Reddit reviews Unchosen: The Hidden Lives of Hasidic Rebels

>If they want to leave the community, these skills will be useful, but when everyone around you speaks yiddish, who needs to speak english?

Well, this is exactly the problem she's complaining about:

>These boys are lacking the basic language tools to take one step out of the community, to communicate with anyone outside their community. [...] I remember feeling angry at this system that churns out, intentionally, boys who cannot speak or read English --- the first step in acquiring basic skills to function as an adult in the 21st century.

So yeah, she's working from the perspective that freedom of choice is a good thing.

edit: the idea that they "could totally learn that content if and when they need it" is not really borne out by the experiences of people trying to leave Haredi communities. The lack of a basic secular education has far-reaching consequences in adult life. Hella Winston, among others, talks about this.

I was raised Jewish with all the schooling but never believed in a god. TzniusNotMyNameOh writes good questions to ask yourself. This year I refused to even be seated at the seder table (in the past I sat but didn't participate) because the entire Haggadah is just praising a god for killing other people. If you reread the stories of Lot and Dinah, they are also just as disgusting. And ask Orthodox about what they believe was the reason for god not intervening in the Holocaust- because he is too great for us to understand his reasons.

Some other books to check out:

God Is Not Great: How religion poisons everything by Christopher Hitchens

Unorthodox: The Scandalous Rejection of my Hasidic Roots by Deborah Feldman

The Year of Living Biblically by AJ Jacobs

Unchosen: The Hidden Lives of Hasidic Rebels

interview with Nathan Englander

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dx7irFN2gdI

http://www.theatheistrabbi.com/

http://jewishatheist.blogspot.com/

http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/

http://i.imgur.com/YWUig.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/7UdCA.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/rNOET.jpg

http://www.southparkstudios.com/clips/411550/its-raining-frogs

http://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&v=6axdZAxyt2g&feature=endscreen

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G5JtxrR6msg&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E67ommy95-o&feature=related

http://vimeo.com/25149893

well for me i wasn't raised orthodox, so its no like the book "unchosen" where it was a big huge scary deal for me to leave. Everyone just kinda went "meh" and moved on, but if you want i can do one.
http://www.amazon.com/Unchosen-Hidden-Lives-Hasidic-Rebels/dp/0807036277/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1334949033&sr=8-1