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Comments: 262 +- News: Colleges Struggling With the Digital Bathroom Wall on Saturday November 28, @09:36AM
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Soulskill
on Saturday November 28, @09:36AM
from the for-a-good-time-use-google-stall-search dept.
from the for-a-good-time-use-google-stall-search dept.
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theodp writes "Back in the day, anonymous character assassination was confined to permanent marker scrawl in bathroom stalls. But now, thanks to sites like the student-run CollegeACB.com (ACB=Anonymous Confession Board), which can get hundreds of thousands of hits on a good day, TIME reports that anonymous slander is going viral on campus. Even the most elite universities — normally the land of the politically correct — have been struggling with the problem of anonymous gossip sites and their very un-PC posts, which an Amherst dean likens to 'the worst of junior high.' If he thinks things are bad now, wait until the kids start getting creative with Google Sidewiki."
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Anonymous coward posted (Score:3, Funny)
Welcome to the internet, please enjoy your stay or GTFO promptly.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
It's funny how this particular thread is attracting all the Anonymous Cowards
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Let's say you are a nerd. You get some verbal slaps from a few dorks, and learn to get along with it in the end. That's life, it can'te be all roses and clear sky for everyone. But while you can grudgingly accept to be called names by a few guys, you would absolutely hate to hear the same broadcasted on the school's radio. Furthermore, you would hate it more to see such aggressive texts written on a website which everyone visits and makes fun of you.
Remember American Pie and the shame of hav
Re:Anonymous coward posted (Score:4, Insightful)
For weaker people, this might lead to psychological problems and ultimately suicide
So what's your solution? Stifle free speech so that a bunch of pussies will feel better about themselves, and not get their poor feelings hurt? I don't want to see anyone commit suicide over something they read online, but the best solution to this "problem" certainly doesn't involve censorship.
Yes, I was depressed for most of my life up until a few years back when I finally was able to cure myself of it. I know what it's like to be teased and picked on and to hate life. If someone is getting picked on all the time, then the real solution is for him to "man up" and grow a spine and thicker skin, instead of trying to neuter and gag everyone else.
Parent
Re:Anonymous coward posted (Score:5, Informative)
Sounds like natural selection to me.
Oh wait, that wasn't the PC thing to say. I'm sorry, should I report to the Museum of Tolerance or skip that step and go straight to Tolerance Camp?
It doesn't sound like natural selection to you if the poor kid who hangs himself in a closet is yours.
:) People tried to bully me, but my sheer irony managed to turn their rather limited attempts against me, so most gave up. Exceptions were the (in)famous sports class guys, who used their punches where their wits were powerless. Classic story, yeah I know. Yes I managed to be fine. However, I might have more empathy in me for those who get bullied.
...And let me tell you another real-life story:
I know a couple who have a kid. Back when she was pregnanti woth this kid, she was involved in a car accident and the kid had some birth defects. Now I don't know exactly what happend or how the condition is called (it's not a nice thing to avidly ask them for details), but he can't walk properly, when talking he mumbles horribly (I don't understand a word he's saying, but his parents can; they learned the hard way) and will most likely never go out by himself, meet a girl and/or procreate. He can write but the letters look like crap and are very hard to decipher. He's 12 now.
Back when he was 8, his parents attempted to send him to a public school, and for about a week or two all was fine; but one day teachers found him tucked behind a garbage container; turns out some of his colleagues mocked him, prodded him, called him names and so on. Bullied him, in a word. And they finally dumped him behind that garbage container. He refused to eat or drink, his parents had to take him to the hospital, sedate him, feed him intravenously and pray he won't die. He eventually got better. By that I mean back to what is normal for him.
So what?, would you say. Natural Selection, he'd better be off dead. Okay, but he paints. He's a bloody ARTIST, my friend. He makes art like you or I can't, and he's good at it. I've seen him do it, it's amazing. Now he's no Picasso or anything and at some points his paintings are hard to understand (my guess is he sees the world very differently from us), but it's amazing nevertheless. His parents are not interested in showing his work, they're just glad this activity makes him feel better, but when I enter their house, the walls are literally covered in his drawings. So learn this, man: not all people who can't behave like us are bound to go silently in the night.
Now teens are living by their own standards. You're successful as a teen if you got the dough, the looks and the (sometimes chemically enhanced) sexual stamina. Whoever doesn't fit the pattern likely becomes a victim, no matter the size of his brain. When I was younger, I was respected during the IT classes/exams (because I could help all others) and at parties because I know a gazillion of jokes and I'm pretty good as an amateur stand-up comedian. That's it. I wasn't welcome to join the gang when they went to see movies or in clubs. I ain't good looking, don't have the dough and even if I'm okay in bed, I had to match first two prerequisites to be able to prove the third
When I was a kid, I had a classmate who was poor. I mean, dirt-poor. he only had 3 pairs of pants, and other kids noticed. One day, they threw some god damned substance on his pants (oily stuff, can't recall what it was) and the pants were ruined. He was so ashamed that later that evening his parents caught him attempting to commit suicide (he fucking hanged himself on the outside of the window). He managed to survive and later he earned a sponsored scholarship and became a doctor in the ER in a local hospital. He saved dozens of lifes. Hell, if you have a car crash near that town, he'd be the only one able to help you (small town, one hospital) and save your life. But hey, maybe you're right, maybe he oughta be dead...
You know, it's not always about the "rig
Parent
Re:Anonymous coward posted (Score:5, Insightful)
I do agree there are worse things in life than bullying. But let's stick to the world seen from a teenager's perspective. They don't cope with an assholde boss. They will later, but not now. They also don't cope with aggressive drivers, not till they turn 16 (in US) or 18 or even 21 (in some countries). And here we don't talk about Facebook, we talk about dedicated school websites/areas, where the message target is your entire class/school, not a few friends you can block.
Now about that good-bye letter you mentioned. The Suicide rate because of such things amongst teens is surprisingly high. And whereas you can't help getting dumped sometimes, you can (or should be able to) do something against bullying and targeted verbal/physical aggression in schools. And by action I don't mean throw the offender in jail, but counsel the offender and at the same time silently remove the offending entry/post from the website. As for the seriousness of the offense and its implications, let me put an analogy together...
Let's say there's a corporate forum which all your co-workers access. And it's anonymous and unmoderated. Now I, covered by anonimity, go there and write "Shakrai has a small dick, finishes in 2 minutes and can't satisfy a woman ", you wouldn't like it. You could just go ahead and ignore my entry and even the forum altogether, but your co-workers won't. They will show each other this entry and some (most, from my experience) would assume it's true. And all of a sudden, you are going to be the lame hero of the company, the guy everyone makes fun of. People will cease to call you, you will feel isolated and so on; and when the poor soul who hasn't read my entry comes and sits next to you or talks to you, there's always going to be someone who will gladly (and viciously) point the uninformed guy to my entry. Gossip goes fast, gossip goes far. And before you know it, a large part of your life (that would be work environment) would shred to tiny pieces.
Now, you are entitled to sue my ass and get a large amount of money from my misdemeanor, but surprise!, you don't have anyone to sue, because Internet anonymity protects me, and the webmaster doesn't give a shit about your protests (forum outsourced to Vanuatu Islands, good luck reaching someone). OK, maybe you would find a solution, because as an adult you are resourceful, but what can you do as a 14-17 year old kid?
Finally, you say there are lots of help channels available. That's reactive thinking. You wait for the problem to happen and then attempt to fix it. How about being proactive for a change? Identify offenders, counsel THEM, remove the offending post. If cyber-bullies know that their entries are moderated and won't see the daylight if they are aggressive, they will cease doing it.
How about freedom of speech? Freedom of speech applies to identifiable people, to those who are ready to take the heat if they are proven as liars. Not to the so-called "anonymous cowards" (no pun intended) who hide behind the iron curtain of Internet to harm others, willingly or not. Therefore, if I could be identified in the above mentioned imaginary forum, then yes, that forum can be un-moderated and I would be held responsible for my actions.
Parent
When I read the title.. (Score:3, Funny)
Herpes (Score:4, Funny)
Soulskill has herpes!
So, it's... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:So, it's... (Score:4, Funny)
Jerry Springer for the interwebs
Parent
Re:So, it's... (Score:5, Insightful)
"4chan for Harvard?"
Lulzworthy!
I favor anything that "helps" the public view graduates of such schools with less respect.
Since the internet rarely forgets, it will be a hoot when some of this comes back to bite the high and mighty as they rise up the political ladder.
Parent
Re:So, it's... (Score:5, Interesting)
Kids do stupid things. That's aout as newsworthy as the sun rising I the East. Within a few years, stupid comments you made way back when will be recognized as such.
But while there is real slander going on, that's the extreme edge of a real sea-change going on. Sites like RateYourProfessor.com have fundamentally changed how studets and learning institutions interract! My wife, daughter, and two oldest sons are all attending CSUs and they all rely on RateYourProfessor HEAVILY to decide what classes to take. They find that it's quite accurate, too!
This is something that strikes at the very heart of (IMHO) antiquated conncepts like tenure, which often works to cement boring, mediocre teachers into irrevokable positions in schools, draining the will of otherwise good students, and making education more expensive and less valuable to all others involved.
This is a very good thing!
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
No. It's the Valley of the Squinting Windows. Technology has brought us right back to the ignorant, vindictive and intolerant society we started out from. The more things change....
futile struggle (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:futile struggle (Score:4, Insightful)
Maybe instead stop being so bloody touchy about stupid things stupid people write? What is it we've told our children for ages - "stop caring, don't give it attention"?
That's a nice theory, but it's a really hard thing for people, especially immature people, to do.
Teenagers in particular are extremely sensitive to criticism, and often respond poorly. Spend some time watching the interactions of a group of, say, 14 year-old girls on Facebook. Vicious doesn't begin to describe it. People in general are willing to say things behind the shield of their computer that they would never say face to face. Add to that some low self-esteem and peer approval dependency and you have a recipe for a whole lot of heartache. Kids have always been mean to one another, and always will, but online interaction raises it to a new level.
Kids in college are a little more mature and self-confident, but only a little. And there's a lot of variability, so you can expect these online fora to be filled with the spew of the least mature, the least secure and the most vicious.
It will indeed be interesting to see how society evolves in response. Hopefully we'll all develop a thicker skin and learn to be more forgiving of all sorts of errors. That would be a good solution, and would actually make the world a better place than it used to be. Another possibility is that the next generation is going to grow up almost universally traumatized and defensive.
Parent
Re:futile struggle (Score:4, Insightful)
Kids have always been mean to one another, and always will, but online interaction raises it to a new level.
I don't particularly think it "raises the level", but I'm sure that it (the online-ness) makes things much more visible to adults - which is of course when they become horrible. (Mind, I for one think this is horrible in general but in particular cases I'm of course not horrified by things of which I'm unaware). Parents, guardians, schools, etc. must combat this problem exactly the same way as before - by taking time with their children, individually, not by spying or censoring public forums.
Parent
Re:futile struggle (Score:4, Insightful)
Adults do it too, the only reason it becomes "horrible" when kids do it is because kids tend to be less discrete so it become EMBARRASSING. Otherwise I don't think most adults would care.
Parent
Re:futile struggle (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:futile struggle (Score:4, Informative)
You spend time watching 14 year old girls, on facebook?
I watch my 14 year-old daughter's interactions with her friends.
Parent
Re:futile struggle (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Another possibility is that the next generation is going to grow up almost universally traumatized and defensive.
I sure hope so! Then those with any degree of emotional fortitude will have all the greater advantage because of their willingness to take more social "risks". Success and greatness will come to those who risk, even more so than before because of all the opportunities not being taken advantage of by the cowards. A greater separation (in terms of control of the direction of energy of society) will develop between those who face life boldly and those who whimper at a cross glance, and greater advancements wil
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
"Really, it's futile in the long term to try and ban "harassment comments" or whatever you want to call it, unless you want to really compromise free speech and become worse than China."
Sure, because making infantile comments about other people is just as important as being able to speak freely about your government's policies.
Re:futile struggle (Score:4, Insightful)
Sure, because making infantile comments about other people is just as important as being able to speak freely about your government's policies.
The entire point of free speech and all human rights is that they can't be categorized as more or less important. Once you start making them relative to each other, you enter the realm of what is often called 'the tyranny of the majority' whereas if the majority decides that your right is unimportant, or unacceptable, it vanishes.
This being said, libel is illegal and if you are a victim of it, you are well within your right to take your case to court. I think society would work better if we maintained that libelous statements must be false though.
Parent
Re:futile struggle (Score:4, Insightful)
I understand the slippery slope of these issues, but at the same time it's silly to pretend there aren't differences of degree even if as a practical matter we have to treat them the same in law.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
That would be an e-swirly.
Re: (Score:3)
I can see both sides of the argument. But I'd say it's a safe bet that most of the people who say "just ignore it" have never been seriously bullied and terrorised in their lives before.
Since noone posted this yet... (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm so going to whore karma with this obligatory Penny-Arcade reference [penny-arcade.com].
Mod redundant at will.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
and then Halo 2 came out and showed how much worse it is when everyone has voice chat.
Though fucking noogies. (Score:3, Interesting)
Freedom of speech wears-out only if you don’t use it.
— Maurice Maréchal, founder of the satirical french weekly “Le Canard Enchaîné [wikipedia.org]“.
Real reason for their objection? (Score:4, Insightful)
Dilemma (Score:5, Insightful)
It's a dilemma inherent in our choices of technologies.
If we allow anonymity, people will
(a) Use it for good: whistleblowing on evildoers;
(b) Use it for evil: anonymously libelling the innocent;
If we prohibit anonymity, people will
(a) Use it for good: standing by their assertions;
(b) Use it for evil: track every word you say, stifling whistleblowers and witnesses.
There is no right answer. There are only choices between problems.
Untouchable? (Score:5, Insightful)
Owner Peter Frank, a sophomore at Wesleyan University... runs ACB out of his dorm room. The 19-year-old English major... "I'm untouchable," he says.
You don't sound untouchable Pete, you just sound stupid. Especially after letting time.com publish your full name, picture, the city you live in, AND the school you attend. I am thinking that the next year is going to be very educational for you once your site slanders a couple of people to the point that they lose control and decide to take a trip to Middletown with your picture in hand.
Looks like a non-issue to me. (Score:5, Informative)
So the supposed big gossip site Juicy Campus folded in February after existing for a whole year and a half. CollegeACB is some site run by an English Major out of his dorm room. If you actually GO to the site, you'll see a lot of old, outdated posts mostly people asking for gossip and very few actually providing gossip. So this is supposed to be the big problem Colleges are worried about?
This is just another lazy journalist creating a story out of nothing.
Re:PC, huh? (Score:5, Insightful)
Or perhaps people still don't like other people behaving like asses? We were raised (well most of us) to treat each other with at least civility. It grates when you read or see something like that. That's the whole idea of peer pressure.
I wish they'd do away with anonymous for trivial/unimportant information posts. It serves no purpose other than to bring out the juvenile in everyone.
Parent
Re:PC, huh? (Score:5, Funny)
Hey, I'm an oversensitive pussy, and I find your post extremely offensive and wrong.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I wish they'd do away with anonymous for trivial/unimportant information posts. It serves no purpose other than to bring out the juvenile in everyone.
And who is going to determine that a post is trivial / unimportant ?
The author. If you're not anonymous, you're less likely to post trivial crap like "Davee is teh gaye!!11!!" It becomes self censorship, mostly because you want to keep posting, and don't want to get banned.
The flip side is that anonymous lets people post useful stuff that they shouldn't for other reasons. While you may (or may not) find the position distasteful, our form of government is composed of everybody, including drunks, racists, gays, junkies, and whoever else. Today it would be political suicid
Re:PC, huh? (Score:5, Insightful)
The name "political correctness" implies the two bad attributes of the phenomenon: That it's political and that it claims to be correct (without justification and in a field with many differing perspectives). Politeness often also has these attributes, but the realization that a new behavior is in some way similar to an old behavior which one didn't question should not compel anyone to agree with the new behavior in spite of better knowledge. PC is a limitation on discussion and therefore a limitation on thinking, which is unacceptable. So fuck you.
Parent
No you are wrong. (Score:5, Insightful)
Complaints about PC are generally not about any version of right or wrong. They are complaints about being required to use, or avoid, language, which it is claimed might offend someone.
I don't care what language you use and do not want to restrict your use of any particular words. You might care what language I use and seek to impose restrictions. Those two approaches are not equivalents and PC falls into the latter.
Just because two people disagree, it does not mean that both views are equal in some way.
Parent
Re:PC, huh? (Score:5, Insightful)
Bill Cosby said some things about his community a while ago that was very un-PC, but he felt it needed to be said. White people have said the same things before (as well as less prominent Blacks) but were then called "racist" or "bigots", then ignored and in the meantime, the problems in the community continued. Of course, all of those problems were always blamed on others and never on the community - ex. not getting education because it was a "white" thing and then being angry and pissed when the only jobs they can get are janitors which then lead to more rancor and beliefs about being oppressed and what not.
And it's not only the African American community it's across all racial and religious lines . Although, it's just that it's PC to say anything about white males.
Parent
Re:PC, huh? (Score:5, Insightful)
Political correctness is nothing but a bunch of random rules of communication setup as a system of traps for people who dare speak their mind. It doesn't make any sense except to derail communication from its intended purpose.
When you get white Americans calling European nationals who happen to be black 'African Americans' it's gone too far.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:PC, huh? (Score:4, Funny)
Haha, and sorry nothing citeable here because I'm going to post anonymously for this but I have a black African friend who punched an American who referred to him as "African American" [in UK btw]. What a day that was, sigh..
Parent
Re:PC, huh? (Score:5, Informative)
I don't have a primary source for this because it was supposedly on TV, but apparently there was a conversation between an American reporter and black British athlete Kriss Akabusi that went something like this:
"So, Kriss, what does this mean to you as an African-American?"
"I'm not American, I'm British"
"Yes, but as a British African-American ..."
"I'm not African. I'm not American. I'm British."
Parent
Re:PC, huh? (Score:4, Informative)
Political correctness is just an impossible game of cat-and-mouse using weird terms until the terms become popular and you have to use newer ones, making reading older texts on subjects like psychological disabilities impossible. When you get streaks of renaming like mongolism -> Down syndrome -> trisomy 21 and stupid -> mentally retarded -> mentally challenged -> differently abled (or whatever the current one is) communicating becomes a nightmare.
Parent
Re:PC, huh? (Score:4, Funny)
When you get white Americans calling European nationals who happen to be black 'African Americans' it's gone too far.
Exemplified by the brilliant satire of Sacha Baron Cohen, in Brüno:
Brüno: There's a lot of African Americans in Africa!
African-American Lady: No! There's a lot of Africans in Africa!
Brüno: That's racist!
Parent
Re:PC, huh? (Score:5, Insightful)
Political Correctness is just a new version of Politeness
Political Correctness is not polite. In fact, it is the opposite. PC speak at its core is about deception, and as such is one of the greatest forms of insult to any listener that can read between the lines.
Parent
Re:PC, huh? (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
Uh, no, not really (Score:5, Interesting)
Have you been encased in a cement bunker for 20 years? "PC" is not just about avoiding overt insults or, say, the fact that we have condom ads on television now with a guy getting his junk buffed in a wind tunnel. When recent polls in the polls in the UK indicate that 80% of the population is tired of political correctness, you have a real problem, not a generation gap.
When people complain about PC, they mean the sort that causes valid or even scientific discussion from even taking place because some hypersensitive miseryshit somewhere might be offended.
It's the sort of PC that chastises a kid in a Halloween pirate costume for wearing an eye patch because it's offensive to the disabled. Oops, I mean differently-abled! Sorry! Don't sue me for causing emotional distress, please! It's curious they never seem to ask an actual other-abled person. No, wait, "other" sounds exclusionary doesn't it? Argh! The low seas of PC be treacherous, me mateys!
Political correctness also seems to be covering hypersensitivity to safety, so you have it applied to cases where trapeze artists are required to wear hard hats or the Army is told to make their training courses safer to the point of, well, pointlessness. That seems odd to me, but the street finds its own uses for words, much like hacker is used in place of cracker by the general population. Language evolves- deal with it.
Parent
Re:PC, huh? (Score:4, Insightful)
"Politically correct" bullshit makes it a crime for anyone to speak out against queer sumbitches who want to get married, and take over the churches, schools, military, or whatever else offends them. Opposition to homosexuality becomes a "hate crime".
Don't ever confuse "polite" and "politically correct".
Polite pretends that the queer isn't a cocksucker. Politically correct demands approval of cocksuckers.
As an incorrigible cocksucking queer sumbitch myself, I would like to take this opportunity to offer to you my sincerest gratitude for your honesty. My partner and I have been denied housing by "polite" people here in Texas who are always be forced to go far out of their way to find some valid excuse to support their obviously bogus decision. Everyone in the room knows the truth, but for some reason, the mores of politeness demand that no one verbally acknowledge it.
Fuck that. It's much better when people just come out and say what they believe. I'm old enough and wise enough now that I truly don't give a shit what people think of me, but they should at least have the courage not to hide their feelings behind a veneer of "politeness." I can respect them for that.
Parent
Re:PC, huh? (Score:4, Insightful)
I can understand that. Maybe someone will mod you up. ;^)
I've been denied service a few times in my life. Lame excuses like, "We just ran out of beer" is bullshit. If you were really out of beer, all the rest of the customers would have been on their way OUT as I walked IN. Just tell me that you don't want no sailors hanging around your bar, no white people hanging around your Bar-B-Que, or that you don't like Americans in general.
There's a lot to be said for honesty.
Parent