Off The Cuff

Campus Gossip Sites: Good Or Bad?

Posted by: From Arkansas in Are You Kidding Me?, Shame of America on Mar 20 2008

Welcome back!

Until I heard about them this morning, I really had no opinion about these websites at all. That is, not until I heard about them. What are they? There is a fairly well known site that allows college students to name a person and put in awful things about them, then be anonymous. The effect of that is that some student will find their name on that site, find horrible things said about them..true or false, by the way. How can someone defend against that?

Everyone that has not lived in a cave for the last 50 or so years is well aware of how cruel people are getting, especially young students. It is at an epidemic proportions and it affects how young people perceive themselves. This could easily put them into a depression, which is what the author has in mind…damage of some type, all because of hatred or in the name of “fun”. IF, by any stretch, the student that was attacked, because it IS an attack, finds out who did it, they will just say “it’s a joke”. Some joke. When someone’s character is attacked, that is the heart of the person, the one part of them that means the most. And that, of course, is why they do it in the first place.

But what can be done about these sites? After all, there have been suicides associated with the sites. Some people want it to go to the Supreme Court. Some want to sue the site. Some want to let it ride because of the constitutional right to have free speech. Pardon me here, but when is free speech just a way to trash a person’s reputation? IS that free speech or just a warped way to get their evil words on the net where they never go away? What kind of sick minds think these things up?

Individually, if a person is raised right, they should get the clue that gossip is wrong, no matter how nicely it gets packaged. And those websites are the package that’s totally wrong. In fact, the sites encourage this sort of behavior saying that it’s good for the students to have that place to go and express themselves. I would LOVE to express myself about those evil little jerks that put their maligning gossip up on the net in the first place. And worse, it is totally anonymous. You do not have to give your name while you give the other person’s name. This is akin to putting someone’s name up on the bathroom wall in the men’s room. Hateful.

And again, what can we do to stop it? Not much. If you take it to the Supreme Court, assuming they would hear the case in the first place, you might not like the ruling. If they were to rule in favor of the sites of that kind being shut down, which I wish would happen but not through the Supreme Court, then the president is set so that if I wanted to talk about a candidate, for instance, I could no longer do so without breaking the law.

By the way, we are now living in the land of the Supreme Court and other courts that are now MAKING the laws rather than upholding them. Not good. That body has no business doing that but they are simply because someone starts a law and it goes to the Court to see if it works. The opinion given decides whether it actually is a law or not. Not good.

Can we stop those websites with lawsuits? Maybe, but if you do, there will be another one to take it’s place as soon as it’s shut down because the same guy is going to have his say, no matter what. He is making it clear that his site is going to be there and the opinions of others are gold. He throws out the free speech card abundantly. I do believe he is misusing that but it might be a tad hard to prove.

The best way to fight that dragon is to not go there. I will not give the website url because I believe that this guy needs to have his site die on the vine. The problem is that there are more and more nosy people in the world and that includes so many young college students who want to know who did what to whom last night. Not good.

So, for the young man who started the first college gossip site and for all the other copycat sites, I hand out the SHAME OF AMERICA award today. I am ashamed that they exist in the same country that I do. I believe that they are misusing their supposed rights to further themselves. The fact that there have been suicides because of such sites does not phase them in the least which says to me that they are incredibly hard hearted, blocks of ice for not only their hearts but for their brains as well. They have no morality, no honor, no humanity. God, I pray for them. They need it desperately.

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