DaMoshe

Joe, you ignored my last point – what about paying tuition?
I also wonder how many Rabbonim today would actually encourage people to live on pas b’melach. What about for Shabbos, when you must have wine or grape juice for Kiddush, and meat for your seudos? Do you ignore that as well?
Joe, you just pick the things you want, that seem to fit your point, and abuse them. You have no modern Rabbinic backing for this.
Now, in my case, I discussed going to college with R’ Bender before I left Darchei. He felt that I should go to college, and encouraged me in it. I have no regrets at all about having attended college.

Joe: Incorrect. You can find the statistics with a simple Google search – I assume mods won’t let me post a link here.
In 1964, 16% of the young male population completed a degree from college. In 2010, that had gone up to 28%. You’re correct that for women that was much higher – it rose from 9% to 36%. But I don’t think that makes a difference to your point. The main issue is competing in the job market. In the 1960s, most women were homemakers, and didn’t contribute to the finances. Men didn’t have to compete with them for jobs. Today, you do have to compete with them. It’s the overall number of people in the market that matters, not what gender they are.

There is a big difference between perceived yichus and just knowing where you came from.
I don’t come from anyone who was a well-known Rav. But I know that my grandparents were amazing people. They were Holocaust survivors who kept their emunah and bitachon. They came to America and built a family of frum, ehrlich people. I wish I’d have a quarter of the faith that they had. To me, that is good yichus.
My Rebbe, R’ Bender, held my grandmother in such high esteem. He still sometimes speaks to me about her, and how amazing she was. I have pictures of him at some of my family’s simchas, where he made sure to go to the women’s side to wish her a Mazal tov. He’d sit at her table just to speak with her for a few minutes.
That’s yichus that is worth something.

Joe, there is a big difference between being embarrassed to be a Jew, and treating non-Jewish neighbors nicely.
There are plenty of issues with communities that have huge Jewish populations. The OP is right, that as the Jewish population grows larger, non-Jews are often squeezed out, because their quality of life declines.
There are towns with large Jewish populations that have signs up telling people how to dress. In a public street, you have no right to do that! (Assuming, of course, that the person doesn’t fall into the legal definition of public indecency.) If you’re a non-Jew, who has lived in a neighborhood for most of your life, would you suddenly want people telling you that the way you dress is not ok? How about if someone is hosting their family for a BBQ on a Saturday afternoon, and they’re playing music in the yard? In a place like Boro Park, do you think that would just be allowed to happen? Or would someone go over and ask them to stop playing that kind of music?
Then you can get into the issues of the public schools in smaller towns. Look at what happened in Ramapo – a huge Chillul Hashem!
Joe, you love to talk about the Shalosh Shavuos when it comes to Israel. Don’t forget the second one, not to provoke the other nations. Even if the Oaths are no longer in effect, it’s never a good idea to antagonize the people around you.

I second the idea of a GE model with the Shabbos keeper. I have this, and it is fantastic. You don’t have to remember to switch it to Shabbos mode each Friday, it does it on its own. It also adds on extras that some companies aren’t aware of, and may require people to rely on b’dieved situations – this was developed so you could use it l’chatchilah.

common: No, that would be per capita. Household income is exactly what it sounds like, total household income.
Joe, if a talmud chacham is making $43k per year, and has 5 kids, then he’s relying on tzedakah to live. If that’s viewed as a success, then there’s a problem with the Lakewood system.

Joe, according to your post, going to college in order to learn a trade can be a mitzvah (paragraph C). You just need to be sure not to be exposed to apikorsus in the classes you attend, which isn’t difficult.

Indeed, many Rabbonim attended college/university. The Novominsker zt”l attended Brooklyn College. R’ Hutner studied philosophy in University – philosophy being a subject which can contain apikorsus.

R’ Bender has said that his father, R’ Dovid Bender, went to college and actually became a CPA.
Regarding your story about R’ Segal zt”l, I have a relative who wanted to stop attending general studies, and learn the whole day. R’ Segal told him absolutely not, and at minimum you need a high school diploma in order to get a job.

At the end of the day, even if someone wants to live at the bare minimum level, working 3 hours per day is not enough to support a family. Not when you have tuitions to pay. For most people, working 8 hours per day isn’t enough to cover tuitions in full if you have more than 3 kids. It’s one thing to ask for a scholarship when you’re working full-time, but how can you ask for help when you don’t want to work a regular job?

Regular is a very vague term 

coffee: I heard he tried to run but couldn’t make it more than 2 steps.

Joseph, R’ Schachter is definitely a gadol, and not only did he encourage attendance, he himself attended the rally. As others said, keep your lies to yourself!

Yasher koach! Being nosei b’ol is a huge deal. I posted about it a few weeks ago (https://www.theyeshivaworld.com/coffeeroom/topic/nosei-bol-chaveiro), as R’ Bender had spoken about it.
I gave up eating dessert after meals. Small things make all the difference!

Probably because the organizations who planned the rally aren’t Orthodox, and the frum orgs didn’t support it until things were already set.

Joe, you are so eager to attack me that you’re just reaching now. I’ve posted many, many times that I 100% oppose Weiss and YCT. Got anything else to show your hatred of a fellow Jew?

Joseph, you can say whatever you want – I hope you realize that nobody here takes you seriously.
Agudas Yisroel encouraged people to attend, and I assume that there will be Rabbonim attending.
Go crawl back under your bridge, you sonei Yisrael.

Avira: Or, Satmar is completely wrong, and Israel is NOT preventing the geulah, but rather is a part of it.

Neturei Karta are reshoim. No, they do not have a point. You oppose Israel for a halachic reason? Fine, go ahead and oppose it. But how dare they go out and march with those who want to kill us? How can they go to Iran and meet with the leaders there? That is why they are 100% wrong, and are reshoim. Don’t compare them to Satmar – R’ Yoel would never have been friends with the leaders of Iran, or been mechalel Shabbos marching with Palestinian supporters.

To the OP – you are right, it isn’t easy. It’s easy to have emunah and bitachon when things are going well. It’s times like these that show the real faith. Remember, we say “l’hagid baboker chasdechah, ve’emunascha balailos.”
I heard from R’ Shmuel Brazil that if we want to be able to properly celebrate the chasdei Hashem, we need to keep the emunah in the dark times.
Look back at Purim – the story took place over a number of years. When we read the Megillah, we see that the salvation was in place even before the real trouble started. Hashem never abandons us. Even though we can’t see it now, the salvation is already in place for the current situation.

The really frum seminaries won’t take you in given what you describe. So you switched from 3 hours to 6 – they prefer 12. Stockings that are 70? Keep going, as they say, “biz a hundred un tvuntzig!”
Pas Yisrael is a good thing to take on. Chalav Yisrael is only good if you bad-mouth those who don’t keep it, that’s the more important part of the chumrah. After all, you’re not really holier than others if you don’t tell them so!
Not eating gebrokts? You need the extra chumrah, not to drink any water at all at meals where you eat matzah. Except, of course, on the last day, when there is a minimum shiur of 8 glasses per meal, which you must drink while chewing on the matzah. Some are extra machmir to drink all 8 glasses within the short zman of 60 seconds.
Please try keeping those chumros, and then the more serious seminaries will give you a shot.

Unfortunately, even staying home for Yom Tov can be extremely expensive. The cost of food has gotten so high that it’s difficult for families to afford it.
There is one thing I usually only do special for Yom Tov – I’ll make a roast. For Shabbos, the beef I’ll eat is cholent meat (which is usually a cheaper cut) and cold cuts. A roast (or a brisket, which I enjoy smoking) is something special for om Tov. The only exception is if I’m having choshuv guests for a Shabbos, I may make a roast, but that is extremely rare. It’s my item that is l’kavod Yom Tov.
Anyway, the cost of a roast, no matter what cut, has gone insane. So now, I keep my eyes open all the time, because there is one store I know of that puts whole briskets on sale for about $7/lb. When they do, I’ll buy a 14-15 lb brisket. When Yom Tov is coming, I’ll smoke it. One piece goes into the cholent whenever Shabbos comes out on Yom Tov. Most obviously gets served. I freeze whatever is left, and will serve it for the second days.
But meat is only one item. Grape juice is now $6 per bottle, although ShopRite sometimes has it on sale for $4.50. If you’re unable to bake challah, you can be paying $6 for each one. Cold cuts, even without the fancy boards, cost a ton. Salami, which has always been the cheapest one, was available just a few years ago for $7-$8 per lb. Now it’s $14. Pastrami is $25. If you have any guests at all (and what is a Yom Tov without guests?), you can easily be paying thousands of dollars to make a Yom Tov at home!

Chaim, it’s not just luxuries that people spend on. Tuition has increased exponentially since our parents were raising us, and it’s a crushing burden. With lots more families having 2 working parents, often 2 cars are needed in order to commute to work.
There’s also housing costs. I saw a study that compared house prices from 1965 through 2021. They adjusted for inflation. House prices rose 118% from 1965 to 2021, even adjusting for the inflation. Income only rose 15.5%. In 1965, the ratio of avg house price to avg income was about 4.5. Currently, it’s about 7.33. So paying for the same size home that our parents had is costing us significantly more than it cost them.
I agree about fancy vacations, and indulging on fancy foods. If you can’t pay full tuition for your kids, you have no business spending money on a fancy trip. I get that people need vacations to relax, but there are affordable options. You don’t need to fly the whole family to Israel.
At the end of the day, let’s all just remember that all our money comes from Hashem. You want to ensure financial well-being? Make sure to give maaser. It’s guaranteed to help your finances. And don’t forget to daven. Davening and doing mitzvos accomplish more than any segulah for parnassah out there.

I’ve seen both sides of this.
I have a friend, who I’ve known since I was young. He is now in his 40s, and has never been on a single date. He doesn’t want to get married. Why? Because his parents can’t stand each other. They constantly fight. But they live in a chassidish community, and were told that divorce is not an option, so they stayed married. He did not see a healthy relationship between his parents, all he saw is fighting, so now he doesn’t want his life to be like that. So he refuses to date at all.

On the flip side, I have a close friend who got divorced. They had one daughter together before they split. It was not an easy split for him, and he had a lot of tough feelings towards his ex-wife. But he told me, “I put those feelings aside, and I deal with her as nicely as I can, because we have a child together, and she is the main priority. We have shared custody, and she sees how we interact with each other. So I treat my ex respectfully, because that’s what is best for my daughter.”

Sadly, there are cases where a child is used as a pawn against one parent in a divorce. But that doesn’t mean the divorce is wrong – the actions of the parent are the issue, not the divorce itself.

In some cases, a parent may claim that a child is being used against them, or that there is parental alienation. Sometimes, removing one parent from the kid’s life was a decision made by a beis din or a court, for the child’s best interests, but the parent can’t accept that. So they start a social media campaign, trying to paint the other parent as a monster, to put public pressure on them. That too is wrong.

Kevin McCarthy is only 58. Not all that old.

Joseph, why so-called?

Sam, the Mishna says that there are 4 different Roshei Shanim. Nisan is one of them, and it is used for counting the months, as it says straight in the pasuk. Tishrei is when the world was created, so as far counting the age of the world, we go from there.
Saying DIRECTLY FROM HASHEM all in caps all the time doesn’t make your argument any more convincing – if anything, it leads me to think you’re just not entirely rational. In modern times, the only things we have which are clearly directly from Hashem are the words of the Torah. Nevuah is long gone. The messages we receive from Hashem now are done indirectly – it’s up to us to see them.
Yes, 9/11 was a message from Hashem, but it had nothing to do with any numbers or anything like that. If it was meant to be connected to Tisha b’Av, it would have occurred on Tisha b’Av.

Kugel, as I mentioned earlier, I won’t read the book because it contains kefirah. If you want to study the New Testament so that you could properly understand Christianity’s arguments before dismissing them, then I’d say you have a right to ask that we read your book.
As for other possibilities for Mashiach if he can come from the dead, well then, R’ Akiva thought that Bar Kochba was Mashiach. Maybe that’s who it would be? I’d trust R’ Akiva more than any Chabadnik – more than anyone alive today, honestly.