Clarissa Blanco, Blog #9: What is Mine

        
            "Privacy" is more of a joke than a real word nowadays. Absolutely nothing is private, not even what you do in the "privacy" of your own bathroom (in college atleast). Oftentimes we find ourselves running away from the reality that is the public private world. Social networks like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram etc. don't make it any easier on us to have our own lives without the criticisms and attention of the public eye. I know what you're thinking, "Well then don't engage in social media!". My friends, that is so much easier said than done. In our modern times, everyone is so connected to each other  by these means, that when you don't have at least one form of social media it is almost like you're out of the loop. Nine times out of 10 (through the statistics of my own thoughts and opinion) information, gossip, and the latest news travels the web much more quickly than it does by word of mouth or written word. Who wants to be the only only one in a group of people that simply does not know what the heck is going on?

         Yet, its important to remember that we indulge in these networks at the risk of being sucked into the social world and giving up our own lives figuratively. Though no man is an island, in this century no man has the option of being one. I'd have to say that the people who are most susceptible to the criticism and ridicule of the public eye are celebrities. It's almost as though choosing to accept fame is choosing to accept everyone into your once "personal" life. Celebrity lives are no longer their own, but become the lives of those peering into them with the intent to make their business the business of the world. This is why what is mine is minimal compared to what is of the world. 

          

          Yes there are many rules and restrictions regarding one's privacy in the business world, but privacy is no longer a sacred thing. For example, this link : http://www.ohio.com/news/akron-general-fires-employees-for-patient-privacy-violations-in-hospital-shooting-case-1.341300, takes you to an article written in October 2012, where multiple employees of a hospital were terminated for having looked into a patients file after she was murdered while in the hospital. You would think that if a patient was involved in a murder, it would be okay to look at their files- but according to this article her privacy was more important. Isn't it ironic that a dead woman's privacy is valued much more greatly than a celebrity's such as Kourtney Kardashians in this article, http://hiphollywood.com/2013/03/baby-daddy-drama-male-model-claims-to-be-the-real-father-of-kourtney-kardashians-son/, where she is accused of infidelity? Columns like these tear people's lives apart all the time, but privacy, much like alot of things nowadays, is defined so loosely depending on who it involves.