Twitter Fosters Teen Debates

by Nick Mourtoupalas ‘13

Sherwood’s Twitter community is fueled by its most audacious students, constantly booming with fresh opinions, jokes and rumors. Some students who use and observe Twitter feel that its more adventurous users can make some disrespectful comments that shouldn’t be taken too seriously.

Many of these comments are made in political discussions between students, especially since the recent presidential election. Sophomore Ankur Kayastha, who regularly tweets his political views, stated that “Sherwood students belittle others indirectly through subtweets. They’ll use pronouns instead of actual names, but often times it’s quite obvious who they’re talking about.”

Politics is just one of the many topics about which students make bold statements. One of the more popular personas to take on is that of a comedian, certainly using a much less stern attitude toward their words. Senior Christian Carswell, “known for posting eye-catching things,” said, “I like to tell a lot of jokes and make people laugh. Either people really like it or strongly disagree, but for me it’s all just a big joke. I’m never trying to hurt anybody’s feelings.”

Carswell also feels religion is a medium that students attempt to characterize themselves through on Twitter. “When you see someone post a biblical verse and you know they don’t go to church every Sunday, you see that they want people to view them as religious, holy or involved in society,” said Carswell. “Social networking is fun for that purpose: to see which people think they know what they’re saying.”

These identities that teens try to live by have gone as far as causing users like junior Dean Emerson to quit using Twitter altogether. “Part of the reason I deleted my Twitter is because everybody tries to be someone else. At times I’d fall into these wannabe categories of philosopher or comedian, and I didn’t want people to think that was the real me,” said Emerson. Ironically, there is a parody account about Emerson.

“Twitter causes so much unnecessary drama. I’ll see people just going at it with each other. In reality, if you want to cause drama, which, frankly, you shouldn’t, do it to their face, not behind a computer screen,” said Emerson in regard to the commentators who use the Internet as a protected and sheltered medium for sounding their opinions.

“Generally, I see a lot of posts by teens that seem rather narcissistic, selfish or angry,” added Emerson. “People tend to get offended over the smallest things on Twitter. If people didn’t take everything so seriously, it would actually be pretty funny. Twitter isn’t necessarily a bad thing; it’s just misused by the people who use it.”