Poking around for mud

Anyone who has doubts about the prevalence of Facebook can now sleep soundly this weekend. The online networking community Web site has reached outside the simple college realm and, for better or worse, is now knocking on the doors of potential employers and Indiana congressional races.\nRecent newspaper stories have highlighted the expansive power of Facebook, and they all seem to be revolving around the same theme: college students doing things college students do, and looking like idiots in the process.\nRachel Kearney, director of IU career services and alumni affairs, recently told the University of Wisconsin's Badger Herald that employers are using Facebook to check up on student employees.\nIn the example she provided for the Herald, she said a government employer who hired interns from IU used current and former interns to access Facebook profiles.\n"Upon finding distasteful information and pictures of a former intern and current IU student, the employer 'demanded' its name and the student's internship status be removed from the Facebook profile," the Herald reported. The student, Kearney said, complied with the request.\nAdditionally, a recent controversy -- if you can even call it a "controversy" -- involving 19-year-old IU freshman Andrea Ellsworth has spread into her father's race for Indiana's 8th district congressional seat. In her Facebook profile, there were pictures of Ellsworth drinking underage, which, to the utter surprise of no one, is illegal. It's also something that happens every day in a university setting, so to a group of college students, you can understand why we're not particularly outraged that she did it. \nBut you can't be so naïve to think other people don't view it with such passivity. And you have to wonder, with the Internet growing larger and larger, why anyone would voluntarily make an ass out of himself or herself in such a public manner.\nIf you're under 21, why would you post a picture of yourself drinking? If you're looking for a job, why would you post a picture of yourself smoking pot? Facebook isn't your dorm or your bedroom apartment; when you play on Facebook, you're practically prancing around in public. \nThe utility of Facebook is becoming increasingly more apparent. In the last year, the IU Police Department has used Facebook to track down a criminal suspect. This year's executive tickets running for the IU Student Association both have Facebook groups students can join. On the dirty political flip side, "distasteful information" on Facebook is the same ol' swung mud, just from a different technological medium. \nThe fact is, you're an adult now. We're certainly not claiming to hold the moral high ground, but certain kinds of fun bring with them certain kinds of risks and responsibilities. How you wish to portray yourself on Facebook -- which has essentially become your unofficial autobiography -- is up to no one but you. And the bed you make is the one you get to sleep in.