September 21: Jewish Women Watching

The anonymous group of creative provocateurs, Jewish Women Watching, published a front-page ad for Rosh Hashone in the New York Times on this date in 2001 stating: “Jewish Women/Girls: Hold your community accountable. Sexism is a sin.” “We want Jews to ask forgiveness for the sexism it [sic] practices and allows within its institutions.” Jewish Women Watching has been on the scene since 1999. With greeting card campaigns, costume parties, and other creative protests, they have taken on Jewish dalliances with the Christian Right, George W. Bush’s attacks on reproductive rights, and, most recently, “Jewish racist voices” that protested the creation of the Arab language-and-culture-focused Khalil Gibran International Academy, a public school that opened in 2007, while embracing the Hebrew Language Academy, another public school that opened in 2010.