Chareidi is a very subjective concept. To a non-frum Jew, anyone who is Shomer Shabbos and appears to be kosher, may be viewed as Chareidi. In my husband’s family (he is a baal teshuvah of thirty-six years’ duration), they think that anyone who goes regularly “to temple” is “VERY Orthodox.” What I as a modern machmir person, might view as being chareidi, is a whole different kettle of fish. I think that most people who read Yeshivah World News most likely view the Chareidi Jew as the more Yeshivish or
chassidish type. It’s the kind of thing where you know one when you see one. And yes, I agree, they do not dress BETTER, just differently from how some other ALSO frum people dress. If my son wears a colored Shabbos shirt, and not only white shirts, he is no less frum than those who only wear white. He likes to wear Shabbos suits that have a subtle stripe, and maybe they are navy, grey, and only sometimes black. I will stack him up against any so-called chareidi. His Middos tovos and ability to give over a d’var Torah are such that people could do well to emulate him. My husband, who did not grow up frum at all, has more appreciation for and dedication to observing the mitzvos, than many yeshivish people in my community, especially in the area of doing chessed. This is not to say chas v’sholom that chareidi people are not baalei chessed. But sometimes some of them are not. It does not come automatically with the territory of being chareidi.
LGBG mentioned the story of Moshiach’s Hat, and it is a very telling story. People are so busy checking out the size of each other’s brims and crowns, that they look down upon the boy who comes in to daven three times a day with a minyan, with “only” a
kippah on his head. And we wonder why so many frum kids go off the derech.