Dear Matzav Inbox,
Have you noticed the peculiar trend in the world of podcasts catering to the frum community? I’d like to share the following with the Matzav readership.
It seems that unless you have a backstory straight out of a Hollywood script, you’re not considered podcast-worthy. A simple, “regular” frum Yid—someone who davened Shacharis this morning, went to work, learned a blatt, came home, and helped their kids with homework—apparently just doesn’t cut it.
Instead, we’re left with a parade of extreme and bizarre narratives that distort what mainstream Yiddishkeit looks like. The guests featured often come from the most unrelatable corners of the Jewish experience. Unless you’re a twice-divorced African ger-turned-Satmar chossid who served in the IDF, or an Iranian migrant who survived the Titanic and now wears a shtreimel, or a Hollywood actress who became a Bais Yaakov teacher in Boro Park, or someone who spent 12 years backpacking through Peru only to discover their roots in Slabodka mussar shmuessen, you don’t make it to the microphone.
What results is a distorted, carnival-like portrayal of what frum Yiddishkeit is. These podcasts, meant to “represent” our community, instead create a warped version of it. People tuning in might think our collective identity is made up entirely of the rarest and most extreme outliers, with little room for the core values and daily lives of the overwhelming majority of frum Yidden.
Where are the stories of heroic yungeleit? Mothers building homes of Torah and chesed? The fathers balancing work and learning? The bochurim and girls striving for growth in the sometimes messy but beautiful tapestry of everyday frum life? Where is the representation of the majority of Klal Yisroel?
The obsession with the sensational, the strange, and the quirky undermines the richness and normalcy of what it means to live a frum life. It’s not just frustrating—it’s harmful. It sends the message that “ordinary” Yiddishkeit isn’t compelling, that it’s only the fringe stories that matter. But the beauty of our community is found in its consistency, in the mesorah passed down through generations, in the daily avodah of regular people doing extraordinary things quietly, without fanfare.
We need to reclaim our narrative. The backbone of Klal Yisroel isn’t made up of survivors of South American earthquakes who now preach from the hilltops of Tzefas or ex-South African priests who now run Breslover kehillos in Williamsburg. It’s made up of regular, loyal Yidden who serve Hashem every single day. Let’s hear their voices.
Sincerely,
A Frustrated Yid
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