Is YU Hirschian?

 

Not really. YU is Litvish Judaism with lots of Zionism and enough feminism to emasculate the men but not enough to challenge the rabbis. See Zev Ellef's articles: Between Bennett and Amsterdam Avenues: The Complex American Legacy of Samson Raphael Hirsch, 1939-2013 and AMERICAN ORTHODOXY’S LUKEWARMEMBRACE OF THE HIRSCHIAN LEGACY,1850-1939.

Being more open to things, YU will have some talk about Rav Hirsch and some Chassidus, but even those are approached Litvish style, which means analytically and coldly. They are more open to careers in part because Modern Orthodoxy is very expensive with the million dollar houses and day school tuition at $40,000 a year per child. Nobody is encouraging fulfilling careers for men, just ones that make lots of money. Women on the other hand go into whatever careers they want. I know a Modern Orthodox woman who left Israel with her husband who quit his job to go study in a theater program in Colorado.

I once told a MO rabbi that it was nice that we are doing so much to improve the lives of women but I believe we need to do the same for men. He said, "I don't know what you are talking about," turned his head and walked away.

The lives of men aren't nurtured in that world any more than they are in the yeshiva world. There's the same pressure to become a genius and to 'learn more Torah,' as well as the pressure to move to Israel, which also can destroy your life. They have little sense of caretaking of the soul in either the MO or yeshiva worlds for they are after all Litvacks.

Hirsch was neither a Zionist nor a feminist nor a Litvack so YU can be a problem but so can be every other group. 

To be a Hirschian you will walk alone because what's left of the German community is either Modern or Litvish. The few people who describe themselves as Hirschians are usually Zionistic, sometimes intensely so. They rationalize that if Hirsch were around today, he'd be a Zionist. That's what you call delusional rationalization as most Zionists have replaced God and Torah with State and that's exactly what R' Hirsch said not to do. He also said to be cognizant of the dignity and purpose of gentiles. Show me a Zionist who does that. 

So, no, YU is not TIDE. You have to be TIDE on your own. Go for it. R' Hirsch will be by your side, and all the gadolim who praised Hirsch are by your side too because they understood that he was sent by Hashem to help people in their Judaism. 

But you won't be entirely on your own. You can have a foot in many communities. In the Israeli Haredi world you get the anti-zionism of Hirsch. It's a militant anti-zionism because Israel is a militant country but you ignore that part. You also get the religious intensity that was true of Rav Hirsch, although he didn't impose that on others. In the Chassidic world you get the sense of community, more of a focus on God, and a pursuit of happiness. In the Modern O world you get more of a tolerance for earning a parnassah. In the small Yekke world, mostly Wash Heights, you get the German Minhagim. And they all respect Hirsch so you keep that in your back pocket.