The one example I felt was poorly argued was about the teacher fired for a posted picture on MySpace. My view of that situation is that the teacher knows that what she posts on MySpace is extremely visible. Anyone can access that picture and other information she chooses to share. Therefore she is responsible for what ever is on her account. It seemed in this example that she was fired for something she should not have been fired for. I do not think this issue lies in privacy and surveillance of the Internet, but rather in the problems of the school who let her go. The school was not in the wrong for seeing that photo, and MySpace was not in the wrong for displaying the photo. Basically it was a bad situation for the teacher and she was unlucky that someone thought the picture was bad enough to fire her. But to repeat again, I do not think it has anything to do with the issues we covered in class.
I hope that people in class do not judge people for their views and arguments. I am a firm believer that disputing can be healthy. Just because you disagree with everything I said in class today does not mean I think you are a bad person, or weird or anything. It just means we disagree. Feel free to comment, because I like to hear your opinions whether you agree or disagree with anything I post.
2 comments:
Hi
I think you are right, the argument about assumptions is a really good argument and one that we not thought of before, at least not by me.
What I thought was really strange is however that with the teacher example nobody came up with the hypothesis: What if somebody else had posted that picture of her? The whole discussion was bassed on the fact that she had put the picture up there herslef, but what if somebody else did? Would it still be her fault that the picture led to her being fired?
By
Merel van Helden
PS I am not offended by people commenting on my arguments.
You're right about the teacher point. It wasn't the best point for any side to debate over. The problem does lie with the school over the Halloweenie costume. I agree with you that neither the school or Myspace were wrong in seeing/posting that photo. The school seems to be actively seeking such a photo. Again, we don't know circumstances so the school could have possibily been trying to find any excuse or incriminating photo to fire her with.
Myspace does a "friends only" privacy setting, so the entire profile is off-limits unless you add someone.
I'd be a lot more uncomfortable if Myspace is selling the information on people. Ie; schools pay myspace to let them search through these private profiles, messages, etc.
She was unlucky in getting fired. You're right, it wasn't the best example for anyone to use.
I also agree with you on disagreement. Discourse is healthy. It gets boring to talk to people that always nod their head to you. It's a good challenge to beliefs, to wonder why you stand by the position that you do. It's good for people. Again, disputes are healthy as long as they only attack the arguement, and not the person. That's just poor taste.
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