Why do we tell PNMs to clean up their Facebook?
 

After reading yet another thread telling a PNM why she needs to clean up her online presence, I thought... Why do we do this?

If the PNM is someone who needs to hide who she truly is in order to have a favorable outcome during recruitment, why do we want to extend an invitation to her?

If chapters really don't care if the woman parties hard, sleeps around, does drugs, etc. then why remove those facts from her online profile? It is simply truth in advertising.

If chapters don't want a woman who parties hard, sleeps around, does drugs, etc. then it is to our benefit to have that information available so we know who we are really dealing with.

I'm probably in the minority, but I agree with you. Facebook can be valuable to both PNMs and to sorority members.

I think the problem is that FB may not be very representative. For example, I think every FB picture of me in the last year involves me drinking. Does that mean I do nothing but drink? No, it means that I am so busy that I hardly ever go out, so all the picture-taking occasions in my life are weddings, big parties, etc.

If you do one stupid thing, and a friend snaps a photo and tags you, I don't think that should disqualify you from membership.

Also, there are things that may be okay to the collegians that would have the 85-year-old rush advisor clutching her pearls.

One problem is that a Facebook presence may not be "who she truly is" at all. Some people -- gasp, including recent high school grads -- may have deliberately made themselves look wilder / skankier than they are, in the belief that they'll seem more mature, attractive, whatever.

Of course, others may have toned their lives down a lot for Facebook.

One never knows just from Facebook, right?

Some of the "clean it up" advice is a way of saying "give yourself a break, for purposes of a first impression."

I was putting together a slideshow for a charitable organization this month and I noticed this phenomenon. Nearly every photo that was contributed (and there were over 80) was of the members drinking. We looked like horrible lushes! It took a major effort to find pictures without alcohol in them to try to balance out the presentation so it wasn't embarrassing :o

Swerving, but how is this different from asking someone to "put his/her best foot forward" for a job interview?

This is my thought as well. "Clean up your facebook" is good advice for life, including and excluding GLO recruitment/membership.

This.

This

My guess is that if a rush advisor has reached 85, she's seen things that would make most of the current sisters blush. :)

This

indeed she has!

Ditto.

You're also over 21. Most PNMs are not.

Because you are only an employee of your company for 8 hours a day. You are a sorority member 24/7.

Perhaps we'd have fewer issues with members posting stupid things on Facebook, allowing themselves to have pics taken of them while holding drinks when they are under 21, etc. if we only gave bids to young women who were smart enough to keep their social media posts clean in the first place. It's called good judgment. As the parent of an 11th grader and a 9th grader, I can say that very few of the young people's Facebook pages that I see have anything inappropriate on them. Those are the young people I'd want to be joining our GLOs.

I also think it's a similar principle to why we should not judge sororities by their websites. A website cannot accurately represent a sisterhood, nor can a facebook page represent a woman. Both can be easily manipulated to look one way or another and therefore aren't reliable means of evaluation.

To this end, I don't know if I'd want to be friends with some of my current sisters if I judged them solely on their facebooks-- but of course now they are some of my best friends and future bridesmaids! To put it succinctly-- facebook is a two dimensional representation of a three dimensional person.

Not exactly. Even though it's 9:30 PM, I'm still *technically* an employee of my company.