By Cynthia Lee

Facebook and other social sites have become a new portal of communication for the young and old. The status updates can be seen by both the people you are closest to and to people you don’t know. We can see who is where, what they’re doing, how they are feeling, who offends who. We may not see all of this, but we can shrug it off because it didn’t offend or may have even made us laugh.

I’m not one who tries to offend people but I found myself in that situation, because one of my posts was taken out of context. I’d rather not repeat the comment. Let’s just say that I failed to think about those that wouldn’t get my humor.

I should know more than anyone that words have power. That’s why I want to become a writer! In that moment I was wearing a ‘dunce’ hat. We get so wrapped up in our own feelings and don’t think about how it may affect someone else. Arguments escalate into fights because of how we choose our words or how we choose not to care what it is we are saying.

Also, having ancestors forced through a tragedy like The Long Walk, the forced march of the Navajo from the current location of the Four Corners area to eastern New Mexico, and being constantly tormented throughout the years, who am I or who are we to set back other minorities, other people with a different sexuality, when our ancestors struggled and survived in hope that we, their children could live in a world without having to be discriminated against.

We are starting to see ads against bullying over the internet and text messages. Some may see others as being ‘too sensitive’ but that isn’t the case, just think about what you are saying. Employers are able to check the employee’s Facebook, Twitter, Myspace pages because as we know now, they say a lot about who a person is when their not on the job. We are intelligent people, we should talk and act like it. We need to realize when we are going too far there are boundaries even when it comes to, “Sticks and stones may break my bones but words can never hurt me.”

Cynthia Lee is a student at the University of New Mexico-Gallup