Riley Mushkin, Reporter
@RMushkinCourant
Yet another app that allows users to anonymously post photos with captions on a public newsfeed has swept through the school. Similar to Yik Yak, an app that stirred up social issues last year, Streetchat allows students to abuse the anonymity of the posts to target their peers. Students scroll through the feed at home and in school and witness the student-on-student attacks. Whether they giggle at humorous posts or nervously laugh at posts that seem almost too cruel to be true, this app has caught the attention of not only the student body, but also the faculty and administration.
According to the application’s website, Streetchat is “a live photoboard for schools and colleges.” To others, Streetchat is a vehicle for unfiltered student opinions, serving as a distraction to student users. “It allows people on Streetchat to use the app in not the best manner and a lot of the postings have a negative connotation to them,” senior Owen Kennelly said. “Also, I think that it creates a lot of focus on the app itself, and people aren’t as engaged in the more important issues in school.”
The app’s design is simple: you sign up, you connect with your school, and you can immediately see the posts from your fellow students. Some see this feasibility as a cause of the abuse of the app. “It’s like any other social media. You can use it, you can abuse it and it is easy to start trouble with,” freshman Charlie Hane said.
While Charlie feels the app can be used to cause trouble, he does not believe this trouble has a major negative impact. “Nowadays news is ever-changing, so even if you don’t like a certain post, it will be forgotten in a week,” he said. “The only negative effect I personally can see is with those who let it affect them.”
Contrarily, school psychologist Sandra Warkentin believes many students are not as comfortable brushing the hateful posts off their backs. “Streetchat targeted adults and students, and I think it was very disconcerting for teachers to find out that people were taking their pictures without their permission and posting them with negative comments,” she said.
Including the teachers in the posts is what troubled the administration. “It’s uncomfortable and it makes you not trust the students in your room,” Ms. Warkentin said.
Ms. Warkentin also added that those who Streetchat users target have difficulty handling the nature of the posts. “The very people being targeted are the very people that cannot handle it,” she said. “They are fragile or vulnerable in the school.”
Students also recognize the potentially harmful effects Streetchat has on others. “I personally think it’s wrong for some students to think the posts are funny, but in reality it could be hurting others if it is about them,” sophomore Ellery Baran said. “Overall, I think it’s a bad app because people use it to ridicule others anonymously like they did on Yik Yak.”
Sophomore Casey Gallup believes the pictures on Streetchat add an additional layer to the gossip not included on Yik Yak. “At first the app was really funny; there were things that were not really directed towards anybody,” she said. “But then it just went downhill, and everyone started posting bad things about people; it was just another Yik Yak but with pictures.”
The ability to post pictures in addition to comments creates another difference between Streetchat and Yik Yak. “On Streetchat, people were pointing out mostly physical issues, and then they would attack people for things they have done, while Yik Yak was more about social issues,” Casey said.
Ms. Warkentin believes students need to understand the severity of the content of the posts and their impact on students. “Some people try to rationalize it by saying ‘Oh, it was just five or six or seven people that were writing the comments,’” she said. “But if you know it’s wrong, then say something. That’s the only way these things stop.”
Although people are making efforts to end the bullying on Streetchat, that does not mean that online bullying will end. “After Streetchat dies out, it will be something new that will come up,” Ms. Warkentin said. “So from Yik Yak to Streetchat; it’ll be something new for students to latch on to.”
