Pass the bacon

Lately, the facebook algorithm machine has been putting me in touch with people from the old country. And by old country I mean Suffern, NY, which by the way is featured prominently in the new Martin Scorsese film, "The Irishman."

I suspect this reconnection trend is due to my increased political arguments with folks from the old neighborhood who seemingly stopped educating themselves the minute they were handed a high school diploma.

From what I can tell there is trouble afoot in Suffern. And I'm not talking about the football team's inability to score once in the Red Zone. I'm talking about the Hasidim.

At one time they were concentrated in Monsey, the neighboring town. And by the way if you get a chance read Beware of Dog, written by fellow ad guy Shalom Auslander, who grew up in Monsey and paints a vivid, if not prescient picture of the changes taking place in Rockland county.

I'm not about to wade into the Hasidic issue. As I mentioned on a Facebook thread, I don't know enough about the ins and outs, the problems, the conflicts or even the possible resolutions.

Suffice to say that if some of the more religious Christian zealots in the region took the time to get to know their elder Abrahamic brothers and sisters they'd find they have a lot in common:

* A slavish devotion to Scripture

* An unfathomable and fact-free belief in some Messiah thing

* A backwards archaic view of homosexuality, chastity, marriage and virginity

* An unrealistic halcyonic view of the past

In fact, one might say that these people are like peas in a pod. You know if it were not for the Hasidim's unreasonable refusal to eat pork and pork products. I bet a few racks of baby back ribs slathered in tangy sauce from Copper Top BBQ in Big Pine, CA, best barbecued meat in the west, would change all that.

Let me walk the plank a little further and provide those who would accuse me of Jewish self-loathing with even more ammunition and suggest the Hasids have a major PR problem. And so much of it stems from their outdated and unappealing shtetl wear.

One doesn't normally come to R17 for fashion forward advice, but today we offer it freely.

To wit, what if the Hasidim looked like this:

I see a Bravo Network show, or at least a fascinating episode, in all this...

Queer Eye for the Hasidic Guy.