The article:
My comment:
The New York Times article on “FlatbushGirl” Adina Miles Sash raises serious questions about the whole “Ervah” (nudity) campaign.
First, why do it? As the article demonstrates, the tactic offended the community, which FG knows very well; it had no chance of succeeding. In fact, Raphi Stein is quoted: “Contrary to her claims of helping ‘agunas,’ her activities helped strengthen my negotiating position.”
Second, the timing is suspicious. According to her own account in the article, FlatbushGirl personally and separately took risqué photos of herself in February 2026, a month before the “Free Adeena” campaign started, ostensibly to send to her husband.
Given the likely ineffectiveness of the nudity campaign (just the opposite; it predictably backfired); given that Adeena Kohn requested privacy through a friend; and given that FG did not even ask either party for information about the case before launching the campaign—was something else going on here?
For example, did FG’s personal photos leak, and now she had an excuse to redirect the narrative?
This is important. According to the article, around 200 women compromised their privacy in outrage. And Raphi Stein was mercilessly gang stalked for months, losing his job in the process after being characterized as a truly monstrous person.
Please see the key quote from the article below.
“The idea for the Gett Naked campaign, for instance, came to Sash in February, she said, when she began to take risqué photos of herself to send to her husband — a way of spicing up a 20-year marriage. Then one morning, Sash connected the dots, just like that: The way to make more people pay attention to the Kohn case was hundreds of revealing photos. ‘It was just a jolt of inspiration, and from conception to posting it publicly was very impulsive and a matter of minutes,’ she said.”
Question from a reader:
“So you promote men not giving gets and holding women emotionally and often times financially hostage?”
“Her campaign brought attention not only to that specific case but to the overall crisis.”
“You act like the women who posted pics did it against their will – it was their choice and none of the pics were actually nude.”
“And Raphi ended up giving the get. Or would you rather bring back rabbis in vans to make men give gets? I am fine with either but too many rabbis were going to jail for the van tactic.”
My answer:
Your comment is an example of shifting the goalposts to avoid the point being made, but it’s a fair comment in light of my coverage of the case overall, so I will respond directly to it.
Obviously, no one is “in favor” of withholding a Jewish divorce or using it as a bargaining chip. I have witnessed the latter tactic in action. While the numbers may not justify the term “crisis” the existence of a power imbalance under Jewish law is problematic for actual women who fear being trapped in marriage. This is why the rabbis advocate a prenuptial agreement which moderates the problem to a large extent. It isn’t perfect; without getting too technical, a better solution would be to write conditions into the marriage contract that nullify it under certain conditions. The rabbis can also nullify the marriage altogether. In my opinion these options are underutilized.
You are right in saying that Adina Sash aka FlatbushGirl has brought attention to the plight of chained women in general. The Jewish courts, being run by men, with an emphasis on their implementation of Jewish law, are naturally not an empowering place for women but rather quite exclusionary.
For the above reasons, “FlatbushGirl” had my strong support at the advent of this campaign. I simply trusted her. And that is where things went off the rails.
Based on the New York Times article, Sash had a pre-existing problem, and that was that she had taken revealing photos of herself in February 2026. Have you noticed that the entire conversation around this case has gone completely silent? That her Instagram (which was not remarkable) is completely down and there is no alternative account stood up? They don’t just close accounts because people report them; there has to be a reason. The logical answer is that Sash herself shut it down, because something else is happening. If that “something” has to do with her own sexual selfies, the question comes up — did she actually create the nudity campaign to submerge her own scandal?
Certainly her sex campaign did not help Adeena Kohn. It backfired. Nobody in the community supported this. Kohn was completely embarrassed. You could say the backfiring benefited Stein. He and Kohn reached a civil settlement together and he immediately gave the Gett as in 24 hours.
The bigger problem here concerns FG’s possible exploitation of her 100,000 followers, and incitement of them to undertake actions that could get them into legal trouble as co-conspirators in the gang stalking of Raphi Stein. These women can also find their photos used against them if their identity is matched to the image and they leak. I believe that FG may have used these women to cover her own indiscretions. That is completely unforgivable and an abuse of power. While it’s true they acted on their own volition, they also trusted her as an advocate for women, and believed they were doing a noble thing.
Remember, Sash invented an entire campaign out of nowhere. Raphi Stein’s case was unknown to her when she took on the campaign. As the New York Times article notes, she did not speak to him or to Adeena Kohn first.
I actually changed my position after reading the publicly available court papers from the Supreme Court and looking up basic divorce practices as they concern the modern Jewish courts. All they were doing was litigating civilly, after which the Gett would have been awarded anyway.
Very clearly, the Gett campaign was meant to destroy his job, make him homeless, and ruin his reputation in the community so that he would have to leave town and de facto abandon his children.
Keep in mind that Stein was never accused by Kohn or even by Sash of any kind of domestic abuse other than Sash calling the protracted divorce case a form of abuse.
To the contrary, the entire case came about because he was an extraordinarily involved and committed father, something women should applaud.
Writing by Dr. Dannielle Blumenthal 