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WinnieThePooh,
When it comes to halacha, we follow chazal even if modern medicine contradicts it. A very simple example- the tomato is scientifically classified as a fruit, but we say a haadama on it. We don’t say C”V that chazal did not know enough science and got the whole system of classification wrong and therefore we should say ha’etz.
The English-based fruit and vegetable classification really has nothing to do at all with the halachos of brachos. All produce is called “fruit” (pri): borei pri haadoma, borei pri haeitz, borei pri hagafen. So pri seems to refer to the edible parts of plants.
Scientifically, “fruit” (not pri) refers to the seed producing parts of a plant, even when it’s not edible. Vegetables are the edible parts of plants that are not seed bearing. But even that is not the final say on the English word “fruit”, since, in most dictionaries, fruit is defined by its culinary properties (sweet), and vegetables are not-sweet plant products, whether or not they are seed bearing!
So pri != fruit(science) != fruit(culinary)
🙂
I think cases like this (different definitions) are a large part of the perceived contradictions between science and chazal that are not necessarily so.
lightbrite,
Okay hope this isn’t a damp rag on a flame… on the flipside, having an emotional connection can exist independently of a healthy relationship.
Absolutely. And there can be unhealthy emotional connections as well.
It is important to note that true love also comes with respect and the voluntary ability or choice to give and receive. Giving to someone wouldn’t be enough if it comes with unhealthy behaviors and such.
Yes, for sure.
I mention this because it can be confusing when someone both gives to and hurts someone a lot. It can look like love from the outside but inside it’s quite different.
And such behaviors unfortunately can cause bystanders to disbelieve the abused person when s/he decides to do something about it.
At first it sounded foreign but a friend made sense of it to me. She said that she could relate. For example, she is makpid on tznius for Hashem’s sake. It may strengthen her relationship with her husband but the main drive is to do it for Hashem.
I think this is fine, as long as the giving doesn’t come across as a major challenge that needed to be overcome. Nobody wants to feel like a burden to be overcome, even if the one overcoming it grows spiritually from the experience!
WinnieThePooh,
So if a couple sees that they are at the point where they want to give to each other, and are prepared to do so, then they can be assured that the emotional connection will come.
I agree, and that desire to give would reflect an emotional connection that is already being built.
BigGolem,
Would you agree with someone ending a relationship due to lack of emotional connection, even if the other party has everything this person is looking for?
If that were the case, then I’d first investigate why an emotional connection wasn’t forming.
Lilmod ulelamaid,
(you are married, right?).
Yes.
FuturePOTUS,
Infatuation by definition fades away after a certain point. So it wouldn’t be smart to base the relationship on something that will all of a sudden disappear.
Agreed.
(It may not disappear all of a sudden, but the realization that it is gone generally happens in a flash of intuition). The point of infatuation is to kindle a flame between the couple to allow them to use that time to build a much deeper relationship that will last beyond the time that the infatuation fades.
Agreed again.
So as you said, it is real ‘learning.’
I wasn’t referring to infatuation when I made that analogy, but the formation of a loving bond, which one does from day one of marriage.
But it’s not yet strong enough to base an entire relationship on (similar to that we don’t expect a 5th grader to understand a Maharsha.)
I’m not sure I understand. Why does a bond have to be strong or mature before one can base his marriage on it? A farmer bases his livelihood on tiny seeds buried out of sight underground.
So in your opinion, what then should a new couple base their relationship upon?
Forming a loving bond together! Maintaining an awareness that this person has chosen me out of all people to share her life with, and feeling gratitude both to Hashem and to her for that. Always remembering that I chose to marry her and to be her husband, and that this choice is renewed constantly by how I think, speak, and act. To focus on bringing her pleasure, to be kind to her, to make her my top priority, and to make myself worthy of her choice as best as possible.
Step 1: Make sure whatever took out the pilot doesn’t get the co-pilot
Step 2: Co-pilot takes control of the aircraft
Step 3: Everyone argues about the proper protocol for treating the pilot
FuturePOTUS,
I didn’t see your first response to my post before I responded to your second.
But I think we have to make a differentiation in love. Infatuation is not love,
100% agree here.
and it is nearly impossible to attain a real feeling of love in the beginning stages of a marriage, because it is something that can only be reached with long-term effort, commitment, and a real knowledge and appreciation for one’s spouse.
I mostly agree with you here, except I think we’re defining “real love” differently. You seem to consider real love to be the mature loving bond of a long lasting healthy marriage. I agree that this is not attainable in the first stages of a marriage. Just like we don’t expect someone in their first year of learning to master a tractate of Gemara. But I do think that someone learning their alef-beis is accomplishing “real” learning. The appreciation and commitment can and must start on day 1.
I’m guessing our discussion will largely boil down to differences in how we’re defining terms 🙂
So to start, I believe we can agree that basing a relationship on infatuation, and therefore on the feeling people think love is, will not work out, for the above reason that that comes and goes and isn’t yet substantial.
Yes, I agree 100%. I think unfortunately the American culture surrounding us conflates infatuation with love, to the detriment of marriages. Secular fairy tale “love” stories always end with, “and they lived happily ever after” right when the real love story is supposed to be beginning!
FuturePOTUS,
Basing a relationship on real love is a different question.
Ok – any thoughts on that question?
When a marriage starts, love simply isn’t there, infatuation is,
Infatuation is a natural, G-d given feeling, and it has its place. It’s like the very bright flames that jump up when you put a match to kindling. If you carefully put logs on the kindling and tend the fire, you’ll get long lasting warmth that is difficult to put out (and you can toss more kindling onto the logs to get big flames again when wanted!). If you don’t do anything to tend the fire, however, the flames will die out as soon as the kindling is gone.
so when starting a relationship it’s impossible by definition to base a relationship on love.
Why not? Of course love after iy”H many years of marriage is very different from love in the first year. But I see love as an active decision more than a feeling. Would you say that a chosson saying “I love you” to his kalla is not being truthful?
One other thing to point out – when calling 911, stay on the line and on the scene if at all possible, because the operator can give you lifesaving instructions over the phone while waiting for help to arrive.
Health does have a very interesting point, though I’m not sure why he cloaked such important information into a guessing game.
I got CPR certified years ago, and despite numerous devices intended to simply the process (jingles like, “hey! Are you ok? You – go call 911!” to remember first trying to speak to the person and then getting another bystander to call emergency services – and ABC’s for first opening the airway by tilting the chin up, then breathing mouth-to-mouth, then compressions, repeat), the process was still daunting. Even though I was certified, if I had G-d forbid ever had to use it, I would have been very scared to do so, and overthinking the process.
When Health posted his answer, I thought he left out a step – checking for a pulse – because I originally learned that doing compressions on someone with a heartbeat could be harmful to them. This caused me to look at more recent instructions, and it seems like the process has been simplified extensively from when I learned it. E.g., no more mouth-to-mouth breathing, and focus on compressions alone, which in fact are unlikely to be harmful even if inadvertently done on someone with a heartbeat. This updated guidance seems geared towards encouraging more bystanders, even those untrained, to do something. Because in a case of cardiac arrest, anything is better than nothing, and those first few minutes before the emergency responders arrive are crucial for survival.
FuturePOTUS,
A marriage should never be based on love,
I disagree. Love is the foundation of a healthy marriage, and Hashem wants it to be the foundation of our relationship with Him (what comes after Shema and Baruch Sheim? V’ahavta).
especially conditional love,
There is no such thing as “conditional love.” That’s just a euphemism for manipulative behavior.
because love is a fickle thing
Love isn’t some external thing that flitters on to you and flutters off on its own will. Love is an active choice.
and if one person isn’t feeling it one day, then the whole thing goes down the drain.
I’ve never woken up and decided “I’m just not feelin’ the love today.” Yes I’ve woken up sleep deprived and in a sour mood, or annoyed by something, but those feelings are like dust on glass. They are the ephemeral feelings that can and should be brushed away. Proper perspective on our emotions is vital.
Marriage must have a permanent foundation. Ideally, it should be based on Torah and the husband and wife should take advantage of their marriage and relationship to help bring each other to new levels of avodas Hashem.
Agreed. But love is the fuel that makes that engine go.
Practically, that’s mostly impossible to implement for ordinary people
Why?
so a marriage should be based on a shared future together and for their children, which is something that doesn’t change and isn’t subject to the whims of emotion.
Why would we base our marriage on something we have absolutely no control over?
zahavasdad,
Saying we are all sinners and need to do tshuva sounds very similar to a philosophy of a relgion started by a man whose big birthday bash is coming up this weekend
+1 to DaasYochid’s response. The “we are all sinners” philosophy is not where the birthday bash religion errs. Rather, their philosophy states that teshuva is worthless, and man must therefore accept their avoda zara in order to be “saved” from eternal torment that is due to man for even the tiniest transgression.
The Torah teaches us that Hashem accepts our teshuva lovingly and desires that we come close to him, and that work is meaningful even if we are imperfect creatures. And that Hashem is fair in judgement, not a sadistic tormentor.
Joseph,
Those are good points, however, I still see a world of difference between the words and intentions of the Tosfos Yom Tov, Rav Avigdor Miller, the Chofetz Chaim, and other gedolim and Torah leaders, and the parody above.
Mashiach Agent careened between two contradictory metaphors, and the second one (the doctor with the patient not following the treatment plan) was offensive. I disagree with his rhetorical question suggesting that Hashem might CV”S be callous to Jewish suffering: does [He] have any reason to feel bad? How would he know what Hashem thinks? Would Rav Miller ever have said something like that about Hashem?
I also object strongly to the lashon hara he spoke about the Jewish people: suggesting that almost all of us simply threw news of the murder of a child over our shoulder and didn’t care about our brother. That he is “not surprised” that we are beset by tragedies [because we’re such a rotten nation in his eyes after all]. What would the Chofetz Chaim have said about such words and implications hurled at the holy nation?
I know Mashiach Agent’s posts are satire; however, I feel the need to point out a critical distinction between what the Chofetz Chaim said and the parody here. The Chofetz Chaim’s words are instructions for how we should respond upon hearing about tragedies. The fact that we heard about it is meaningful, and we should take meaningful action as a response. This is very different from playing prophet and purporting to know Hashem’s reasons for any given tragedy. Not even Moshe Rabbeinu achieved that level of prophecy (????????? ??? ??????? ??????? ??? ???????). Also, I find the portrayal of Hashem’s dealings with us as a tit-for-tat dangerously mistaken, even in jest.
WolfishMusings,
I’m confused, why wouldn’t it be a chessed?
Hi!
Lenny1970,
Avram, if you’ve ever known a wife who has checked out, you would know your solution is more polyanic than anything else. But thanks anyway.
In reading through your posts to this thread, we find that:
1. Upon being told by a rav to do more to make your wife happy, you retorted, “how”? And 11 (!) years later, you still have no answer.
2. Upon “finally” hearing why your wife is so angry with you (that’s much different from “checking out”, by the way), your reaction is to discount and minimize her feelings, calling it “dumb stuff.”
3. When encountering slight difficulties, such as Rav Simcha Bunim Cohen not returning your call, or $150 counseling fees, you didn’t follow up, even though what supposedly is the most important thing in your life – your marriage – is on the line.
4. Almost every interaction with your wife you have described involves some form of coercion.
I don’t know if your wife has “checked out” or not. We haven’t heard her side. But it seems like you have checked out of the marriage yourself, and not recently.
Bentch friends.
I don’t think a two-handled cup is needed for washing before bread either. A regular cup will do in this case too. But it should be large and not have a spout at top (so the disposable cup is better than the water bottle in this case).
lilmod ulelamaid,
the question is how to get to that point (of being married) and different people need different things.
I agree. My post was more in response to the notion bandied about in this thread that’s tangential to the OP, that there is a strong relationship between the number or type of dates and the health of the subsequent marriage.
We’re discussing elementary school aged children here (i.e., ages 5-11), right?
With regard to happy marriages and reducing divorces, I think one’s attitude and conduct after the chuppa is much more important than how many dates happened beforehand, or what kind of dates, etc. There is no magical formula to plug in before a marriage that guarantees success. That’s a fairy tale, and all fairy tales end before the real love story begins. A spouse must wake up each and every morning and actively decide to be committed to his/her marriage.
lightbrite,
Why not use a water bottle or disposable cup?
Lenny1970,
Avram, imagine living a life where the children and grandchildren are full of midos. No money or health issues. But things are going terribly wrong in your marriage. Would you try and fix the marriage or divorce?
I would try to fix my marriage even if I R”L had money or health issues, or if my kids lacked middos. However, nothing you have written in this thread indicates that you are attempting to or have any interest in fixing your marriage. Rather, you are attempting to coerce your wife into staying married to you.
Consider the difference between:
I want to go into counseling so that I can understand you better, and understand what happened in our marriage, because that is important to me no matter whether we stay together or not.
And
I will only go to counseling if you drop the demand for a get. Otherwise it’s a waste of my $150 bucks.
lilmod ulelamaid,
ZD – please read my post carefully before commenting on it. Nothing you said in your last two posts relates to my comment.
I disagree. Zahavasdad responded to your “if it’s assur, it’s assur” comment with:
And Like I said there are plenty who say because there is no Kinyan it is not a Halachic Sale
and
i am VERY familiar with the process and the Halachas.
These responses seem to me to be an argument that his type of business is mutar, which does relate to your post. Perhaps you are looking for him to say that he personally asked a shaila and got a psak, but you haven’t asked that directly.
lesschumras,
Avram, no, it’s not. I’ve asked her repeatedly to back up her sweeping assertions, which are routinely ignored.
Hogwash. I’ve followed this thread too. At the beginning of this thread, lilmod ulelamaid was quite careful to prepend her statements with phrases such as “I think”, or “Maybe”, and occasionally added statements such as, “I might be wrong.” And she was respectful of others’ opinions. She did make an assertion right before your first post of seeing a correlation between short courtship and healthy marriage, which you could totally have questioned. But instead, you launched this invective:
Lu, are you Joseph? You keep justifying your opinions by using the ambiguous “many people”. How many is many and please cite use actual stats ( and cite your sources ) to support your claims
That request didn’t even make sense based on what she wrote before. In a thread full of personal opinions, why are you singling out lilmod ulelamaid for this harshness and extra-stringent standard?
Lenny1970,
Why do you want to stay married to this woman?
lesschumras,
LU, you constantly make broad, sweeping claims…
by now you must realize that LU bases all of her generalizations…
Emphases mine.
Pot calling the kettle black?
Enough Divorces,
There is usually not one abuser and one quiet sufferer.
How do you know?
If the silent spouse would communicate better with the ‘abuser’ spouse, and work things out (even if not equally fair), then most probably the ‘abuser’ spouse would not be yelling.
Yeah, and if only people would not have wallets, then robbers wouldn’t mug them. Stupid victims.
I know of marriages where one spouse is very aggressive, and the other spouse learned how to accommodate him/her and they are very happily married with no yelling at all.
There is a big difference between an aggressive personality (i.e., direct, confrontational, let it all out) and abusive behavior. The former is an attempt to communicate, the latter is an attempt to control.
If we believed more in the sanctity of marriage
I believe deeply in the sanctity of my marriage, therefore I do not yell at my wife. Just like I do not throw my tefillin on the ground in a rage. There are some things that we just do not do.
Joseph,
I missed that. Sorry. You remain firmly on the straight and narrow 🙂
Mashiach Agent and Joseph,
Your opposition to life insurance is an indication of just how far you have sunk during the past few months… a shame now that we are in Elul!
Just a mere four months ago, you were extolling the virtues of dying al kiddush Hashem (see: http://www.theyeshivaworld.com/coffeeroom/topic/being-niftar-al-kiddush-hashem), even to the point of implying that it is meritorious to daven for such a death.
And now here you are, denying the ability of Hashem to answer your tefillos for an early death at the hands of our enemies by refusing to purchase life insurance!
http://www.theyeshivaworld.com/coffeeroom/topic/time-to-go-troll
popa_bar_abba,
What I wrote to you in this thread was way too harsh and unnecessary. I apologize.
Redleg,
You know, I sometimes think that, rather than offering chizuk and mussar to the CR, MA is really subtly mocking the feelings and ideas he offers with such seeming sincerity and, by extension, the other members of the CR that do, in fact, actually hold those views and attitudes.
Everything you wrote is correct, except for “subtly.”
WolfishMusings,
There are some days when I am so depressed, I question whether or not there is any good in anything that I do. When I that happens, I tend to think that there is no future s’char for me for the mitzvos (or anything else) that I do.
I get these feelings from time to time as well. I don’t think they are uncommon feelings. Persistent depression, however, should warrant a trip to the doctor. It’s not a sin to get a stomach virus and be unable to lay tefillin, and likewise it’s not a sin to have depression and be unable to experience meaningfulness in what you do. But if the symptoms are persistent, you owe it to yourself and to your family to get a checkup.
These feelings don’t actually stop me from doing the mitzvos
B”H!
I do it because it’s what I do, it’s what I was commanded to do, and that’s it.
And that, at its most basic level, is the point. Knowing that there is a “Commander” who has given you commands. All of us need a lot of building maintenance and repair, but you have a very solid foundation under yours.
Reward? Do I really deserve a reward for going to shul this morning and davening, especially if it’s just part of my normal morning routine?
Does a factory worker still deserve to be paid if he shows up and runs his machines all day because it’s his routine, not because he’s thinking about how he’s going to benefit the company?
Do I really deserve a reward for not eating seafood when the thought of eating crab disgusts me?
Do you avoid products with shellfish additives that wouldn’t be disgusting to you?
Does my not wearing sha’atnez make the world a better place in any conceivable way?
Yes.
I feel like I’m going to be told “so you did this things. Big whoop.
Compared to Hashem, anything any human does, no matter how strong, good, heroic, whatever, is a big whoop. But that’s ok. We are what we are.
Other people did them better than you did and under far more trying circumstances than you.”
I don’t think Hashem will be judging us in comparison to others.
However, when I have these feelings, I’m also reminded that someone who questions the concept of reward and punishment for the mitzvos has no portion in the World to Come. So, when I feel this way, I actually have no future reward waiting for me, because I’ve disqualified myself from it by having these feelings.
You don’t seem to be questioning the concept of reward or punishment, but rather your own personal worthiness. So of all the things to worry about, I don’t think this should be one of them.
Avi K,
Avram, actually according to a recent study most murders are executions. The murderer decided that the victim did something that makes him deserving of death.
“Actually” implies a contradiction to something I wrote. How does your statement or the statistics following it contradict anything I wrote? Deciding that someone “did something that makes him deserving of death” seems like a textbook example of impulsive thinking. So do murders arising from fights over property and domestic violence.
Ubiquitin, one can kill even more with explosives. Criminals can get either or make it without any problem.
Are hundreds of thousands of Americans injured and killed by explosives each year?
DaasYochid,
Your first example is not inherently true, but we do follow that approach in our weak dor.
Previous generations practiced taharas hamishpacha differently than ours?
Avi K,
Moreover, various and sundry implements can be used as weapons for both murder and suicide.
This is a variant of the old, “why bother putting up a fence along the bridge” argument. After all, someone bent on suicide would just find another way to do it if there were a fence blocking the way off the bridge. Research has shown, however, that that is not true. Suicide and many murders are impulsive acts, even if they are planned out over a period of time. A fence, a question like “how are you feeling today?” or waiting periods/background checks can be crucial to snap someone out of impulsive and reactive thinking.
Health,
Even if bought elsewhere, NYC laws apply!
Avi K and I were discussing criminals, not law abiding citizens. Please at least try to understand the flow of the conversation before hurling your insults.
zahavasdad,
The torah Rav Chaim learns is very important to this world, every second is precious and invaluable
Do you really believe this, or are you saying it because it’s what you think “Chareidim” believe?
You would interrupt his valuable learning to ask him your important shaila if you should buy a Honda Accord, Toyota Camry or a Chevy Malibu?
Would Rav Chaim interrupt his learning to perform a chessed? I would think so. Giving advice to a friend or talmid is a chessed. And where would you draw the line? Should Rav Chaim refuse to answer any shaila because it would interrupt his learning?
Is it silly to ask a shaila about whether to buy a Honda Accord vs. a Toyota Camry? Sure, I think so. But 1.) I have no evidence that there is a rampant problem of gedolim being pestered with automobile questions, and 2.) what does the fact that there are silly people in the world have to do with the debate regarding Daas Torah?
There is a story regarding Rav Moshe I once read, where a woman would call him frequently to ask very simple shailos, and would even call back to ask the same shaila again, or to double-confirm with him what his answer was. One of his attendants (or sons, I cannot remember) became angry because of the woman’s behavior, feeling it was disrespectful and a waste of the rav’s precious time. But Rav Moshe stopped him from rebuking the woman, and said that she was acting this way because she was a nervous and fearful person by nature, and could not act differently. In other words, to Rav Moshe, doing a chessed for this woman trumped his time.
anIsraeliYid,
one thing I heard many years ago is that one who does not shake a woman’s hand should say “I’m sorry, but for religious reasons, my wife doesn’t shake hands with men, and I don’t shake hands with women”. By phrasing it that way, you hopefully avoid insult by making it clear that the issue is not that you consider women unclean or beneath you – the restriction cuts both ways.
This is an extremely good point to think about when navigating this issue. I wonder what a good phrase would be for someone who isn’t married.
NYC has one of the strictest laws in the world but that never stopped criminals.
Despite parts of NYC being literal islands, NYC is not figuratively an island. In other words, NYC can put as many strict laws into place that it wants, but guns can always be brought in from outside of the city.
yet the murder rate is very low, especially when factoring out terrorism, underworld hits and “family honor” killings.
While murders and mass shootings get almost all of the media attention in the U.S., the large majority of gun deaths here are a result of suicides.
America has a huge population so statistically there will be more people who go nuts. Also the mentality regarding violence is very important.
Not just a huge population, but a huge quantity of guns. There are likely more guns than people in the U.S., and the U.S. population is almost 310 million.
Health,
How many would it reduce?
One way to determine that would be to examine the gun death rates in other Western countries that have more robust gun control laws. They are substantially lower than the U.S. rate. Of course the cultural makeup of the U.S. is different, so it’s impossible to have an apples to apples comparison, but I think it’s a safe bet that the gun death rate would substantially decrease.
I don’t think it would be a significant amount!
On what basis?
The DemonCrats solution is off-the-wall!
Who are the DemonCrats, and what is their solution?
Do you want to stop mass killings? Gun control is Not the answer!
So what’s your answer?
I like L. Graham’s video, that’s posted on YWN news.
He makes a lot of sense!
The vast, vast majority of gun violence in the U.S. is not perpetrated by people on the no-fly list. Sure it’s a good measure to take, but in terms of reducing gun violence, it’s like trying to cure a melanoma by wiping the skin with a cloth.
zahavasdad,
So is it Daas Torah if someone asks if they should buy a Honda, Toyota or a Chevy (People do ask such things incredibly) and you get an answer
Do you really think that there are rebbes out there who order their adherents to buy Toyota Siennas, threatening cherem to anyone seen driving a Honda Odyssey or G-d forbid a Kia Sedona?
One would certainly ask for a friend’s advice before making a big purchase if he thought the friend had some insight; why is it such a horrible thing to ask for your rav’s advice (or bracha), if he is your mentor and friend?
akuperma,
For example, the largest shooting incident in America (involving civilians being shot, and not part of a war) would not have been possible without gun control (several hundred recently disarmed civilians murdered at “Wounded Knee” just over a century ago – if they had guns the casulties would probably have been less).
Not to minimize the atrocity of Wounded Knee, but the shooting started during the disarming, not afterward, and between the Lakota and friendly fire, 25 soldiers died, and more were wounded. The Lakota were outnumbered and outgunned, so even if none had been disarmed and shooting started, their death toll probably wouldn’t have changed much – but the army’s death toll would have been higher.
zahavasdad,
Every Jew a 22
popa_bar_abba,
A .22 ain’t gonna stop anyone.
Fine. New slogan: Every Jew a F-22.
Joseph,
So if, say, Rav Belsky has a public psak halacha where he holds it assur to copy a friend’s music CDs, should a cautionary note be made when publicly relating said psak that the nuance may be lost, the information is hearsay and a private psak from him may differ?
1. The issue of copying CDs is intrinsically less complex and nuanced than the issue in this thread.
2. I’m certainly not advocating for cautionary labels on any posts discussing piskei halacha. Just an awareness that an actual conversation with a rav or attendance at a shiur will give one much more insight than posts in an Internet forum.
Would it eliminate gun deaths and crimes committed with guns? No. Would it reduce gun deaths in the U.S.? Yes.
Joseph,
Yet, dear aIY, you above commented that “I’m happy to share general Halachic discussions and “public” Piskei Halacha.” Surely you cannot fault others for, too, sharing public Piskei Halacha.
I’m not sure if anIsraeliYid would make the same distinction or not, but I’d think that something a rav said in a public shiur would be fine to bring up and discuss here, with the caution of course that much of the nuance may be lost, and the information is hearsay. Sharing a personal psak is something completely different, because it is something tailor made for the recipient, and is usually given in a private setting.
zahavasdad,
Companies caught doing such things pay a bigger price than what was saved.
This is not about being “caught”, and there would be no price paid whatsoever by Starbucks.
In the release you quoted, Starbucks labels this program a “service”, not a guarantee, promise, or even a policy. It’s no different than the “sugar in the raw” packets they provide as an alternative to the “regular” processed sugar packets for those who prefer natural foods. Unless they were guaranteeing cholov Yisroel milk, nobody would get in trouble if they switched it out, and they probably wouldn’t lose any business (this is an attempt to drum up business, not retain it). So I agree with DaasYochid. This is a very nice gesture on the part of Starbucks and a sign that they do research on their consumers, but it doesn’t really change the calculus as far as kashrus and CY go.