Mod 80. So, you admit use of those terms conjures up images in the minds of the speaker as well as the listener. Those images may get you into the ballpark, but may or may not put you in the right section, and likely doesn’t put you in the correct seat, yet, we should use them?
What image is conjured up in your mind if I told you “ploni was modern”. I asked a fellow sitting on the train next to me and he came up with “small leather kippa, polo shirt, definitely does not wear a hat on shabbos and usually goes by his legal name (as opposed to the name he was called by his bris). Others on YWN in various posts have labeled anyone who doesn’t wear a white button down shirt, as modern. Still others claim you are “modern” because you grew up davening in a Young Israel (a label stuck on me when I was in shidduchim, for some reason my blue shirt didn’t have me labeled modern, perhaps it was because of the name of my yeshiva?). I’m curios what you and some other readers here would say.