Jay T Ponders Social Media

The title for this article comes from a little nugget posted on Active Rain by Terry Haugen, it in no way reflects my thoughts or opinion.

In fact, as one who spent 28 years living in Texas, is a product (in part) of a Texas public education, who graduated from a Texas university, and considers Texas his adopted home state, I find a statement like “No wonder people from Texas sound so ill-informed!” patently offensive.

Hell, as a human being, Texan or not, I find stereotyping and asinine statements patently offensive.

But this isn’t the first time some “writer” has offended me, nor will it be the last. That’s not what has compelled me to write this post.

In case it gets deleted later, here is the post in its entirety:

The Texas school baord [sic] which is comprised of a 15 member board, incuding [sic] 10 republicans, has decided to included MORE references to christianity [sic], and fewer mentions of civil rights leaders like Abraham Lincoln and George Washington.

On a 7-6 vote, the board added "causes and key organizations and individuals, " including Phyllis Schafly, the contract ON America, the ever present and always wingnut Heritage Foundation, the NRA, and the Moral Majority, to the students curriculum.

They also voted against requiring teachers to cover Ted Kennedy, Supreme Court Justice Sotomaor [sic], leading Hispanic civil rights groupls [sic] LULAC and MALDF.  Fortunately Thurgood Marshall, the country’s first Afriacan [sic]-American Supreme Court justice, will be taught.  Whew!  Thats [sic] a relief!

In addition, Sen. Joseph McCarthy will of course be reverred [sic], because of his communist witch hunts in the 50’s.

Oh and here is the best one, students will be required in U.S. History classes to distinguish between legal and illegal immigration. (considering, a good number of students attending schools in TX were born of illegally immigrated parents, this should be an outstanding history lesson.)

Way to go Texas!  If you can’t rewrite history, well then just present the issues you want to present to your students.  No wonder people from Texas sound so ill-informed!

While the irony of a post ostensibly about the Texas School Board being riddled with spelling and grammatical errors does not escape me, that’s not why I’m writing this post either.

And Terry Haugen is certainly entitled to her opinion. But as a student of blogging and social media, there are certain things beyond the obvious that disturb me about Ms. Haugen’s post. . .

Active Rain is a “Real Estate Network, a free social network and marketing platform for real estate professionals. This network helps agents to create business relationships both within the industry and with the consumer.” This straight from their about page.

What, pray tell, does Terry Haugen’s post have to do with real estate, real estate marketing, or creating business relationships within the industry and with the consumer?

This isn’t Ms. Haugen’s first foray into political discourse on Active Rain. Far from it. Here are just a few sample titles from her recent posts on AR. All from January of this year:

• Military Weapons Maker Inscribes Bible Passages On Weapons!
• Yet Another Wingnut Pastor Blames Haitian’s For The Earthquake!
• Peta Video Reveals Ringling Brothers Circus Animal Cruelty
• Prop 8 Court Case. In Defense of Same Sex Marriage
• Its Really NONE Of Their Business! 39 Congressmen Work To Block Same Sex Marriage in D.C.
• Legal Abortion Is A Fundamental Right!

It goes on and on. You get the point.

While I clearly don’t share political views with Ms. Haugen, what I really don’t understand is her use of the ActiveRain network blogging platform to delve into her politics. It’s a social network for real estate professionals. It is designed to help people “create business relationships both within the industry and with the consumer”.

Clearly, at least inside my head, the types of articles Ms. Haugen writes do not belong on the platform she has chosen. It’s hard to imagine that these posts help create business relationships. Given her often caustic responses to people that challenge her in comments to her posts, one has to wonder what any consumer would think, regardless of their political leaning.

Hey, this is the United States. I’m a HUGE fan of the First Amendment. If you want to express your political opinions, knock yourself out. But why not take it to your own blog? Go to wordpress.com and get yourself online in 3 minutes at zero cost. Blogger is free and open too. Rant away on those platforms.

But to corrupt a real estate network with these rants seems senseless. If Terry Haugen wants to drive away consumers that might utilize her staging services, that’s her prerogative. But she shares Active Rain with 171,000 other real estate professionals and what she writes there can affect the public perception of all members.

Terry claims that she doesn’t care what people think, that she’s not posting to “win friends” but she is “here to inform” (source).

Yet when I asked her to cite her sources, she didn’t. I was told to Google it. When I asked if parts of her post were fact or opinion, she didn’t answer (in fact, less than 30 minutes after I posed those questions, she elected to close comments on the post, saying she felt “the discourse is getting out of hand”.)

I would challenge that she isn’t informing anyone of any thing. She’s tossing in her opinion of news stories she refuses to cite, and when challenged, she either deletes the comment or closes the thread to further discussion.

Fine, do that to your heart’s content on your own platform, not one you share with 171,000 of your fellow professionals. Lord knows John Q. Public has a lousy enough opinion of real estate professionals, we don’t need Terry Haugen’s help reinforcing those opinions.

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