Korach:Conflict

This is a tough parsha, especially for an Orthodox, American Jew. 

To read the parsha from an Orthodox viewpoint is anti- Democratic, anti-American.  How can the elite alienate the aspirations of the people?  What is all this exclusivity?

But Gd chooses those who may  ( and those who may not) approach. People have a right to choose the nature of their interactions with other people, Gd seems to have that right, too.  Korach and his group do not have license to force their way into the Holy Service. 

Furthermore, the Holy Service is dangerous.  It is always a trespass ( avon) whose consequences  the designated ( Cohanim) are immunized from.  It is for their own good that others are banned form the Holy Service. 

So what should I think about the Women of the Wall?  Are they the Democratic mob trying to approach the (dangerous, sacred, holy) place where  they don't belong?  Are the Haredim protecting them from spontaneous combustion and the hungry earth?

 The tradition contains thousands of years of misogyny.  But much of that tradition is oral, subject to reinterpretation.  The tradition contains misunderstandings.  The two thousand year exile from Jerusalem led to the sanctification of a Herodian retaining wall. Nether men nor women of the Orthodox persuasion ascend to the Temple Mount itself. 

The wall is a battle for its own sake, a testament to misogyny, and hopefully the battle is a first step toward the correction of that problem.