Is anyone else feeling "out of place" like me in the frum world? What’s going on?

Okay, I need to express my feelings and see if any other long-time Orthodox Jews have noticed what seems like a real decline in our standards lately. The overall vibe, the hashkafa, the whole frumkeit atmosphere just feels weaker than before. Am I imagining this, or is something really changing?

One thing that truly concerns me is how quickly many Orthodox Jews have embraced social media. People are sharing really personal parts of their lives with total strangers. They post about their marriages, family drama, and struggles with emunah, all in public for anyone to comment on or twist. Discussing long, detailed halacha with non-Jews online also feels off to me; it rarely helps anyone, and it reduces complex sugyas to shallow points that attract trolling, arguments, and a lot of antisemitism. Making our private mitzvos, minhagim, and inner avodas Hashem into content for public consumption seems like the opposite of tznius and basic common sense. It exposes the community more than it needs to be.

Remember when having a TV in the house was a big deal? Now every kid walks around with a tablet or phone, and the idea of protecting what comes into our homes seems to have mostly disappeared. Men’s clothing used to have a standard, too; slacks and a button-down shirt were the normal way to look put together. These days, it feels like half the guys in shul or at the grocery store wear old sweatpants and t-shirts. That sense of kavod and dignity is just gone.

And the teens are a whole separate issue. Many boys come off as rude and disengaged. The sloppy outfits, “broccoli” hair, tiny kippahs barely staying on, and this entitled attitude all feel different from what used to be normal. Being a teenager is always tough, but this level of open chutzpah and checked-out behavior in public seems new.

There is definitely a lot of learning happening, which is good, but it often feels superficial. Every shiur seems to need insane spreads and over-the-top food, like the main draw is the food instead of the Torah. It feels backward.

Then there’s the increasing obsession with appearances. Not to pile on about tznius, since women already face plenty of criticism, but the normalization of Botox, fillers, and constant image-fixing in frum circles is unsettling. A couple of decades ago, that focus on looks would have been seen as shallow and too influenced by the outside world, but now it’s just something people do regularly.

Lately, it honestly feels like the world changed overnight, leaving me in a place that doesn’t quite fit anymore. The pace of all these changes has been so fast, and it really doesn’t feel like it’s for the better. The Orthodox community from twenty years ago felt healthier, more grounded, and more serious in almost every way. It’s painful to feel like that version of the community is slipping away.