be unnecessarily and inappropriately triggered. Anyone who says otherwise is in denial of this basic fact of human nature. The well-established contemporary Western idea that men and women must mingle and do the exact same things (i.e. careers, workplaces, etc.) to be “equal” denies this healthy and natural sexual sensitivity instead of keeping it alive and healthy and reserving it for committed marriage relationships.
Bottom line? This really has nothing to do with “segregation.”
it is a private company they could do what ever they want
This is from the Reuters report:
“The DOT said the public bus has been franchised to Private Transportation Corp since 1973 and is not subsidized by city money.”
So?
Is this in reaction to someone being forced to sit in a specific place?
As best I remember – there is no sign commanding the women to sit in the back, rather, this is done by community members in adherence to their own modesty customs.
Correct me if I’m wrong.
Although I agree with those who want to keep the bus segregated. Its a lossing battle trying to explain our position to the secular jews or to non jews for two reasons.
1) they can’t stand that we never melted into the American melting pot like them. therefore they attack organizations like Shomrim (like after Kletzky) and Hatzolah or in this case a segregated bus when they can, As these are things which our community developed since we have a different lifestyle then them.
2) No matter how we try to explain tznius to them they just wont get it. a few months ago when a yiddish paper cropped Mrs Clinton’s picture, whether they were wrong or right to do it was one issue. but when they tried to explain the tznius reasoning behind the cropping the non jewish media just didn’t get it.
I rememeber during Mayor Dinkins era there was a problem with a “tznius” issue in the city’s swimming pools. On his weekly radio show somone suggested to have seperate swimming. Till today Its in my mind how Mr. Dinkins answered something like we dont seperated boys and girls.
As a woman in this community I see nothing wrong with the way it was till now. This is the way it should be !!!! Would I even want to sit between the men? The ppl that think Bloomberg is right are most probably at the same level of Mitzvah observance as Mr Bloomberg. U can do Teshuvah together!!
Not only does the bus line not receive any public funding but Private Transportation Corporation pays the city for the right to provide a public service. The agreement goes back to at least 1973, and last year the franchise paid the city $22,814 to operate the route, according to the New York City Department of Transportation. Great, the Mayor is seeking to deprive the New York City Department of Transportation of much needed funds just to keep a bunch of left wing progressives happy. Maybe the Mayor can explain that to his constituents.
So now that we have established it is a private bus, why not hang a sheet down the middle and put men on one side and women on the other?
1) The bus is franchised by the MTA thus it must follow the rules for public accomodations and cannot make women sit in the back.
2) “99% don’t mind” is a useless argument: it didn’t work in the South with Jim Crow laws that made Blacks sit in the back, it won’t work here.
3) Perception is reality: making anyone sit in the back is perceived as making them second class. Our arguments about tzius will not win.
I have a question—-if the men choose to sit in the front and the women choose to sit in the back, who decides which row is the dividing line? Do men, especially younger ones, who are sitting in the last row of the “men’s section” get up to give their seats to pregnant women or to a woman shlepping a few kids or to an elderly woman?
nobody is saying to sit mixed, but the difficult part is when women are carrying stroller and kids, and there are no seats, while the men sit comfortably in their seats…Tell me why a man cannot give away a seat to woman with kids???
Just wanna know if its would be the muslims that are doing it what you will say then we are ppl in the city and 95% users from this buses so you have to do what ever you can 4 our religions
Can the City “force” mixed seating?
What does the law say to Self Imposed segregation? Lets say that there is no rule imposed by the bus company that women need to sit in the back, but the chasidic-women-users go to the back of their own will, because that is what they were taught in school as appropriate, would the City nix the bus license to operate? – Can the city “force” mixed seating?
I’m currently sitting on the Williamsburg/Boro Park bus. There is no poster telling people where to sit. I checked the schedule where they have “Bus Guidelines” and it’s not mentioned there either. You can sit wherever it pleases you, nobody is forcing anyone to sit at designated seats. We as a people respect the Tznius and we do what’s right for our standards.
This article sounds like someone is looking for a fight over nothing.
It’s our own fault because the Boro Park bus company had painted their buses with silly Jewish advertisements.
What did they think? Millions of goyim are driving on the BQE obviously some non-chasidish people took notice. The owners of the Boro Park bus company were to naïve to accept those advertisements and now they will lose even more money to fight those allegations.
It’s about time that the owner would get his lesson how the commute with people. I have five words to say. What goes around comes around….