Reply To: Ona’as Devarim Toward Newly Yeshivish

UJM, maybe it’s a generational thing. It’s more common in the under-30 crowd, which I am part of.
Questionable, I would like to understand what you mean by a Harry, if you say it’s not what comes to mind.
A) Do you view the term as condescending? Would you call someone a Harry to his face (if not, why)?
B) Is there anything religiously or morally wrong with the individuals you describe as Harry?
C) You describe it as cultural and not religious, so can a newly yeshivish person be fully yeshivish and a Harry at the same time?
D) You wrote that a Harry describes “a person who grew up American and doesn’t necessarily understand all the cultural nuances.” Is this a specific form of American? (I ask because of what I’ve often heard from yeshivish rebbeim, that we live in America but it’s not our home. Not as a Zionist statement but more along the lines of that Galus is a state of being in the world, and not a geographic location or the often used terming of diaspora; for the same reason as these rebbeim understand they would still be in Galus even if they move to Israel.)

In a nutshell, you can have two people. One grew up in a Lakewood kollel family, and the other grew up in a Five Towns doctor & lawyer family. Say the Five Towns individual drops Torah Umadda or adjacent beliefs, and embraces the kollel lifestyle and mentality. If Mr. Lakewood and Mr. Five Towns are the same age, and start at the same yeshivish yeshiva at the same time, you’d probably notice something about Mr. Five Towns that gives it away, at least in his first few years in a kollel community. But if it’s purely cultural, as described by some above, is there any religious difference between the two?