Everyone knows, So, it can be stated that when we were children, somewhere in the early 1980s, our parents were required by school principals to declare that they did not have a television at home. So they signed that they did not have one, even though some had a small one in their bedroom.
Everyone knows, You and I, because hundreds of yeshiva students, raid kiosks and pizza places on Friday nights and other evenings and watch sports games, basketball, soccer, the World Cup and the Olympics. Some even don't see it as bad, but no one is willing to talk about it out loud, and 'open' this very hot topic for discussion.
Everyone knows, You actually know, and so do my cousins and sister, that you went to the seminar interview with the short, ugly wig you borrowed from the dowdy neighbor across the street. The seminar director knows it too. But there's a tacit agreement between you not to talk about it.
everybody Know, both you and the deputy principal [why the hell are there endless men there] because a week after the girl entered the seminar you return to the long custom wig, the skirts and the blouses, all that needs to be said about them is that Mendelsohn and Lieberman have never met anyone like them in their lives.
everybody Know, You, and the diligent cell phone agent who sells 'only' kosher devices, that you have two phones, a kosher one and a call one, and that on the form for the haider and the seminar you wrote down the kosher number, and prayed that they wouldn't call from the secretariat while it wasn't on you.
everybody Know, including yeshiva heads and supervisors who spoke to me personally, because they sat in hell for their crimes of sectarian discrimination, but they are bound by the social norm that determines that a good yeshiva is considered one with a low percentage of Sephardim. Everyone knows this, but social inertia is stronger than all of them.
everybody Know, Certainly those of us who have gone through difficult crises, whose questions of faith and doubts about social-Haredi institutions, even those that were sacred in our eyes, threaten to break through to the surface of seminars and yeshivahs even if no one talks about it.
everybody Know, that all of us, even the frock-wearers among us, watch 'standard' films like Shtisel, The Courtyard, Oshpizin, etc., but the children, with the wisdom of survivors that characterized generations of the Jewish people, know that it is forbidden to talk about it 'outside.' They are also forbidden to share the 'Uncle's Garden' films that they saw at their grandparents' with the neighbor's children, who also saw them at their modern uncle's.
everybody Know, Even the terrorists and the devout haters among us, for whom many bad things happen in the camp, are yours, but you choose to continue to justify your group, even when a little dwarf whispers in the corner of the attic of your heart that 'what's happening here is not right, and who knows where it will end up.'.
Everyone knows, that there are great Torah rabbis walking among us who are considered 'liberals' and capable of supporting far-reaching social initiatives from the perspective of the Haredi street, only they are not willing to declare this publicly. Everyone, it seems, knows exactly who these rabbis are, but on the other hand, everyone also understands in their hearts and with terrible anxiety that their names will be associated with such initiatives.
everybody Know, Even after the Esti Weinstein affair and the colorful investigations by Shmuel Rosner and 'Hamkor', there really are no pills for all the children in 'Gur', and that the 'regulations' are not really implemented by all Hasidim and Hasidism. Everyone knows this in Hasidism and outside, but they don't talk about it out loud.
So if everybody Know All of this, and yet they behave in a way that is so different, perhaps even polar to the 'formal' ideal, why on earth don't they do it openly?
If the masses have non-kosher phones, the women wear spectacular wigs outside of the interview with Feuerstein, most of them do not observe the regulations in Gur, the heads of yeshiva admit that they have been in hell, the haters and terrorists understand that something is wrong here, the educationists are aware of the questions of faith burning in the hearts of young people, and the supervisors know full well what is happening in a significant portion of the mediocre yeshivahs on the third day of the week on Thursday (and also on the days between Sunday and Thursday), why not do it externally, and perhaps through this finally address the problem?
Why consciously live a lie?
This double life is not dangerous from a spiritual or religious perspective, as processes of religious movement in a conservative or reformist direction, converging or assimilating, entrenching or opening up occur and result from a series of so many factors and variables that no one can prevent them.
The real problem is the decay and distortion that are rampant in a society that lives in lies.
When the entire collective knows that it is lying to itself, its sons, its teachers, its neighbors, and even its family - the young people and children within it learn that the culture of lying, self-deception, and lack of truth may constitute a legitimate way of life.
Is this what we want, at the end of the day, is this the kind of society we aspire to live in?
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