Negativity At Critical Mass On Facebook

Web Editor

Adam Ragusa (1L)

Last month, the editors of this newspaper brought to the attention of the community the fact that the official student Facebook groups for each graduating class were managed by U of T Law’s admissions office. They pointed to a chilling effect on student expression as a primary reason why the groups should be made available to students only. In my opinion, they were right. Who would dare express their true opinion while Professor Alarie looked on? We needed a sounding board. Now that we’re free from the chilling effect, it’s starting to look like we all need to chill. Okay, that was a bad play on words. Please keep reading anyway.

With the advent of new student-run Facebook groups, we have revealed ourselves to be a very negative group. We seem to go from zero to outrage at the drop of a hat. We have a snarky response to just about everything. I am just as guilty as anyone of helping stoke the fire, opting to join in on long comment threads that pile on the criticism, exchanging the internal reputation of our school for likes. Now imagine a prospective student looking on and finding out what current students were posting. Is it any wonder the admissions office felt they had to be in control of what incoming years saw?

Once we could not be honest for fear of the administration, but now we can’t be honest for fear of each other. A mob mentality has emerged that is difficult to oppose. It’s entirely possible that any positive opinion is being withdrawn for fear of rejection by our classmates. No one wants to be seen as the person sticking up for the man. If we continue to treat these Facebook groups like dumping grounds for insults, they will never be the forums of discussion we claimed to need. Take a step and back and think about what we’re doing, and the effects this kind of discourse can have. We cannot individually abide while we collectively decide that our school is a joke.

We are clever, we are vocal, and we know how things should be. These are the qualities that have helped us get to where we are today, and they are more powerful if we use them properly. Yes, we can flesh out the issues amongst ourselves and it is of great value to bring these things to everyone’s attention, but at some point it’s time to stop commiserating.

There are many helpful channels of communication available to us. Instead of writing the 50th comment that slings mud, write an article, a Follies skit, or an email. If you can offer particular insight, talk to the SLS directly or visit the Dean. Use the channels that get you to the people who need to know. Perhaps most importantly as far as this article is concerned, if you have something good to say on the Facebook group, please say it. Somebody has to be happy around here.

Maybe this new culture of complaint is a natural reaction to having been suppressed for so long. And not everything is negative—groundhogs and basketball championships lighten the mood, and posts about opportunities interrupt the constant dissatisfaction. Let’s commit to making sure we don’t sink the conversation so low it starts to harm our community. The Faculty of Law has its warts, but at the end of the day it’s what we’re centered around. We don’t need to lie down and accept the mistakes, but we don’t need to shit all over everything either. Let’s find the balance, and let’s have some dialogue.

Categories:
Tags:

Advertisement

Begin typing your search above and press return to search. Press Esc to cancel.