For those of you that don't know, Yik Yak is a social media app with the virtues of being both location-based and anonymous. As could be expected, this allows users to digress into grumbling, insults and various flavors of bigotry. There is no damage to reputation, leaving the app without the check common to most other forms of social media. Only a thin popularity-based voting system attempts to filter the nastiness of humanity. All we get is raw honesty, and sometimes that stings.

My school, George Fox University, recently made known their stance on the local Yik Yak community. They felt that many of the posts made this semester fell far outside the environment they envision for the campus and that some university response was necessary. At a widely attended chapel service, they critiqued the student body, claiming that what is posted on the app does not exemplify the ideal of a loving, Christian campus. We were told to encourage our friends not to share the hateful things that currently characterize Yik Yak here at GFU.

The thought here is, of course, absolutely commendable. The present situation potentially leads to cyberbullying and supports activities outside our lifestyle contract. The problem is that this approach, if anything, is only going to exacerbate the issue.

We are calling the denizens of Yik Yak unloving and asking them to move away from that place. The thing is, Yakkers already know what they are. The reason why the more controversial posters exist is because they want to live the life of the dark and edgy. This group is a subdivision of the school community that already knows and embraces their off-color identity, so when we criticize their particular dynamic, we do not convince them to change their ways. We only alienate them.

Whenever a hostile message is projected through social media, the problem lies not with the platform but within the people themselves. Victimization is one part of the issue, but we must not forget to care about the people who would say such things in the first place. Censorship manifested through peer pressure only obscures the root of the situation.

I believe that with Yik Yak, and with all anonymous social media, the best way to change the content is to encourage even more people to engage it, without naming a desired environment. As long as the overall campus culture is more wholesome than the average yakker, the yaks will slowly improve.

What I mean by this is that I believe there is hope for our stereotypical poster of hate. Being in that position isn't fun. Yik Yak and similar outlets provide temporarily cathartic opportunities to vent, but there are many easier, happier existences. These people don't necessarily see this better life. If they did, who knows, they might change. That's what we all need to start posting. We need to stop telling them to be better and start showing a better way.