Letter to the editor:
Social media has swept the world over the past 10 years. Everyone from 10-year-olds to senior citizens are participating on social websites such as Facebook and Twitter. As a college student, social media is a great way to meet people on campus, find out what fun things are going on and to stay in contact with fellow students. However, if you are an athlete at Ohio State, you might have a different feeling about social media altogether. An article printed in The Lantern in March titled “Ohio State set to enact social media policy for Twitter, Facebook” spoke of how OSU will try to implement regulations on social media. While these regulations are more focused on university accounts, it brings up the question of how much regulation will be done over student-athletes’ social media accounts. I am in the sports industry major at OSU and have many student-athletes in my classes. According to some of my classmates, their social media accounts like Facebook and Twitter are monitored and they have rules on things they can or cannot say. This in turn has led many student-athletes to not use social media at all. I believe the university should allow students the freedom to be adults and make adult decisions and face the consequences of negative actions. While regulations can help monitor OSU’s image to the rest of the world, it takes away from the learning experience of being an adult and being accountable for your actions. I believe this to be a direct violation of the First Amendment.
Tommy Householder
Fourth-year in sports industry
[email protected]
