Tag: social media

Categories
CCAR Convention Rabbis Technology

Twitter for Rabbis: A Crash Course

Today starts the 125th Annual CCAR Convention.

Hopefully, that means that #ccar14 and #whatrabbisdo are about to become Trending Topics on Twitter.

If that above sentence made perfect sense to you, and you responded with a resounded cheer of “yes!” then you probably don’t need to read the rest of this blog post.

If that above sentence made your eyes glaze over with the # symbols and the word Twitter…read on.

How to become a quick-study at Twitter:

1. Go to twitter.com and set up an account. Choose a user name that isn’t too long, isn’t too complicated, and in some way helps to explain who you are. My username is imabima. (Get it?)

On Twitter, users are referred to by the user name, prefaced by the @ symbol. So my username is @imabima. The idea of “tagging” someone in a post actually originated in Twitter but expanded to Facebook.

2. Find at least 10-20 people to “follow.” This isn’t a huge commitment. It’s not like being “friends” on Facebook. It implies no special relationship. You follow other people in order to have something to read and respond to as you use Twitter. Twitter is ideal when there are people having actual conversations back and forth rather than just putting ideas out into the world.

I suggest you start with these rabbis who tend to tweet at the CCAR Conventions (this list is by no means comprehensive):

@ReformRabbis
@RabbiLevy
@Rabbiisa
@rebeccaschorr
@RavMoss
@DeniseEger
@lizwood1982
@rabbisteinman
@ravyair
@RavHeidi
@rabbikip
@ravbat7

The CCAR has a list you can follow for #CCAR14. Just click “subscribe” and you’ll see tweets from everyone on the list.

(There are so many others who tweet….this is just a sample, based on the front page of those tweeting at the CCAR right as I type this post. Also, there are lots of other non-Reform rabbis and other interesting things and people to follow on Twitter. That’s a different post for a different day.)

A single Twitter post is known as a tweet. The verb used to explain what you’re doing when you post on Twitter is tweeting.

3. There are two main kinds of posts in Twitter: your own original tweets and other people’s posts that you re-post, known as re-tweeting. “Re-Tweets” are usually prefaced by the letters RT. Most “good” Twitter users will do a nice balance or combination of their own tweets accompanied by RTs of other people’s stuff.

4. Hashtags: This gets people a little wiggy. It’s really less complicated than it sounds. Hashtags are a way to follow along a certain stream of conversation in Twitter, which can be a vast ocean of stuff. So in order to best follow what’s happening at the CCAR, users will post their tweets with the extra phrase#ccar14. This allows people to follow just this particular stream of information surrounding the CCAR Convention and differentiates our conversation from last year’s convention. You can get by on Twitter with ONLY this hashtag for the convention. You don’t need any other ones. As you get a little more advanced in your tweeting….you can learn more about these things.

5. In real life: Add your twitter username (known as your “handle”) to your name tag at the convention. Talk to other people about how they’re using Twitter. Don’t be afraid to follow people and to see that others are following you.

Twitter is worth exploring. There’s a lot to be learned and gleaned from the vastness of its information stream. It does seem a bit overwhelming and daunting when you merely look at how many tweets there are per day, per hour, all over the world. For specific uses and purposes, it can be a really useful and educational tool.

I look forward to reading all the #ccar14 tweets!

Rabbi Phyllis Sommer serves as associate rabbi at Am Shalom in Glencoe, IL. This post originally appeared on her blog: Ima on (and off) the Bima.

Categories
Ethics News Rabbis Reform Judaism

Thank You for Sharing: Going Public With the Private

The editors at MyJewishLearning.org posted a question on its website a week ago Monday.  Commenting on an article the death of “Superman Sam” Sommer, they asked, “What do you think about publicly sharing a loved one’s illness and death?”

Anyone who resides under the expansive tent created by Rabbis Phyllis and Michael Sommer, and Phyllis’ powerful and poignant blog, Superman Sam, know heart-achingly well of the struggles, early triumphs, later set-backs, and the awful, awful path along which they have had to travel.  One stage of their journey ended very early Shabbat morning, December 14 when their beloved, precious Sam took his final breath, not long after Phyllis recited the bedtime Sh’ma to him.

The reason why I, a friend and colleague, but far from their inner circle, know these details is simply because Phyllis and Michael bravely chose to share their family’s story with us, publicly.  Yes, I was moved to tears, often, because of their willingness to share intimate details of their family’s anguish.

I do feel somewhat self-conscious writing about the Sommer family in this forum.  Any rabbi following Facebook recently has read far better reflections from people much closer to them. After all, I am not a close friend, I do not live in their community, I have not yet met their children, nor did I have an opportunity to meet Sam before he died.

Yet despite my geographical distance from the Sommers, I feel very close to them.  That is the power of their story, of using a blog as catharsis, as communication, and as a way of forming a larger community that can provide essential unconditional love and support.

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Jason Rosenberg, Chuck Briskin and Michael Sommer at a recent CCAR Conference

Sam’s story has touched thousands of people simply because his parents chose to share his life and his death with us.

On Shabbat at the URJ Biennial, a small handful of us who were moved by Sam’s story to join Rabbi Rebecca Einstein Schorr’s and Rabbi Phyllis Sommer’s “36 Rabbis Shave for the Brave” campaign gathered at the CCAR Oneg Shabbat.

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L-r: David Widzer, Chuck Briskin, Elizabeth Wood, Alan Cook, Paul Kipnes, David Levy at the URJ Biennial

As we enjoyed a light moment among colleagues, and friends—new and old—little did we know that 1500 miles away from us Sam had died.

When we learned of his death the next morning, we found one another.  We held one another.  We cried together.  Many words offered throughout the Biennial morning service made us think immediately of Sam.  We read a Torah portion called “and he lived” which is really about death, blessing and memory.  The Sommers’ loss was our loss too.  A vastly different loss, but a loss nonetheless.  I selfishly wanted to hug my children who were home in Los Angeles. More than anything, we wanted Phyllis and Michael to be able to hug Sam.

It seemed strangely fitting then, if Sam’s was to die, that he would die on Shabbat, at the same time as the URJ biennial, where so many people touched by his story were gathered.  It was a gift he gave us.  Those of from different circles of relationship with the Sommers could find each other, and draw strength from one another.  We are friends, colleagues, acquaintances; some were classmates with Phyllis and Michael, others knew them from conventions, several from the world of social media.  Many have never met Phyllis or Michael but feel a close connection nevertheless.

Those of us gathered at that oneg Shabbat, and dozens more are doing something small and relatively inconsequential.  Hair grows back.  It is our small way to restore some power and control since we’ve felt so powerless. We can’t return Sam to his parents’ loving embrace, but we can raise funds to try to make sure that there are fewer families who will have to travel along the same path as the Sommers.

Briskin3Rebecca and Phyllis hoped that 36 rabbis would raise $180,000. More than 60 have signed up, and the initial $180,000 has been met. God willing we will double, even triple our goal.  It’s the least we can do, to honor Sam’s valiant fight, and to help others fighting today.

To answer MyJewishLearning’s question; the answer is an unequivocal yes.  Share, draw strength, use social media to bring people into this tent.  Because of Phyllis and Michael’s sharing, so many know of Superman Sam.  And as long as we keep talking about Sam, and sharing his story with others, his memory will endure.

Rabbi Charles K. Briskin serves Temple Beth El in San Pedro, CA.