Why I miss Smith

I was reading this blog post at the NYT today.

Since it's only available to TimesSelect subscribers, I'll summarize.

It's a stream of consciousness rambling that starts out talking about the romantic comedy film class she took at Dartmouth last quarter. She moves on to analyzing how romance has changed in the age of facebook. Apparently, it's likely that no guys signed up to take the romantic comedy class because if they put that class on their facebook profiles, they'd look gay. Right, because everyone lists classes on their facebook profiles. She then starts talking about the possible long term consequences of people getting bashed on websites when they're young and then having those hurtful remarks show up years later on their "google resumes."

Here's a quote:

For example, Dartmouth students have recently had to deal with the construction of the Web site boredatbaker.com (which has cousins at the other Ivies, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, New York University and Stanford). Intended as a community tool, this Web site has mutated into a forum for the anonymous publication of very personal attacks on students who must try their best not to be emotionally affected when people publicly question their sexuality, comment on their physical appearance and speculate about their value as humans.

I just don't see anyone at Smith ever getting offended at someone questioning her sexuality. Flattered, maybe, but mostly just indifferent. Why can't the rest of the world catch up?

I mostly liked the post. Social networking sites and "google resumes," to borrow her term, are a popular topic to report on at the moment, and while she didn't say anything new, it was nice to actually hear the opinions of someone who uses the sites she talks about. Also, the writer seems smart and articulate, but self conscious, and not always cognizant of when she needs to edit down her own work. I can definitely relate to that.