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love shmutter, but am I the only person who realizes he’s a frum Dave Barry? (that’s a good thing)
I actually asked my Rosh Yeshiva, Horav Shmuel Kamenetzky about this, and he told me it was a “bubbah ma’aseh”
When I went to work, I was introduced to many challenges that were not present in Yeshiva. You can accuse me of being naive all you want, but the fact that I was in a sheltered environment while in Yeshiva allowed me to learn and grow tremendously.
Keeping the white shirt, tzitzus out (albiet wrapped around the belt) helps me stay true to “where I came from.” Dressing in a “yeshivish uniform” is the best reminder for me to stay true to the high standards and values that were taught to me in Yeshiva.
Joe Shcmo-
It sounds like you’re an ACORN voter!
I dissagree with the letter writer, here are a few points:
One of my Roshei Yeshivos just finished giving a shmooze about bochurim coming on time to davening, and I asked him that the vast majority of the bochurim come on time, and the minority that doesn’t won’t start any time soon (this was when I was older, not a young high schooler afraid of getting yelled at), so why bother? He told me that when something is wrong, it is bad for our ruchnius to stand by and let it go. By being passive to other’s improper behavior, we are letting ourselves get affected by it. Therefore, he concluded, he wasn’t giving the shmooze just so the bochurim would change the way they act, but rather for himself; so such improper behavior shouldn’t be something that he got used to and tolerated.
Also, I think the letter writer is fundamentally wrong about people not listening when they are criticized or getting yelled at. Firstly, on an internet forum it is easier to see that actions are attacked and not people- you know that a criticism is not aimed at you personally, because no one knows who you are. Further more, some people benefit by having something pointed out to them. If they are not defensive, they may see something as something they overlooked and didn’t realize. I know this may be a minority, but it still serves a good purpose for someone who wants to improve something that he/she wasn’t aware of previously. Most of us mature adults can see the validity of the points people make regardless of their tone, or CAPS.
Finally, to decry Kol Kories and the sort is decrying the Gedolim who sign them. I acknowledge that there are impostors, who somehow get non sanctioned signatures to appear on their own personal vendetta posters, but the attitude of the letter writer seems to be that everyone should just act their best, and it’s no one’s right to tell others what to do. We are submissive to our Gedolim, and if they indeed “tell us what to do”, or actually sign a Kol Korie with a directive that may be a change to our personal behavior, then you either acknowledge your submissiveness, or you truly think you know better, which I believe is a sad predicament.
People should realize that alot of this isn’t the women’s fault. They don’t just wake up in the morning and say, “how am I going to get dressed not tznius today?” They get encouraged by their husbands to dress a certain way. If both the husbands and wives would realize that a wife should look beautiful for her husband (i.e. in their home), and not for everyone else (i.e. outside the home), then maybe both of them wouldn’t feel like she has to dress up so shtotty before she goes out of the hgouse everyday,
Of course this problem is in Flatbush, and in other communities, and the letter writer is smart for pointing out that he isn’t a “kol korieh” or “taliban” type- he’s just a Flatbush ba’al habos who is looking for some semblance of tznius and proper decorum by a yiddeshe simcha. However, this tznius issue (dressed to kill) is not only in Flatbush (or Monsey, or the Five Towns, etc…), it is alive and well in Lakewood as well. That’s right the mokom torah that is supposed to be “fanatical” in its standards. And it isn’t only by simchos. Actually, by weddings for example, the proper fashion is to dress “conservatively,” I’m more disgusted by the casual dress of women as they do their every day errands. It’s because of behavior like this that some communities have separate hours of shopping etc…
It is almost childish that when you give a woman the “right” to dress fashionably, yet expect them to be responsible to uphold the proper tznius as well, they fail miserably. If someone can’t handle the responsibility of dressing like a bas yisroel, while being in style at the same time, then one of those two things have to stop. Let’s hope it isn’t dressing like a bas yisroel.