One recurring problem that we have had here at Moishe House Cleveland is people outside of our age demographic attending events. We feel that Jewish adults in their early thirties that are unaffiliated with a Jewish community pose no problem and we welcome them at Moishe House events. On rare occasion over the course of the last year we have had a few people come to events that were in their mid-forties. Often they claimed that this was exactly the type of community that they had been searching for and expressed their joy in finding us. Further, a few individuals expressed that they are trying to relive their twenties, that they get along with younger Jewish adults in their twenties better then their peer group, or that they wish something like Moishe House existed for their age demographic. At a larger party, we may not realize at first that there is an attendee who is drastically out of our age demographic by about 20 years, but at smaller or more intimate event, such as a Shabbat dinner, their presence can make other guests who are in their early to mid 20s feel very uncomfortable. It has been surprisingly difficult to ask these middle aged Jews to leave. One person wrote me numerous messages on Facebook regarding how excluded they felt upon realizing that they had not been invited to Moishe House events.
One way we dealt with this problem is by blocking individuals from our MHCleveland Facebook group (so they would not be able to find out about events). We also stopped publicizing MH at the local Jewish college and graduate school (as it turns out that is where most of these individuals learned about us), as well as at a few local temples. Although infrequent, these occurrences definitely put an uncomfortable spin on a number of events.
I have learned that we primarily must use word of mouth to publicize events because fliers attract a different generation.
peace,
n
1 comment:
why not just let them come? At Moishe House London, we don't impose any age restriction
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