Monday, February 23, 2009

First Argument

Social networking sites on the internet are damaging to today's teenagers because they are a venue for social humiliation and bullying. Adolescence is an age of precarious emotions and social standards, and what with social networking technology now enabling just about anyone to explicitly post humiliating or malicious information about someone else with a simple click of the mouse, the potential for degradation and "cyberbullying" is practically infinite. On many of these sites, an entire section of the user's profile is dedicated to the user's friends. A list, usually including pictures, presents the names of the user's friends. The user has the option to accept "friend requests," in which one user requests to be considered another user's friends. Once accepted, their name and picture becomes part of the other user's friend list. Normally, becoming a part of another user's list enables the other user to see information and pictures on the other user's profile that they would not have been able to see beforehand. However, a user also has the option to reject such friend requests, and with these sites completely transforming the traditional meaning of "friend" from a person one regards with affection and trust to simply someone on whose link they have clicked, the social implications of a friend request rejection are endless. Issues like self-esteem come to the fore and are intensified by features like the friend request on these sites. Additionally, posting and commenting, which form the foundation of social networking sites, lend themselves to endless possibilities for social bashing and gossip.

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