So says Helen A.S. Popkin in an article on MSNBC
Did you hear about the woman who was denied a teaching degree because of a questionable picture of her in a costume and posted on a MySpace page with what seemed to be at the time, a rather amusing caption!
The powers that be at the university she was supposed to get her teaching degree from thought the photo was "unprofessional" and "potentially offensive" because it seems to promote underage drinking and she's unfit to be in the teaching profession because of that! (read the link below). Thus she was denied her degree which she is suing for as well as claiming other damages!
Ms. Popkin believes that many people's lives will be interrupted or lost because of having a MySpace site. She also said a good friend of hers lost a well-paying and prominent job because of something the friend said in a post on someone else's MySpace page!
She goes on to say - [quote]"you can’t erase your Internet imprints with skin grafts. Or anything. Your innocent MySpace hijinx never go away. For the rest of your natural life, they remain just a few clicks away, waiting to be discovered, misinterpreted, and abused."[quote]
So should we be afraid, be very afraid, about what we say on our blogs and on online sites anywhere, even in jest? Ms. Popkin seems to think so!
The fact is we are talking about our personal lives, almost all of the time. There are strangers reading yes, but there are times when other family members as well as someone you know will find your page or blog and read it. So, if you don't want to stir a hornet's nest, be very careful what you say because remember your 'conversation' is not private, it's out there for anyone to read!
So if you're one of those people whose jobs or careers requires you to abstain, or to be a prude or to be of an unquestionable past or present, and you're posting Girls (or Boys) Gone Wild photos, and blogging about it; or you're kissing and telling; or even sharing your sexual fantasies...tongue in cheek or not...and you don't want some people to know...don't do it!
Think about it before you press that Enter key because there's no going back once it hits the blog site! And yes, I know there's an edit button and you can hide articles you've changed your mind about, but there are people out there at all hours who are reading everything! You do know how quickly your article posts don't you? Even with JU's wonkiness at times, it only takes one or two people to read what you shouldn't have posted!
So are ethics involved here, should they be involved when it comes to blogging? We're talking about people's lives or careers being ruined after all.
There are blog sites and websites with policies and rules, just like JoeUser. JU does provide a section to mark articles that are adult in nature not for a certain age group to read, and that makes it alright to post adult-oriented discussions and topics and I see nothing wrong with that!
We are also talking about a site like MySpace which is frequented by kids, some as young as 13 (am I right there?) who are exposed to a lot of images and words! They themselves go on and post their own pictures and say things that are no doubt suggestive and questionable.
Ms. Popkin suggests that it's not so much the people using MySpace who are abusing it by posting what they do, but rather the institutions and other 'big brother' types that are trying to stampede on the rights of the owners of the website in trying to force them to do things that are against their own policies, like the attorney generals did recently when they wanted them to hand over the names of any registered sex offenders who had a MySpace site! They, the site's owners refused to do so since it was against their policies. I'm not sure if I agree with them not giving up the names because we're talking about sex offenders here who knowingly go on a site knowingly frequented by teens!
The MySpace people eventually dropped all the offenders and that's a good thing! There definitely needs to be ethics involved here don't you think? Policies that the site owners have and which should be enforced. There are situations that will and do come up that will be questionable and which I'm sure will be regretted by someone at some point in their lives!
Link