For much of the past year, there has been a Twitter page, not affiliated with Madison College, that has surfaced. This page posts photos, mostly unflattering, and proceeds to make inflammatory remarks about the subjects of the photos. It yields tweets and photos from some students at the college and sends them back out on the page. This page should be removed, but the big thing is it is a violation of people’s rights.

On the page, there is a photo of two people innocently talking outside and a caption that states, “I don’t get these people.” There is another one that has a photo of a woman dressed in colorful pants and there is a caption that states, “So many colors, so little cares. This is never acceptable. Lady, knock it the f— off. #fashionpolice #matc. There is another one of a photo of a poetry reading sign outside of Student Life with a caption of #matc #wtf.

There are several more, including a picture of man with a caption that says, “go home emo boy” and another photo with a caption referring to a person as a “freak.”

The thing to remember to whoever is doing this, this isn’t high school. This is a world filled with adults. You are deliberately harassing people online. You may want to claim 1st Amendment rights with free speech, but that only applies if you aren’t doing things like screaming “FIRE!” without provocation or harassing people in a public place. When you start to name call and publish photos online about people’s clothing just because it is not the color of the pants you and I might wear, you step into uncharted waters that the 1st Amendment does not tread into.

You are attempting to trash entities on campus for no reason when they are trying to give students the opportunity to express themselves, advance themselves in life and advance their learning, and you are doing it without provocation. And no, a person falling asleep with their shirt slightly slipped up or a person’s colorful, but odd pants are not enough to claim provocation.

A college is meant for students, including the people who are running this page to advance themselves in life whether that is to a job or another school for further education. It is not meant to trash on people socially and publicly through a social media page.