TB, that was an excellent post, truly. I nonetheless do not fully agree with your implicit assertion that it makes no difference whether chareidi or modern, that going off the derech is equally seen in both camps. I have seen kids in my community (which religiously is an eclectic one, running from very frum, to barely Orthodox), and across the board the most defiant ones were the ones from the more religiously-restrictive homes. Their method of rebellion was to REALLY throw off the “shackles.” Some came back as they matured, but others sadly did not. In the more modern circles, even the kids who experimented with being less frum, came back to at least their parents’ lifestyle when they married. And I believe that is because they were able to more easily re-integrate without that feeling of being judged that is often seen in the more yeshivish world. They don’t feel like people are pointing fingers and talking about them behind their backs. Girls who are massered on by their peers for being seen talking to a boy on their own neighborhood streets, are not going to look kindly on the type of community that encourages such massering. And especially since that community purports to abhor loshon hara. The mixed messages that our kids get, is what is pulling many of them off the derech, in my opinion.
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