[Air-l] Facebook protests

[Ledbetter, Andrew Michael]

>I am not really impressed with these protests at all, these are 
>(mostly?) undergrads we are talking about.
 
I'm a bit uncomfortable dismissing the protesters' concerns merely because of their age and social position---yet, I feel like I see a tendency to do so when discussing this issue (an interesting statement about social cognition itself). In comparison, a number of years ago (sometime in the early or mid 90s, I think), the state of Oregon enabled easier access to individual Department of Motor Vehicles records. The result was general public anger and concern about privacy, and the law was soon changed. If older adults can protest perceived violations of privacy, should not young adults and teenagers have a right to do so as well and have their concerns given a fair hearing?
 
It raises intriguing questions: How would we think about this protest if Facebook was a site made up of middle-aged adults? Would the protest even occur in that case? Would the news media cover it differently if it did?
 
Andrew M. Ledbetter
Doctoral Candidate and Graduate Teaching Assistant
Department of Communication Studies
University of Kansas