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I am a very blunt person — both in real life and in cyberspace. Most people who know me are aware that I’m rather sarcastic and try not to hold anything back whenever possible. However, for some reason these same people have a hard time distinguishing when I’m joking from when I’m being serious online.
In recent months, I have come under fire for my use of Facebook.com profile, though the items posted and written have been neither libelous nor obscene, but perhaps merely catty. In spite of some people’s opinions, Facebook is just like everything else on the Internet and should be protected by the beloved First Amendment.
Not everyone will agree with items posted on Facebook or other social sites, but that doesn’t give anyone the right to try and censor them.
Look at the evolution of Facebook. This Web site was originally designed for college students, but in a matter of years it has changed quite dramatically, allowing high schoolers, adults and even senior citizens to log on and participate in the detached bitesize yippity-yap we call social networking.
The Neilsen Company reported Facebook users ages 18-24 make up only 10 percent of the online population while users ages 35-49 make up 32 percent. With this change, Facebook has lost its edge.
It’s one thing to be cautious about what is placed on the Internet, but it seems people too often forget to read things in context when they stalk one another. You should read things from the point of view the writer has taken and by no means should anyone have the right to try and tell others what they can and cannot place on the Internet. If you can’t handle them saying they don’t like something — or someone for that matter — you really have no business trying to social network.
According to Facebook’s terms of use, users control the content on their pages and thus are responsible for them. They also have the right to filter who can and cannot see what is on their pages, but really there is no need for said filters — they prevent others from seeing the full aspect of who the users really are.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m not encouraging cyber-bullying, but people jump to conclusions far too easily when using the Internet. They should try to interpret what is placed on social networking Web sites in terms of what the author meant it to be, rather than what their impulses lead them to think.
Ethnographer, danah boyd, who does not capitalize her name and is the author of “Taken Out of Context: American Teen Sociality in Networked Publics,” told CNN in October she believes social networking is a reflection of the real world. Ethnographers are anthropologists who deal with the scientific description of specific human cultures.
“The Internet is not this great equalizer that rids us of the problems of the physical world — the Internet mirrors and magnifies them,” she said. “The divisions that we have in everyday life are going to manifest themselves online.”
I agree with this sentiment, but then again, too many people are trying to interpret social networking with their personal beliefs. Until we can move forward as a society and begin to take things in context of the social networker’s intentions rather than what they write, no strides can be made to improve how the Average Joe networks.
-Tim Schrag is a sophomore in electronic journalism. Please send comments to opinion@spub.ksu.edu
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