By Dan Stamm, NBCPhiladelphia.com
Some local rabbis noticed something strange when they signed onto their Facebook accounts Friday morning — their title was gone from their profile.
Just in time for Shabbat they’ve taken the “Rabbi” away from the social network.
Chabad rabbis throughout the country began to notice the title “Rabbi” being dropped from their accounts on Thursday night, according to a source.
A simple search for the term Rabbi on Facebook reveals a slew of local Philadelphia rabbis who no longer have the title “Rabbi” at the beginning of their Facebook names.
NBCPhiladelphia.com tracked down the people over at Facebook for a response to this supposed dropping of names.
“We do have systems in place that block people from using certain words and titles in their names,” said Simon Axten with Facebook.com.
“This is to prevent abuse and help maintain our real name culture, which drives accountability on the site,” said Axten.
To be fair to the Facebook people a search for Reverend and Pastor also yields few results for the Philadelphia area.
These systems have been around for a while, according to Axten.
“To be clear, people who try to sign up with a name that contains a word on our blacklist, or who try to change their name to one that includes one of these words, will be blocked. They can then write to us if they feel their use of the word is legitimate,” said Axten.
A blacklist, what names are included on the blacklist?
“The list is quite long and includes words and names commonly associated with fake accounts. You can’t sign up as ‘Barack Obama’ for example,” said Axten.
Facebook encourages anyone who wishes to use a legitimate title on Facebook should contact the Facebook team. “Our User Operations team will investigate and honor the request where appropriate,” said Axten.
lol look at how the conversation changed from “rabbis on facebook” to ”how kosher is facebook?”
I think it’s wrong for mashgichim in yeshivos to set up fake accounts in order to catch bochurim with girls on their list. 1. it’s legitamizing it’s use and 2. it’s a complete breach of privacy
I am a shaliach and I use facebook to contact my commuinty, particularly the students and teens. That said I am shocked how many “frumme” people are on, how many bochrim have girls on their friends lists, how many questionable pictures etc. I don’t think any child should really be using it and only an adult who needs it for their work/shlichus should. As somebody said above, you can use a private blog or a yahoo group for family etc.
to 9
well put
its a kleepas nogah that should be used for good, like hafotzas hamayonois.
signs of the times, umolah haaretz deah es hashem
i kind of disagree with number 2 after all if this is the way people are interacting then they are interacting and thats the person who is connecting with the rabbi
second stop trying to protect people from someone who is aimlessly walking down the street
oh my god people get a life
So now Facebook decides who is or isn’t a rabbi! Maybe Facebook should decide who should be the rabbonim for crown heights.
And yet another agreement! I don’t understand this obsession with Facebook & why Chassidishe couples put up pictures is beyond me! All of a sudden they have thousands of “friends”!!! I know my campus Shliach son in law needs Facebook to keep in touch with the students, but for everyone else, inc. my own kids, I think it’s nasty.
Yes, I too agree with you #2
We are all much too familiar in general and this is just one more avenue that broke tznius barriers.
I guess if we are not going to be more careful G-d sent another to do it for us.
yeah, i agree with you, 2.
facebook is not appropreate, especially for a rabbi!
there are other ways to stay in touch with family overseas! you can make a private blogspot, for example.
if you have a facebook account, you are looking for trouble.
As a chabadnik I’m uncomfortable with seeing some of the racey and not tznius pictures that some of the Rabbis have on their “friends list”. Many of the women are either congregants or ? , even if it is innocent it still raises the question of maris eyin , etc… I’m not being a prude here, but, if a shliach has a wife she should have these people on her friend list. It should be something that bothers all of us, if it doesn’t ? what does that say about us? People look up to us to set an example,… Read more »
Its a good thing so not any “Yukel” can just call himself Rabbi and degrade the title,
the shluchim should contact facebook and request that it be returned.