You are getting it wrong MerryMom. I didn't struggle. It was clear as day have money = do what you won't with it. Don't have money = make do another way. The thinking has clearly shifted, across the board. And yes, part of what is seen here on this board is that a lot of the younger moms who did get camp and whatever amenities and can't provide the same for their children, for whatever reason, are falling apart at the THOUGHT of having their kids home. That's right, just the thought is enough to send them into a downward spiral. Not all moms, but enough to make it a problem because the money to send their children to camp just isn't there, unless you want to give to them as well.
FTR, the camps we give to are for special needs children and for children in war zones.
We do. Agudas Yisrael has a camp scholarship fund that they solicit for. I wish everyone would feel for those kids left behind while their friends are having a blast. I'm all for principles when it comes to the adults but when it comes to kids, don't make them pay the price for their parents' financial troubles.
Um , a SAHM can make it fun for her kids too! What do you think the homeschooling moms do? It's all about the perspective!!
Even in Europe years ago, the majority of weddings were at a certain standard even for the poorest
My grandparents were married in the living room of my grandmother's parents. The canopy was a tallit. The rabbi was a family friend. The bride and her mother cooked. They considered themselves middle class.
No one is saying camp isn't beneficial for many kids, nor that kids should be kept home. But if you are going to be asking for tzedaka to send your kids to camp, the reason should be much better than "I'm a SAHM who doesn't want to deal with/entertain my kids."
Honestly, its this attitude that is absolutely destroying our communities. It covers everything - weddings, bar mitzvahs, houses, clothing, jewelry etc.
Which is what really makes me ill.
I disagree. I've been to weddings where the people could well afford it but the ostentatiousness was really borderline disgusting (although beautiful and very enjoyable so I really wouldn't put it like that). I have never been to a wedding that poor people gave that I had the same reaction to. There's nothing wrong with making a memorable once in a lifetime event for your child, even when you can't afford it. Yes, perhaps they shouldn't be offering a choice of lamb or filet mignon but if they want to get gorgeous flowers or a beautiful bridal gown on someone else's charity? Why not? Isn't that what hachnasas kallah is all about? Making the bride happy and definitely not shaming her that she should feel pathetic by today's standards? Even in Europe years ago, the majority of weddings were at a certain standard even for the poorest. It was only the very wealthy who went beyond the community standard. I really don't think the poor were expected to have a different standard when it came to that day. Although I do agree with you once we get to Bugaboo territory.
Im sorry but no, a hachnasat kallah is NOT for a kallah that wants a wedding that is more expensive than who ever is paying for it can afford. A hachnasat kallah is for a kallah that can not afford the basics. If I ever found out that I was giving money to a hachnasat kallah that had everything she needed at her wedding but she wanted more beautiful flowers or her dress was not the bomb of a dress, but she had one, I would be fuming. Such tzedakas are for people who truly NEED the help, not someone who has but WANTS more.
Wow, I am so in shock from reading this.
And just by the way, no a wedding does not have to be an over the time venue simcha. That is also where our generation has gone loony. Do what you can pay for, thats it, no more.
You are wrong, shabbat, because hachnasas kalla is about making a kalla happy, yes, also providing for unnecessary luxuries as is usual in her community. And that is the key point. If everyone in her community has a beautiful dress, it is dreadful to tell her - here, someone donated a dress that fits you. You don't like it? Too bad, be grateful you have a wedding dress (even in nicer words). It also doesn't mean she has to choose the most expensive dress from the most expensive salon with tzedaka money, but she should feel good about herself on her special day. If everyone in her community has a live band, don't set up some CDs to play ane tell her she should be happy there is music.
The basics in this context (as opposed to sending to camp) is not what people really need, but what is accepted in a particular time and place. Of course, communities as a whole also need to address the problem of what becomes accepted for all weddings when we are talking luxuries.
No one is saying camp isn't beneficial for many kids, nor that kids should be kept home. But if you are going to be asking for tzedaka to send your kids to camp, the reason should be much better than "I'm a SAHM who doesn't want to deal with/entertain my kids."
Honestly, its this attitude that is absolutely destroying our communities. It covers everything - weddings, bar mitzvahs, houses, clothing, jewelry etc.
Which is what really makes me ill.
I disagree. I've been to weddings where the people could well afford it but the ostentatiousness was really borderline disgusting (although beautiful and very enjoyable so I really wouldn't put it like that). I have never been to a wedding that poor people gave that I had the same reaction to. There's nothing wrong with making a memorable once in a lifetime event for your child, even when you can't afford it. Yes, perhaps they shouldn't be offering a choice of lamb or filet mignon but if they want to get gorgeous flowers or a beautiful bridal gown on someone else's charity? Why not? Isn't that what hachnasas kallah is all about? Making the bride happy and definitely not shaming her that she should feel pathetic by today's standards? Even in Europe years ago, the majority of weddings were at a certain standard even for the poorest. It was only the very wealthy who went beyond the community standard. I really don't think the poor were expected to have a different standard when it came to that day. Although I do agree with you once we get to Bugaboo territory.
Im sorry but no, a hachnasat kallah is NOT for a kallah that wants a wedding that is more expensive than who ever is paying for it can afford. A hachnasat kallah is for a kallah that can not afford the basics. If I ever found out that I was giving money to a hachnasat kallah that had everything she needed at her wedding but she wanted more beautiful flowers or her dress was not the bomb of a dress, but she had one, I would be fuming. Such tzedakas are for people who truly NEED the help, not someone who has but WANTS more.
Wow, I am so in shock from reading this.
And just by the way, no a wedding does not have to be an over the time venue simcha. That is also where our generation has gone loony. Do what you can pay for, thats it, no more.
You are wrong, shabbat, because hachnasas kalla is about making a kalla happy, yes, also providing for unnecessary luxuries as is usual in her community. And that is the key point. If everyone in her community has a beautiful dress, it is dreadful to tell her - here, someone donated a dress that fits you. You don't like it? Too bad, be grateful you have a wedding dress (even in nicer words). It also doesn't mean she has to choose the most expensive dress from the most expensive salon with tzedaka money, but she should feel good about herself on her special day. If everyone in her community has a live band, don't set up some CDs to play ane tell her she should be happy there is music.
The basics in this context (as opposed to sending to camp) is not what people really need, but what is accepted in a particular time and place. Of course, communities as a whole also need to address the problem of what becomes accepted for all weddings when we are talking luxuries.
I understand what you are saying. But it's very tricky territory. Why are weddings different than camp? Why should a poor kalla be given everything (via tzedeka) so she can be happy on her big day, just like everyone else, and a poor child shouldn't be given everything (via tzedeka) so s/he can be happy all summer long, just like everyone else? And if tzedeka means giving so people can live up to societal standards, it will never end....
Back to the topic, I can absolutely see the wonderful worth of camp, but I don't think people should be asking for donations to cover it. I also see the wonderful worth of being a SAHM, and I'm not asking people for donations so I can become one. At some point you have to give up even on wonderful things if you don't have the money (or as people here have repeated over and over, made lifestyle choices that preclude you having the money).
Now, there are exceptions where I think asking for tzedekka is warranted - special needs kids for sure, or a mother with clinical depression, or what not. But not in general.
Also, I think it's very important that one chooses a community where one can fit in financially. Of course this isn't always possible - but it should be one of the parameters. We actually once moved communities, because we just couldn't compete with the socio-economic standards there and I didn't want my kids growing up feeling like have-nots.
Even in Europe years ago, the majority of weddings were at a certain standard even for the poorest
My grandparents were married in the living room of my grandmother's parents. The canopy was a tallit. The rabbi was a family friend. The bride and her mother cooked. They considered themselves middle class.
I'm not sure why you posted this, except as a curiose in the discussion.
You do realize that it's absolutely irrelevant to anyone today how your grandparents got married, which was probably normal in that time and place?
The basics in this context (as opposed to sending to camp) is not what people really need, but what is accepted in a particular time and place. Of course, communities as a whole also need to address the problem of what becomes accepted for all weddings when we are talking luxuries.
I understand what you are saying. But it's very tricky territory. Why are weddings different than camp? Why should a poor kalla be given everything (via tzedeka) so she can be happy on her big day, just like everyone else, and a poor child shouldn't be given everything (via tzedeka) so s/he can be happy all summer long, just like everyone else? And if tzedeka means giving so people can live up to societal standards, it will never end....
Because hachnasas kalla is a mitzva and camp isn't. Because the kalla has to have a wedding, so if she is having a wedding that is way out of the norm for her community standards it is no longer a simcha, but an embarrassment (as an example, say everyone in the community has their wedding in a catered hall, and she has hers in the shul hall with food cooked by the neighbors). If a poor child doesn't have a bicycle/ a trip to camp/ a trip to the zoo - he just didn't have something, he is not publicly shown to be "poor". Hachnasas kalla is about making a kalla happy, not just providing her bare physical needs.
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Back to the topic, I can absolutely see the wonderful worth of camp, but I don't think people should be asking for donations to cover it. I also see the wonderful worth of being a SAHM, and I'm not asking people for donations so I can become one. At some point you have to give up even on wonderful things if you don't have the money (or as people here have repeated over and over, made lifestyle choices that preclude you having the money).
Now, there are exceptions where I think asking for tzedekka is warranted - special needs kids for sure, or a mother with clinical depression, or what not. But not in general.
I totally agree.
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Also, I think it's very important that one chooses a community where one can fit in financially. Of course this isn't always possible - but it should be one of the parameters. We actually once moved communities, because we just couldn't compete with the socio-economic standards there and I didn't want my kids growing up feeling like have-nots.
I think part of the problem is that with so many people feeling justified in living beyond their means, community standards are no longer what people can afford, but what they think they should be able to afford... I'll give you an example. I live in a place with many chassidim. Last week they organized a sale of subsidized (or maybe cost price) flour at 2.80 a bag. That makes you think of poor families, right? Yet when they get married they "have to" buy a list of silver as long as your arm - an etrog box, tallit with a silver atara, menorah etc. etc. It is kind of a communal cognitive dissonance.
Does the job of a SAHM relate only to the current baby and housework? And other kids interfere with that job and so they go to daycare so the mother can work?
Different women have different reasons for being home. Some will stay home with a baby for the baby's sake, but wouldn't have been home if it weren't for the baby (for instance, I know of someone who took a year off after each child was born). Some are home for all their kids in general, including those in school (so they can be there when the kids get home, or on sick days, or vacation, etc, and will have time and energy to devote to them in the afternoon). To each their own.
Let's say a particular woman decides that she can only be a good SAHM to two kids at once, does that make her role as SAHM to those two kids less valuable? I don't understand it personally - I find my kids get easier to care for (and to be honest, much more fun to talk to) as they get older, and I davka like summer vacation - but it seems that, if I think it's nice that a woman with 2 kids is staying home with a toddler and baby, it makes sense that it would also be nice if a woman with 5 kids is staying home with a toddler and baby, even if she can't handle all five at once.
I think it is nice for her to stay home with just the toddler and the baby, but I also think it is a luxury in a sense, and not necessarily one which the community needs to support.
The attitude that "OMG my kids are home, what am I going to do with them" also just rubs me the wrong way a little bit (And I know quite a lot of people like this in real life. Who have quite a few kids...but do not want them at home. Ever). Even though I get it, and I feel it sometimes, I'm trying to enjoy the days of summer vacation that I'm home because I feel like I don't spend so much quality time with them, since in Israel we don't have Sundays so we don't get to do many family trips (which I grew up doing and think are really important).
"Also, I think it's very important that one chooses a community where one can fit in financially. Of course this isn't always possible - but it should be one of the parameters. We actually once moved communities, because we just couldn't compete with the socio-economic standards there and I didn't want my kids growing up feeling like have-nots."
DH directs a community kollel in a city where many are well off. But our avreichim and their families are not! Yet the kollel kids go to school with these kids, and the same kaitana is available for all - at a price. Should the kollel classmates disappear from view in July because only they can't be paid for? B"H people are making sure that doesn't happen. And no, the money is not coming out of kollel funding.
Hachnasas kallah is wonderful. The kallah ends up as the overwhelmed mother of kids not in day camp!
in certain circumstances I would rather give money for a kid for camp then for fresh flowers or a new dress for a kalla. I had neither of those at my own wedding and incredibly I survived that experience. Honeslty I wold rather my parents sent me to camp and made me a smaller wedding. But I think for a kid to sit at home for the whole summer in some cases can be detrimental. No, I don't think a kid has to go to camp for 2 months straight. (and then the mothers complain when they have to entertain their kids for a whole week) I also think spending time with family is very important.
I love the days my kids are home and we can do things together.
There is something more spoilt and distasteful about a kalla heartbroken because her parents or community can't pay for fresh flowers, a band, etc then a 10 year old kid who would love to go to camp with his or her friends.
"Also, I think it's very important that one chooses a community where one can fit in financially. Of course this isn't always possible - but it should be one of the parameters. We actually once moved communities, because we just couldn't compete with the socio-economic standards there and I didn't want my kids growing up feeling like have-nots."
DH directs a community kollel in a city where many are well off. But our avreichim and their families are not! Yet the kollel kids go to school with these kids, and the same kaitana is available for all - at a price. Should the kollel classmates disappear from view in July because only they can't be paid for? B"H people are making sure that doesn't happen. And no, the money is not coming out of kollel funding.
Hachnasas kallah is wonderful. The kallah ends up as the overwhelmed mother of kids not in day camp!
I am quite familiar with the city which you are referring to. Sorry, the kollel families made a conscious decision to move to that city. That city is well-known in Israel as being the enclave of a high socio-economic population. The kollel families should have realized ahead of time that they could never compete with these families, and yes, that includes camp.
The kollel families came to do kiruv there, I guess. Kiruv comes with sacrifices. Sometimes it means eating eggs and potatoes in some third-world country, and sometimes it means not having the same high-level lifestyle that your neighbours can afford.
I know for a fact that many, many kids in your city have lavish birthday parties with hired entertainers. Maybe we should set up a tzeddekah fund so the kollel kids can also have magicians and cotton candy at their birthday parties? Why should they feel left out?
Finally, I actually know several people in your town and no, not all kids go to summer camp there. Far from it. And those that stay home aren't looked at as miskenim.
Shalhevet, that's the problem I'm talking about. Escalation. 20 years ago, XYZ was standard. Now everyone lives above their means and there is a new standard that many people cannot afford or responsibily shouldn't have. But we tolerate this attitude of "if others have it, so should all kids/kallahs/families etc" and its destructive.
in certain circumstances I would rather give money for a kid for camp then for fresh flowers or a new dress for a kalla. I had neither of those at my own wedding and incredibly I survived that experience. ...............
There is something more spoilt and distasteful about a kalla heartbroken because her parents or community can't pay for fresh flowers, a band, etc then a 10 year old kid who would love to go to camp with his or her friends.
I have yet to see a wedding paid for by tzedaka that raised communal standards or even perpetuated them. Some had flowers or live music, or the kallah wore a nice dress, but they were all at the very most just average (materially speaking), and more normally, way more simple than average.
I think escalation in standards of living is natural, and is part of the mitzva of tzedaka. Otherwise we could say, "What do you mean, your wife is sick and you can't afford the mortgage or utilities? Just build your own log cabin in the woods somewhere, use candles for light, dig a hole for a toilet and plant your own vegetables out back. That's what everyone did 200 years ago." Nobody is living on the standards of 100 or 200 years ago, we all expect things like dental care and indoor plumbing, and now it's a mitzva to provide those things to people who don't have.
The question is just where to draw the line. Which varies based on community resources, standards, etc.
Fox you said it as it is.
They may not be getting financial kickbacks but some of the chinuch people get cushy camp jobs and - or send their large families there for free. Ugly business. If anyone had tried that with my kids = trying to keep them from taking a job and instead wanted them to go to a $2000 a month camp? You can believe me that they wouldn't be working too much longer in chinuch..
Some being the operative word. Yes, I know of a rosh yeshiva who just became a camp rav. His family I assume will go with him, kids get to go to the bungalow camp, etc., which takes care of what his kids are doing this summer. He will be shlepping to get there and working hard. AFAIK there has been no pressure on local kids to go there and honestly, I don't ever see it, knowing how things work here and the decisions most parents make.
Does the job of a SAHM relate only to the current baby and housework? And other kids interfere with that job and so they go to daycare so the mother can work?
Different women have different reasons for being home. Some will stay home with a baby for the baby's sake, but wouldn't have been home if it weren't for the baby (for instance, I know of someone who took a year off after each child was born). Some are home for all their kids in general, including those in school (so they can be there when the kids get home, or on sick days, or vacation, etc, and will have time and energy to devote to them in the afternoon). To each their own.
Let's say a particular woman decides that she can only be a good SAHM to two kids at once, does that make her role as SAHM to those two kids less valuable? I don't understand it personally - I find my kids get easier to care for (and to be honest, much more fun to talk to) as they get older, and I davka like summer vacation - but it seems that, if I think it's nice that a woman with 2 kids is staying home with a toddler and baby, it makes sense that it would also be nice if a woman with 5 kids is staying home with a toddler and baby, even if she can't handle all five at once.
I think it is nice for her to stay home with just the toddler and the baby, but I also think it is a luxury in a sense, and not necessarily one which the community needs to support.
The attitude that "OMG my kids are home, what am I going to do with them" also just rubs me the wrong way a little bit (And I know quite a lot of people like this in real life. Who have quite a few kids...but do not want them at home. Ever). Even though I get it, and I feel it sometimes, I'm trying to enjoy the days of summer vacation that I'm home because I feel like I don't spend so much quality time with them, since in Israel we don't have Sundays so we don't get to do many family trips (which I grew up doing and think are really important).
Ally, you've said it so much better than I ever could.
If the discussion were *summer camp is a wonderful experience for my kids, and one that I'd really like them to have. So I'm cutting corners wherever I can, and looking for tzedaka where I can so the kids can have that experience,* I would never say a word.
The discussion was also not *some parents have particular needs or limitations, such as personal illness, illness of a spouse, or special needs of a sibling that require extra time from the parent, and under those circumstances, it is necessary for siblings to go to camp in order to allow the parent to devote time exclusively to those issues* I'm on board there. Remind me to tell you about the summer that DS had to do therapy 4 hours a day, 5 days a week, in a quiet enviromment. And since the DOE wouldn't pay, *I* had to do the therapy myself, under the e-supervision of a licensed therapist, because we couldn't afford it otherwise. If he had sibs, would camp have been a necessity for them? You betcha; since quiet and other kids are mutually exclusive. But we can't extrapolate from that to everyone.
But that's not what people are saying. Rather, they're saying:
* Summer camp is a necessity, tantamount to food and shelter.
* A parent who chooses to stay at home with her children, rather than to work inside or outside the home, inherently and inextricably cannot take care of her kids all day for several weeks during the summer. (Something that I have been told I cannot understand as I only have one child, although rather inexplicably, the person who told me that has only 2 kids.)
I think we have said it all but some people aren't listening and are having their own discussion here.
The thread was not about people who were suddenly ill, down on their luck, burdened with terrible life threaning situations for themselves or their loved ones (ill elderly parents) who under normal circumstances could have either sent their children to camp with their own money, or could have easily taken care of them at home but suddenly circumstances changed.
No - that's NOT what this discussion was ever about.
It was about people who made a conscious long term decision about their lifestyle but do not want to pay the price that comes along with that lifestyle and instead want someone else - meaning me, you or anyone being solicited for zedoko - to pay for it.
The world is unfortunately divided into many categories. The poor, the middle class, the richer, and the very rich. The healthy, the semi healthy and the sick, the stronger and the weaker etc.
Some of those are unfortunately givens due to circumstances of birth, genetics or otherwise. Some, like being born blind, cholilo are often unchangeable. But unless one is in extremis, there is a point in life that you realize your circumstances and if you want something to change then then YOU PERSONALLY do something to make a concerted effort to change these unfortunately circumstances and turn your life around.
However that's not being discussed here. Why should I who go to work and have to sacrifice being home with my children and have to economically limit my numbers of children in order to make a living for my family, be asked to support the lifestyle of a woman who decides to stay home and have a large family?
It was HER CHOICE.
That's not what zedoko is all about. This is not Yisachar-Zevulun. We aren't talking about men sitting and learning torah here and other men supporting them and sharing their zechus for learning. We are talking about women who want us to believe that camp is a necessity. Well, if it is, then go out to work like I do to pay for your kids camps. Don't ask me to pay for it or - if my own kids aren't going - to consider it a necessity for every child so that I should support you.
Table is right. Isramom, kolel garinim of kiruv who go to well to do communities do so out of a sense of shlichus that they took upon themselves. It's not exactly that the entire community of X city got up and said "hey we need torah here" because even before your kollel came there WAS a heck of a lot of torah and yeshivot tichoniyot and lots of other religious activities in your area. Your group wants to add a certain color or shade to those activities? That's fine. But why do you then expect the community to support you and your children and your personal lifestyle choices?
It really does all add up to the things that lots of us have been saying. There is a strange standard being bandied about here. People who want a certain lifestyle without the disadvantages of that lifestyle. People who choose to live a certain way that requires emotional, physical, social and religious strength and then say "oy, we don't have that strength, support us because we need things we can't afford with this lifestyle".
No way. This isn't jealousy Merrymom, it's a well developed sense of responsibility and a reaction to what we see as a lot of hefkerus in the Jewish community today and particularly certain segments of it. Buying into something but not being willing or able to see it through and then changing the rules in the middle and deciding that someone else should pay for it.
Weddings - yes I have seen people go to America to raise money for weddings and buying their children apartments from people in communities where those people's own children did not have as big a wedding as the ones which they are now contributing to to be held in EY, and whose children do not own their own apartment while the children being solicited for are going to own one off the money of people who can't even buy their own children apartments. So yes, I have seen such things.
Responsibility for one's actions and decisions. That's what we are asking here. We aren't talking aboutt the case where someone suddenly becomes ill and needs zedoko for his kids, or someone who is suddenly facing bankrupcy or suddenly loses his job and he is the sole family support and until now they were making ends meet just fine and paying for camp.
In my world you make your choice and that's that. I have a friend who went into academia and she would complain about the amount of years she had to put into her degrees and what a lousy salary she was still earning. One day when we were all sitting around and talking her older sister once said to her, "Malka no one forced you to become an academic, and you knew that when you made that choice that you would be earning a lot less than your classmates who studied law and medicine."
Same here. There is a price for being a SAHM. There is a price for living in certain areas. There is a price for lots of things. But to come and tell me that across the board camp is a necessity? Don't start me laughing. Bad joke.
DH directs a community kollel in a city where many are well off. But our avreichim and their families are not! Yet the kollel kids go to school with these kids, and the same kaitana is available for all - at a price. Should the kollel classmates disappear from view in July because only they can't be paid for? B"H people are making sure that doesn't happen. And no, the money is not coming out of kollel funding.
I agree with the others. You needed to take this into account before you moved where you did (and I know where too). This is no different from people who moved to do kiruv and their kids cannot go to their classmates' birthday parties because the food's kashrus is not to their standards.
You are right - if you lived in Bnei Brak you would have cheap, simple day camps available because people cannnot afford more. No doubt where you live they are fancy with expensive trips.
It is also part of chinuch to teach your children that they are NOT the same as the families you came to 'mekarev' or whatever. I know a family in your city whose kids could probably fund your entire family's summer camps from their weekly pocket money, but why do you want your children to be like theirs?
Everything FS and Tamiri and co. are writing here applies to you too (I am not taking into account that you might have special circumstances that you do need to send. I am talking about a kolel family in your city with several children and a SAHM without special circumstances.) You and your dh chose to live where you do for the reasons you did - which may or may not have included a sense of mission, self-fulfilment, wanting to help others, parnassa for your family etc. etc. The position your dh has also allows you to be a SAHM which, as has been mentioned several times, is a luxury, certainly in EY.
So (one of?) the downsides is that your children mix with children from much wealthier homes and have to learn they can't have everything they have. Maybe it's not such a downside. Maybe they'll learn that we can't buy everything we want. (And BTW, don't think all children from kolel families who aren't in kiruv only are in class with other children from kolel families. Do you think my kids' don't see classmates who can afford things we can't?)
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Hachnasas kallah is wonderful. The kallah ends up as the overwhelmed mother of kids not in day camp!
Maybe she ends up as a happy mother looking after her own children for a few weeks.
Practically speaking, the more that shluchim are required to sacrifice, or make their kids sacrifice, in order to fulfill their duties, the fewer shluchim you'll have. So I can see how if someone supports a certain form of shlichut, it would make sense for them to make the shulchim's lives easier, and paying for camp would be a good way to do that.
It's not so much tzedaka to pay for camp in that case, as tzedaka to support the mission of shlichut.
I agree that anyone considering work in kiruv/shlichut should consider all the downsides and not expect them to be made easier by outside help, but if help is offered that's a different story.
Well Ora you bring up a very valid point. However here's a question. What's "shlichus"? Seems to me that not everyone involved in Kiruv can be called "shlichus".
To me, at least, shlichus is going where there are no frum yidden or very very few, and starting up a Jewish community or enabling Jews to end up there for whatever reason (think Mombay, Katmandu, New Zealand) to have Jewish artifacts, services, education etc. In these places, from what I see, had there not been shluchim there would be nothing. No frum yidden, no kosher food, no orthodox minyan, etc.
At least that's how it starts out. Eventually maybe a Jewish community and even a frum community grows and that's wonderful. That's kiruv.
But that's not some of the shlichus being described here. I can't equate that with a charedi group that decided to open a kollel in an upscale Jewish community in EY with a very large and active frum contingent, a yeshiva tichonit, a few religious elementary schools, and an ulpana a hop, skip and a jump away for the girls. With the best - and actually the only kosher restaurants other than hotels in the larger general environs twenty years ago because of a large anglo religious community, albeit MO.
But I don't want to go into detail about that so let me take it elsewhere, the MO kiruv groups, not the charedi ones in EY Although there are what the MO (not charedim) call Garinim toraniim all over the country (different than the kiruv kollel) most opened up in very poor communities some with crime, in order to try and entice the children back to frumkeit. However some of these garinim toraniim have opened up in upscale communities, with large religious kehilos and I hear the same thing - that the families can't afford to keep up with the lifestyle. But there, from what I have heard from my friends in such kehilos where they opened garinim toraniim, the young familes don't even try to keep up with their surroundings, they know they can't financially, and they fund their own services - including a bnai brak style very very inexpensive day camp for the little ones. Because they realize that if their "shlichus" was a choice to live among the well to do, davka they have to show that they are not part of the kehilla but trying to lead the kehilla morally in terms of a tzniusdik lifestyle. Now that's really admirable. And we are talking fifteen garin torani families in such areas total.
So to say that I or anyone else should support the lives of shluchim abroad in the boondocks or here in EY in poor kehilos to make it easier for them so that more people will go idden there for the others to turn to, that's one thing. But not those who move to upscale communities with big religious kehillas already for whatever reason - to strengthen the kolel lifestyle there or whatever, while I can be supportive of their religious activities I find it difficult to see the necessity to support making their lifestyle close to the economic standard of their very upscale kehilla where they chose to go.
But that's only my definition of "shlichus", maybe not someone elses.
When my husband and I decided to live our lives teaching Torah we knew that we would be living on a lower standard than most of our friends and we were very fine with that. What we did not know at the time was that some (not all) of our children would have needs (yes they are needs for them) because of peer pressure that we have a very hard time providing. So when a couple decides to move to a certain area they might not be given the nevuah to know that it will be very challenging 10 years down the road for one of their children. And ten years down the road one cannot just pick themselves up and start out somewhere all over again. It's not so simple.
