How concerned should we be about who we follow on social media?

OneFortyDotSix

Reported by the Daily Wire:

https://www.dailywire.com/news/35303/lawsuit-student-denied-college-following-alex-amanda-prestigiacomo?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_content=062316-news&utm_campaign=benshapiro

I'm wondering to what extent something similar is possible in law school admissions?

Brazil020511

I would love to say" this would never happen in law school admission process."
The truth is that it can happen though I cannot assess how likely it is. Though, it is known that law schools will use every tool available to them including social media to make a decision about an applicant. My advice "don't think twice" and make all social media accounts private, private, private.

Leah M B

Agreed with @Brazil020511. It's something that I think the next generation of students needs to be so much more aware of than when I was applying for colleges. Anything you put out on the internet is public information. Admissions people have been known to go through your social media. There was the infamous case a year or two ago with the deposited Harvard undergrad students being kicked out because of activity in a private Facebook group. Granted, they were passing around racist memes. That is never advisable. It's extremely unusual, to my knowledge, that simply a follow would negatively affect someone. But, it's not a bad idea to either wipe your social media or make it private. From what I've heard, political tweets and the like are ok. But anything extreme, or any partying, things that could give the air of bad judgement, should be removed. I'm a relatively private person so I don't intend to make my socials private. I mostly just talk about baseball and my dog lol. Nothing too controversial. But the industry I work in also has a watchful eye, so I've long stayed away from anything too polarizing.

Bottom line: if you're worried, take everything private or scrub it.

eRetaker

LinkedIn is definitely gonna be monitored so make sure it matches your resume.

OneFortyDotSix

thanks everyone for your responses. I suppose making everything private is the safest bet for some

Leah M B

Not to start any unnecessarily heated political talk but, since as future lawyers we should all have an interest in vetting sources, this story is a little tenuous. A quick google search only brought up a few mentions of this exclusively in conservative media. To keep the student anonymous, all the identifying information has been omitted. That's fair, but makes the legitimacy of this story a little shaky.

I only bring this up to say, I'm not sure how accurate this story is. It sounds a bit off to me, and there is limited info available on it. From what I've read, admissions folks wouldn't judge a student based on follows like this, but what content the student is posting. Since this is all very anonymous, there's not much to back it up and it contradicts general knowledge of what would be a problem with admissions. So, I wouldn't put too much stock in this specific story.

OneFortyDotSix

I think it depends on how much stock we put in Bradley Shear (alleged attorney) and his account of events. He's appeared publicly and interviewed on ESPN to discuss related topics by the looks of it.

Leah M B

Yeah I'm just kinda going with.... unverified. Haha. Hard to make much of a judgement without even knowing what school it is, if there were any extenuating circumstances (were they really denied solely on that one follow?). I also think since so many law students are politically minded and want to pursue careers in policy or politics, law schools would be a little more open about this type of thing.

OneFortyDotSix

True. I definitely hope that's the case for law schools/law school applicants.

On a related note - Daily Wire, in case you weren't aware, is run by Ben Shapiro. He graduated Harvard Law I think at age 22 and practiced for a few years before he started producing content and giving talks. I recommend him to people interested in hearing perspectives they may not necessarily agree with, but that are being delivered by someone who's a practiced attorney and skilled logician.

Wait what

Curious do you guys think not having LinkedIn or Facebook looks bad?

ad_coelum

@OneFortyDotSix said:
True. I definitely hope that's the case for law schools/law school applicants.

On a related note - Daily Wire, in case you weren't aware, is run by Ben Shapiro. He graduated Harvard Law I think at age 22 and practiced for a few years before he started producing content and giving talks. I recommend him to people interested in hearing perspectives they may not necessarily agree with, but are being delivered by someone who's a practiced attorney and skilled logician.

I had the privilege of meeting/hearing from Ben Shapiro this past summer at an event -- remarkable and highly intelligent individual!

_oshun1_

@"Wait what" said:
Curious do you guys think not having LinkedIn or Facebook looks bad?

Hope not bc I deleted my FB and never got a LinkedIn bc I don’t want people to google my name and know exactly where I work.

I’m not sure how much weight is put on likes but I liked a bunch of silly things in high school and I don’t know if currently being apart of the Bernie Sanders’ Dank Meme stash group would make me seem like a mature individual so I deleted. Social media isn’t fun when you know you’re being watched like this.

Leah M B

@"Wait what" Nah. Not having it is fine. Just don’t want any content posted that could come back to haunt you.

cqas190517

The Daily Wire is a conservative rag that publishes “articles” that are extremely biased, and focus solely on manufacturing conservative outrage about a given topic, and their coverage is skewed to only include material that promotes a confirmation bias for readers. It’s a source I wouldn’t deem as credible at all.

https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/the-daily-wire/

OneFortyDotSix

@"surfy surf" said:
Social media isn’t fun when you know you’re being watched like this.

Seconded. It's not so much "being watched" that troubles me (we should assume our statements and actions on the internet and elsewhere are publicly known). What's concerning is the possibility that individuals could lose opportunities as the result of something as innocuous as "liking" a controversial viewpoint or following a polarizing speaker. Who's to say what's extreme or controversial? There are probably things we can all agree are not okay to say, but especially as the lines between what's okay and isn't keep moving, applying such a distinction as a selective measure becomes far more tenuous and questionable.

OneFortyDotSix

@cqas190517 said:
The Daily Wire is a conservative rag that publishes “articles” that are extremely biased, and focus solely on manufacturing conservative outrage about a given topic, and their coverage is skewed to only include material that promotes a confirmation bias for readers. It’s a source I wouldn’t deem as credible at all.

https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/the-daily-wire/

Not disagreeing that they have a rightward bias, but looks like that website gave CNN the exact same score for leftward bias.

cqas190517

No one said anything about CNN at all though? Ben Shapiro is the king of the straw man fallacy. It’s actually really disappointing that he’s using his Harvard education to divide and deceive Americans into throwing metaphorical stones at each other, rather than addressing real issues. He’s very good at setting up fake arguments and knocking them down, quickly, while citing some very narrow and cherry picked statistics he found that don’t portray the entire scope of the argument. I’m surprised that with all of our logical reasoning material you don’t see that.

OneFortyDotSix

I was rhetorically addressing the empirical support you provided for your claim that The Daily Wire is "conservative rag". If we're using mediabiasfactcheck.com as the metric, would you conclude that CNN is "left wing rag"? Would you also proceed to reject any claims made by that network?

While off the topic of this thread I think it would be more productive if we cited and addressed specific examples/support for our claims. Your claim is that Ben Shapiro engages in straw-man and other fallacies. Summarizing and attacking a stance may seem like a straw man to some, while others may see it as a concise/precise debate style. Without specifics the conclusions that either of us draw may well just be conjecture.

10000019

I'm wondering to what extent something similar is possible in law school admissions?

I talked to one person who use to work in admissions at a T14 and she made it clear how little time they have to evaluate an applicant. I doubt that if they're rushed on viewing important things like PS that they are willing to look through an applicants like list.

I speculate, with no good reason, that unless you've given them a reason to look you up on social media they aren't going to.

As liberal as law schools are, I don't think they discriminate against conservative applicants. I don't know any T14 schools that lack a group for conservative students.

Side note:
I find it ironic that a conservative media source is essentially applauding suing people who discriminate (I use that word in the literal sense; not as a pejorative).

OneFortyDotSix

@10000019 said:

I'm wondering to what extent something similar is possible in law school admissions?

I talked to one person who use to work in admissions at a T14 and she made it clear how little time they have to evaluate an applicant. I doubt that if they're rushed on viewing important things like PS that they are willing to look through an applicants like list.

I speculate, with no good reason, that unless you've given them a reason to look you up on social media they aren't going to.

As liberal as law schools are, I don't think they discriminate against conservative applicants. I don't know any T14 schools that lack a group for conservative students.

very helpful to hear the firsthand account from someone in admissions. thanks!

samantha.ashley92

I'll just say that one thing I do every once in a while is essentially stalk myself. I use the Facebook feature of viewing my page as it would appear to the public, and look through EVERYTHING-- likes, pictures, quotes, my timeline, etc.

LawSkewlProbs

You can set your account so that people can't see who your friends are.