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Persecution of Gays   A Plea to Lower the Bar on Bar Mitzvahs
Now that our youngest is a freshman in college, and most of our
friends' kids are well-beyond bar and bat mitzvah age, I feel
liberated to speak out: our bar mitzvah culture is out of
control. It is an unnecessary, extravagant, showy, inappropriate
expenditure, which is done under peer expectation and pressure.
It is an embarrassment to the Jewish people.  What does this bar
mitzvah overkill say about us? What are our children learning
from the bar and bat mitzvah experience? What are they ingesting
about the values of Judaism and the Jewish people?