I

The

Good, the Bad and the Inappropriate.

n the early 1990s, I was an active
leader in my synagogue's high
school youth group. Even as a young
teen, I appreciated the importance of
communication in cultivating new
members to the congregation's chapter
of United Synagogue Youth (USY) and
for keeping current members abreast of
upcoming events.
This membership communication came
in the form of photocopied flyers on col-
ored Xerox paper, phone messages left on
the family's answering machines and hand-
drawn posters attached to cork boards with
push pins in the synagogue lobby. Once
every two months, we assembled a cut-
and-paste newsletter to be photocopied,
stapled and sent to members' homes.
Much has changed in the past 20 years
when it comes to teens and communica-
tion. Everything is now instant. Those
mailed event flyers often took as much
as a week to arrive in teens' mailboxes,
but today's texts and tweets arrive in the
blink of an eye. Direct communication, of
course, has become easier as we're almost
always available to chat. No more leaving
messages on answering machines as teens
can connect virtually anytime using Skype,
FaceTime or text messaging.
Parents, however, are often out of the
communications process in the 21st centu-
ry. Each teen has her own cellphone to talk,
text and video chat, so parents often don't
know what their teens are doing or where

18

March 13 • 2014

they're going unless they ask (or snoop).
For the most part, the growth of instant
communication and social media has been
positive for teens in general, and the suc-
cess of Jewish teenage youth groups in
particular. But despite the ways
social networks like Facebook
and instant messaging services
have made it easier for teens to
communicate with each other
and for Jewish teen leaders
to promote their group's pro-
grams in more efficient ways,
there are some very scary con-
sequences that come with this
high-tech communication and
social sharing.

Hard Lessons

Teens often forget that what
they post on social network sites are per-
manent and will follow them into their
future. They also have a tendency to post
mean, hurtful comments about others.
Inappropriate posts about sex, drugs,
disabilities and others' body type are all
hurtful to others and harmful for future
employment and even college admissions.
This dark side of teens and social media
isn't restricted to Jewish teens, but accord-
ing to the adults who work with them in
youth groups, these are very prevalent
problems today.
I asked a few local experts in the field
of informal Jewish education and Jewish

youth groups to share some of their own
experiences dealing with the overshar-
ing and inappropriateness of teens using
social media. All of the experts agreed that
teens are focusing their time around a few
major social networks includ-
ing Instagram, Vine, Twitter and
Snapchat. Some teens are using
Facebook, but to a lesser extent
than the other, newer applica-
tions.
Rabbi Jen Lader of Temple
Israel, who works with the West
Bloomfield congregation's teens,
says that her main concern sur-
rounding teens and social media
is their "lack of understanding
regarding how incredibly public
(and permanent) their actions are
online. They use social media as a
personal diary, posting every thought, pic-
ture and opinion, with no regard for how it
might affect them in the future:'
The rabbi, who has developed a very
good rapport with Metro Detroit's Jewish
teens and will be return-
ing as a staff member
on this summer's Teen
Mission to Israel, inter-
acts often with teens on
social networking sites.
"I 'like' and comment on
teens' posts all the time,
Rabbi Jen
particularly when they
Lader
are being kind or sup-

portive of each other. I think it helps me to
solidify personal relationships with teens. I
also make sure that I reference what they're
posting, good or bad — congratulating
them on their basketball team's win, or tell-
ing the girls how much I liked their prom
dresses, or pulling someone aside for a
conversation about pictures of underage
drinking, etc:'
Lindsey Rosenberg, who works with
local Jewish teens in the Michigan region
of BBYO, finds that "teens have said mean
things to others or posted pictures they
later regret. Even when they think they
have taken it down forever, others may
have seen it and taken a screenshot. Often
these posts get passed around:'
Lader says that on the one hand she
knows "more about what's going on in
their lives and can connect with them in a
way that feels natural for their generation:'
However, she acknowledges it's difficult "in
that I sometimes know too much, and it
can affect levels of trust. I also don't think
that a social media relationship is worth
the same as an in-person
relationship, and some-
times teens feel that
since we interact all the
time, there is no need
to come to an event to
catch up:'
David Lerner, who
directs
Motor City USY,
Lindsey
is
also
concerned about
Rosenberg