In the dingier recesses of our minds, there are parts of us that we probably wouldn’t want everyone around us to see. You know, those embarrassing little foolish thoughts or momentary guilty obsessions and temptations that bounce around in our ever active brains.
Unfortunately, in our bright new shiny world those drooling and slavering sides of us, no matter how short-lived, aren’t always kept at bay.
Case in point, one Carly McKinney.
McKinney is a 23-year-old 10th-grade math teacher who was recently cornered by an Aurora, Colo., television news show called 9Wants to Know. And what its newscasters wanted to know about was her Twitter page. They were clued into the fact that the account was full of half-naked photos of the young teacher, along with lots of McKinney’s ruminations about everything from smoking weed to flirtatious moments with high school boys. “I live a double life. Teacher by day, stoner/raver/rager by night,” read one of her @crunk_bear tweets. She made it known in other posts that she was grading papers while high and had a stash of marijuana in her car on school property.
When nailed by 9News, McKinney pooh-poohed the whole thing, saying that it was only a parody Twitter account that she and a friend had concocted. She wasn’t even aware, she said, of what provocative posts that friend may have posted as of late. The Twitter account was quickly pulled down.
Account closed, case closed, right? Not quite.
Turns out that, ironically, one of her most revealing photos was retweeted by a rap artist to promote his newest single. Then reporters at NBC’s Today show, using some readily available online search programs, found vestiges of the account including dozens of marijuana-praising tweets and a number of “racy, semi-nude photos.” The young teacher was suspended pending a school review.
I’m not here to beat up Ms. McKinney—we all know that her choices weren’t particularly appropriate. But her tale does point out something important about social media that some may not fully grasp. Mainly that all that external processing, tweet-as-you-go stuff can let out your own Mr. or Ms. Hyde for all to see. When we spill out every little thought that might come to mind, there’s no time for filtering. No chance for your sensible side to say, “Whoa! Hold on there, Cupcake. That’s stupid.”
For that matter, there’s no real chance to even change your mind. Once your spontaneous thoughts are out there—in Facebook form, blog or 140-character twit-in-the-moment tweet—it’s out there forever. As Tustin Amole, director of communications for McKinney’s Cherry Creek School District told Today. “I don’t think they understand, if you put something on the Internet, and you regret sharing it with your friends, you can take it down, but it’s still out there. You’ve given up ownership of what you’ve said.”
But those regretful comments and pictures do still own you. And unlike the fictional id-driven Mr. Hyde, they never revert to an earlier less-rabid or ribald state. They just grunt, drool and toke that bong on and on. Perhaps that’s a valuable extracurricular lesson that a certain young teacher and the rest of us can gain wisdom from.
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