Harvard revokes acceptances for at least 10 students for vile Facebook memes

Originally published at: http://boingboing.net/2017/06/05/harvard-revokes-acceptances-fo.html

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"That’s going in your permanent record!"
also
The Internet never forgets.

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Are parents not talking with their kids about this stuff these days? Making sure that by age 8 or 10, they have been briefed on how things they say and do on the Internet can make their lives a living hell, forever? Thank goodness my own early social networks were local BBSes, USENet, Majordomo mailing lists, and MUDs/MUCKs/MUSEs/etc.

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Sorry, but the students did exercise their right to free speech. But that doesn’t protect you when someone takes away their soapbox that you have been standing on. But hey now, they can make a new group called Rejected Harvard Teens or something until Facebook gets sick of their shit and tells them to piss off as well, though that would never happen.

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Yep. if someone faces consequences for having said something, it doesn’t mean they were not, nor are not, allowed to speak.

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Hmmm maybe you could incorporate it into the birds and bees talk.

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“Free speech” does not apply here - no one was arrested or fined by the government, or lost government benefits or their drivers license. Also, this is hilarious.

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And briefed on how to be a compassionate, respectful human beings, too.

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Well at least they still got an education. I bet lots of people wished they learned this lesson earlier in life when the consequences could be more easily absorbed.

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Look at the bright side; Harvard just gave them an incredibly valuable life lesson and they didn’t even have to pay tuition.

Plus at least 10 spots just opened up for applicants who presumably didn’t share racist memes. Win-win.

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But Harvard was their safety school!

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The expectation bein’ that what ya hear ya don’t repeat. ‘Cause if ya do repeat what was told to ya in confidence then ya will never be trusted not ta do it again. This bein’ the social contract we all do abide by.

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They were on Facebook. There is no privacy on Facebook. None. Nada.

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That’s an ongoing process, but never underestimate the still-developing mind of a pre-teen, teen, or college kid. Some assumption that they will do idiotic things that defy belief is useful.

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The official Facebook group for Harvard’s class of 2021 says they have the right to revoke a student’s acceptance if “an admitted student engages in behavior that brings into question his or her honesty, maturity, or moral character.”

The validity of these revocations of admission seems pretty cut and dried to me. The vile crap on that “private” Facebook group definitely “brings into question” all three of those things about the participants – their honesty, their maturity, and their moral character.

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Yes, we talk with them ALL THE TIME about shit like this. But hormones/lack of frontal lobe development/wanting to seem cool/rebellion/et. al. will sometimes make even the most sensible of teens do incredibly stupid things. (it’s true, there are some kids out there who are simply jerks – after all, Trump was a teen at some point – but the majority of kids are decent most of the time).

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It’s legally OK to fire you for no reason at all, unless the boss was stupid enough to provably do it for reasons contravening the EEO requirements, like age, sex, ethnicity, but then again it feels like violating EEO goes along nicely with being stupid. It feels unfair, but hey, you’ve got no recourse here.

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That part should be over when you are getting ready for college.

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Certainly someone failed at teaching the compassion/human thing. Guess nobody told mom and dad that those things might count as much as a gpa.

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[quote=“Peter_Brulls, post:21, topic:102183, full:true”]

That part should be over when you are getting ready for college.
[/quote]Some studies say it’s as late as 25.

So, in the one sense, yeah, it’s probably true that people should be waiting longer to go to college. But there’s much thinking that people’s brains aren’t fully developed by the time they are 17 or 18.

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