(Jewish Group) Why did The Guardian say Ruth Bader Ginsburg 'abandoned' her faith?
In the wake of Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s death, obituaries across the country lauded the jurist for her contributions to America’s judiciary system and civic life.
But one contained a claim about Ginsburg’s personal life that left some Jews puzzled, and others outraged.
The Guardian’s September 18 obituary initially declared that the justice had “abandoned her religion” at the age of 17, when she was not allowed to join a minyan to say Kaddish for her mother because she was a woman. The moment was, in fact, a pivotal one in Ginsburg’s life, and could be read as an origin story for her feminism. But it was by no means the end to her connection with her faith and culture.
Many viewed the phrase as careless and insulting — not to mention fundamentally false.
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“I think you can’t separate out that Jewish DNA in Justice Ginsburg,” said Abigail Pogrebin, who spoke with Ginsburg about her disappointment with Conservative Judaism following her mother’s death for her book “Stars of David” (2005). “Her orientation was very much toward the person struggling — reminding us to look at the person struggling and lift up the one who is excluded.”
But while The Guardian’s gaffe stood out in the sea of Ginsburg obituaries for its unusual view of her attachment to Judaism, it also represented a larger flaw in how Jews and Jewishness are often perceived in the media.
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To their "credit", they were one of a small number of stories that even bothered to mention she was Jewish.
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