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Friday April 20, 2007

3-year-old’s wisdom alters my view of gossip

by joanne catz hartman

Gossip much? Oh come on, be honest. I do. Or I suppose I should say, I have. I’ve just learned that Jewish law prohibits it. Uh oh. If we can’t kibitz and kvetch with friends and colleagues, what’s a yenta to do?

Stop, apparently.

I’m one of 10 in the Contra Costa Jewish Community Center’s library, listening to Oakland’s Rabbi Judah Dardik discuss the topic of lashon hara, which means “the evil tongue” in Hebrew. We’re watching segments of the movie “Mean Girls,” which addresses modern American gossip — part of the rabbi’s “Movies and Messages” series (the next sessions are April 26 and May 31), highlighting Jewish themes and concepts from selected Hollywood movies.

In the movie, Lindsay Lohan’s character, Cady Heron, a high schooler, pines away for fellow student and hunk Aaron Samuels (gotta be Jewish with a name like that). Actually, he doesn’t gossip much. Did he learn about lashon hara in Hebrew school? Or perhaps it’s because he’s from the male species, which doesn’t seem to have the same drive to gossip as women do. Cady, unfortunately, gets caught up with a gossiping power clique and things go wrong not just for her, but for the entire school.

So, Dardik asks us, why do we talk about others? He proposes these ideas: insecurity, the desire to get back at someone and, well, just for the sake of chatter.

I understand the need for chatter. When my daughter was 3 and a half she told us, during a discussion about the merits of being an adult, that “grownups get to use grown-up scissors, read letters and talk about other grownups.” I cringed — sure, I could see the appeal of using sharp pointy-end scissors, but talking about other grownups? That wasn’t what I wanted her to think were the important distinctions between what children couldn’t do but grownups did.

It made me take a closer look at exactly what kinds of things she was overhearing, for example, when I’m on the phone with another mother from our preschool cooperative, or talking with former colleagues, catching up on the news of the people I no longer work with and miss.

When I truly paid attention to it from the perspective of a preschooler, I realized that what we were talking about sometimes moved beyond “catching up,” to talking about other grownups — and not always in positive terms. So I stopped. Well, I didn’t necessarily stop talking about other grownups, but I did refrain from doing it when my daughter was present.

Gossip connects us, I had always thought, and creates a village. And I’m sure gossip existed in the shtetls of my great-grandmother. As a work-at-home mother, chatter about others was all I had to connect me to a village. But listening to the rabbi elaborate on this topic, I’m beginning to view it in a different light.

Speech is a powerful tool, he explains. “Once you say it, it’s loose — you can’t take it back. And if it’s juicy, it travels like wildfire.” He cautions that gossip also affects the listener, not just the gossiper and the one being gossiped about.

As we watch segments of the movie, he pauses the action to “mix in a few Torah thoughts.” It’s a prohibition — “off limits — to speak badly about someone” — even if it’s true. Giving voice to our anger and frustration might make us momentarily feel better, but the longer-term implications are what we need to consider. Ultimately, Lohan’s character learns that “calling someone fat doesn’t make you skinnier. Calling someone stupid doesn’t make you smarter.”

But what if someone truly has bad intentions and we need to warn a friend? The rule, Dardik tells us, is that there must be a constructive purpose to it and it must be known firsthand. But he suggests prefacing our comments with phrases like: “Consider this,” or “Keep your eyes open,” or “Take this under advisement.”

It’s a mitzvah to be constructive and helpful, to solicit an opinion or offer a suggestion. We can say, “I need to talk about this — I’m confused or upset,” but we should attempt to “leave off names and identifying details.” Ask yourself this, the rabbi suggests: “Will it better the world, better things?”

He also offers this thought: “Can you imagine that if, instead of talking about others, we talked about ideas, values, thoughts, opinions?”

I can imagine. I will remember his words the next time I begin to gossip.

Next time? Maybe there won’t be one.

Joanne Catz Hartman lives and writes in Oakland. She can be reached at jc_Hartman@comcast.net.

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