But alas, dear reader, there is a seedy underbelly to life at Ammy (don’t mock my beloved pet name!) that I just cannot ignore when these prospectives prod me to admit to them the things I do not like about our favorite College on the Hill. I never lie. I always tell them that although I love Amherst’s small, tight knit, family-like community, there is just no getting around that it has significant drawbacks. Anonymity does not exist here. Everyone is in your damned business. Gossiping is a popular hobby. I say this, by the way, even while being the first person to admit that I am a culpable player in this contemptible demimonde. And if you, too, think that the Amherst College community can sometimes feel claustrophobic and catty, just wait: things are potentially about to get even worse.
This past week, someone identifying him or herself as Oberlin College senior Shibo Xu launched AmherstConfessional.com, a Web site dedicated to acting as an outlet for Amherst students’ innermost secrets, desires and even guilt. Within the past year, Xu has also created analogous sites at Bard College at Simon’s Rock (also known as Simon’s Rock) in the Berkshires, Kalamazoo College in Michigan and Queensland University in Brisbane, Australia following the encouragement of friends attending those schools.
Modeled on other confessional Web sites such as the popular GroupHug.org and PostSecret.com, Amherst Confessional offers a effortless way for Amherstians to anonymously divulge their most private affirmations, ranging from the melancholic to the sexually frustrated. (As an aside, much props to the minimal aesthetic and high usability, Shibo.)
Unlike the oft-controversial Daily Jolt, the Amherst Confessional is much more faceless and concise, and much less conducive to conversation. No need for registration or even discussion; just simply type your most private grievance or admission into the small text box on the left of home page, click “Enter the Booth” and watch your secret become fodder for the rest of Amherst (or anyone who knows a valid Amherst e-mail address—more on that later). But beware, there’s no taking back anything you say. Once you’ve confessed, you’ve confessed. I have yet to find a delete option. Comments are discretional and, so far, brief.
I must say, it is certainly cathartic (yes, I admit, I have made a confession or three ... so much for anonymity) and delightfully pseudo-exhibitionist (kinda like jumping into the deep end, but while still donning your floaties), but will the other shoe eventually drop?
Still, rather like the Jolt, the Confessional does have an element of purely idiotic troller mentality. Out of the roughly 40 confessions that have thus far been posted, one person admitted he or she fornicated with a moose, another person acknowledged that Amherst girls are both “ugly” and “stuck up” and someone else disclosed his or her hatred for “black people, fags and feminists” (to paraphrase, since this post has mysteriously been deleted). I just can’t help but agree with the one poster who declared that “this will soon get very, very ugly.”
Both Oberlin and Simon’s Rock have experienced troubles because of their respective Confessionals. In December 2006, the Oberlin College Dialogue Center hosted a talk called, “Racism and the Oberlin Confessional” to “shine light on the negative consequences of a Web site where anonymous postings can induce a ripple effect across the community,” according to The Oberlin Review. In May 2007, the Simon’s Rock Confessional, which caused a lot of controversy on the school’s 400-person campus, was purportedly shut down after the school’s lawyers contacted its creators. Of course, as of now, I see little difference between what could be so offensive on the Confessional and the blatantly stupid garbage that gets posted on the Jolt each day. But, you never know.
The Confessional, I have concluded in my roughly five days of analysis, is paradoxical. Unlike most other anonymous confessional Web sites, which became all the rage around 2003, there is something dangerously attractive about the knowledge that the chick who “can’t seem to get laid” could be that bespectacled blonde standing next to you in line at Val or the statuesque nerd-girl passing you on your way to Seelye Mudd. Then again, I found myself wanting to get dozens of things off my chest this week that would have worked with Group Hug, but cowered in fear that someone could discover it is me by somehow finding my IP address.
Although this Web site seems easy-as-pie on the surface, there are some important kinks to be worked out. Although persons off-campus are not granted access to the site, simply providing a valid Amherst e-mail address for the moderators will send a confirmation e-mail to the party in question. Because no password is required, I became infuriated and worried when I received a confirmation e-mail a few days ago informing me that someone (AKA my uncle) had tried to access the Confessional using my address. Thankfully, neither he nor any nosy parent could access the site without clicking on the link provided in the confirmation e-mail, but no student could know this unless the student confronted his or her parent. When I tried to inform the moderators about this problem, I found no way to contact them—no e-mail address, no phone number, nothing. This is inappropriate and unprofessional to say the least. I suppose I could post a comment on the Blog portion of the site, but that would be airing my dirty laundry for all to see, now wouldn’t it? But perhaps, that’s the point. So I confess, Amherst, that this Confessional is an addictive crock of shit.
Robyn Bahr is going to save her embarrassing confessions for teh Internetz from now on ... or not.