“People have a yetzer hora, and do things they shouldn’t, and know they shouldn’t, and would be embarrassed if they were discovered.”
If only. In one of the shuls I grew up in, people gloated about how they kept separate books in order to claim “entitlements” they werent entitled too. In order to have a seat on the mizrach vant you had to have done some time in jail for tax evasion.
My rebbeim growing up taught us that it is a “mitzvah” to cheat on taxes. These were the rebbeim we were taught to look up to
There is a prominent case of a fellow who is viewed as celebrity in spite of (and to some because of – yes I heard this outright) having committed bank fraud. and I know sure there are all sorts of lomdishe reasons why it wasn’t technically wrong and that everybody does it he had no choice. Please spare me, every group has their own things they struggle with. I am not saying that the group being charged by OP is innocent.
I am just saying that all this holier than though attitude is baloney. You like looking down at them because its easy too. They (and I ) are doing the same (though Glorifying a convicted bank felon is not my nisayon, I do see why others struggle with that