Philosopher, I’m sorry but that’s not historically accurate. Before the government banned payos, litvishe yidden mostly had payos – st the time, there was a machlokes between the divrei chaim and the litvishe poskim. The Divrei chaim held that payos were yehereg velo yaavor as per arkasana demasani, shoelaces, which we are moser nefesh for during a shaas hashmad…the litvishe held differently, except for the netziv who was indeed moser nefesh, as you can see from his pictures. Subsequently it became popular to either not have payos, or put them behind one’s ears
I know plenty of taimani yidden who still have “simanim” even though they’re not chasidish at all