2013’s trend in collegiate social media seems to be anonymized over-sharing, and our campus has not been immune to it. First a Facebook page for compliments in the MU community blew up, then one for insults did, then one for confessions, all while the Twitter accounts “Mizzou Makeouts,” “Mizzou Shackers,” “Mizzou Boobs” and others have gained popularity.
This week, “Mizzou Secret Admirers” has become all the rage, with several hundred posts and several thousand likes since it was created on March 26. The page is dedicated to declaring sentiments of love, admiration and often, lust. Posts are made by a lone moderator, who receives and filters submissions from an anonymous form.
Some of the posts are funny, some are heartwarming, some are dirty and some are creepy. Therein lies a problem, though — which of those adjectives fit which posts can be completely different to each person who reads the page, and what may seem harmless or cute to the moderator may be unnerving, harassing or menacing to the subject of the post. The admirers page differs from, say, “MU Compliments” because submissions are completely anonymous; the danger of true anonymity is that people may be willing to say things they wouldn’t otherwise say, about people they wouldn’t otherwise talk about, if they knew the moderator would see their name.
More importantly, it’s anonymous for the sender, who has a secure way to express feelings and desires, but it’s _not_ anonymous for the target. Their friends, family, coworkers, neighbors, acquaintances, professors or employers, not to mention several thousand strangers, may well see their name attached to graphic, vulgar descriptions of lust. Even if you request the post be taken down, not only has it already been seen by countless people, chances are someone took a screenshot and someone copy-pasted it elsewhere.
The nature of social media as a public platform markedly alters all interactions, and this is no different. Pages like “Mizzou Secret Admirers” aren’t filtered through individual relationships and experiences and the dignity of discretion. If you’re approached in person and propositioned for something you’re not interested in, you can politely decline and keep it private. With this page, everyone else might see the proposition before you do, and their opinion of you could be influenced in a different way.
Although the moderator of “Mizzou Secret Admirers” has done a good job so far at removing posts promptly when asked and not posting anything overtly harassing, there is simply no way to discern what is harmless admiration or pranking from serious, unwanted, scary sentiments and expressions of intent. We’d suggest the moderator recruit others to help monitor the submissions and consider letting the objects of posts approve them before being posted for thousands to see. Regardless, there is a massive amount of responsibility in this moderator’s hands, just as with the moderators of “Mizzou Makeouts,” “Mizzou Shackers” and others, and all of them must be extremely careful with every single submission.
If you are considering submitting something to “Mizzou Secret Admirers” or a similar page, we urge you to think it through. Be mindful of what you’re saying, who you are saying it to, who else will be reading it and what both your object and the audience will think of it. Would you want several thousand others reading about and picturing the object of your post? Consider whether you’d yell it at the person across Speakers Circle — does it sound creepy or uncalled for then?
People will always use technology and anonymity as a crutch to bridge their insecurities and inhibitions — perhaps you remember passing notes and declarations of love to your crush in middle school — but it doesn’t always have to be in such a public manner. After all, you could always work up the courage to send them a private message on Facebook or just talk to them in person if you really think they’d like what you have to say. That avoids embarrassing them publicly and might even end up favorably for you.
All of us need to think about and discuss the standards we set for ourselves and for each other online. We find it bizarre that our culture champions this kind of over-sharing. Why is it normal to talk about someone publicly in such a vulgar and overt manner, where our identity is sheltered but theirs is out for all to see? When we see two people kissing in a public space, such as a party or a bar, why is our reflex often to pull out our phones and take a picture in hopes of getting it on “Mizzou Makeouts?” Why is there this need to share every scene, every urge, every embarrassing moment with everyone, to be kept forever on the Internet? It’s a disturbing trend, and we hope students at MU and people everywhere learn to be more mindful of their actions — and those actions’ consequences — online.
