I can remember Nov. 4, 2008 like it was yesterday. It was my first time getting to vote in a presidential election, and with a fly black guy from the Chi (me too!) running, I was all in and excited. Our first black president? The idea was too monumental for me to grasp before it happened, but all I knew months leading into the election, was that I liked the sound of it! We got up very early (Seriously, it was still dark outside), stood outside in the longest line, and finally got to vote. We even walked out with one of those colorful stickers with the American flag that said, “I voted!” All I had to do now was wait and hope that my vote would actually count. Of course, that evening, we found out that Barack Obama, a former state senator for Illinois and a Leo (whoop, whoop!), would be the 44th President of the United States, and our first black president. Folks were running around my apartment complex in tears, and video from around the world, and even in Kenya, showed that the same elation was being felt all over.

Well, not by everybody.

That night, I noticed that some people I had classes with, shared laughs with and worked with were trying to be party poopers on Facebook and Twitter, and couldn’t take John McCain’s loss gracefully. They continued throughout the night to bulls**t about how they were packing up and moving to Canada, and to this day, none of them did so, of course. People spoke as if it would be the end of the world as we knew it, with President Obama bringing the downfall of the U.S. and “Change” not happening. As a comeback, some friends of mine, and associates as well, were going on social media and telling folks “DON’T HATE!” and all that jazz. While tensions were high for the rest of the week, especially through social media and in classes with very few people of color, people got over their issues, and President Obama took office.

Almost four years later, it’s an election year again, and I’m already tired of folks. For one, I’m tired of the TV at my job staying on cable news channels where I have to hear the ramblings of Mitt Romney (especially since he doesn’t take a firm stance on anything), but I’m also tired of people making me want to delete them from my lives both through social media and in real life for their antics and very LOUD opinions. A young man who I actually became really cool with in college has gone on weekly rants and even had a profile picture that was an illustration of President Obama sucking the blood out of Lady Liberty’s neck. On any given day, you can find him posting stuff like this:

As President of the United States, Barack Obama’s administration has:

- Degraded the U.S. Constitution
– Weakened America’s defenses with senseless defense cuts
– Encouraged our enemies with weak foreign policy (Iran)
– Irritated our closest allies (Israel)

- Moved us increasingly towards a Socialistic ideology
- Increased entitlement and welfare spending – Drastically increased our budget deficit and National Debt
– Weakened our economy
– Had an unemployment rate of 8%
- Trivialized the war on terror
- Ultimately FAILED to meet any of his promises I cannot understand how anyone in this country can still support this guy.

NOVEMBER 6th WE TAKE OUR COUNTRY BACK!

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I knew I was being sabotaged! Just kidding, but seriously I just said something about this last week, wondering what happened to the days when people would ask if it was OK to put a certain picture of you on Facebook before you went online and saw a notification that someone posted a pic of you looking like whodunnit. A new survey shows  those unflattering pics your Facebook friends tag you in may not just be a matter of differing taste but a conscious choice to throw e-shade. Great, just what we need more women hating on each other.

Photo gifting site MyMemory polled 1,512 women over the age of 18 and found that one-fourth of women admitted to having tagged unflattering photos of their friends on Facebook. Another two-fifths of women fessed up to purposely posting a picture of a friend without makeup. Not wearing makeup doesn’t make someone unattractive so I assume this was done to people who normally have on a full face and would not be pleased to have a photo of them without it floating around on the Internet. What’s worse is when asked to remove an unflattering photo, one-fifth of the women surveyed said they refused. That’s how World Star Hip Hop videos start. Even more ironic is the fact that 65 percent of the women polled said they would be angry if a friend posted a bad photo of them even though they had no problem doing it to someone else.

“To see that so many women deliberately commit ‘photo sabotage’ and upload unflattering pictures of friends is somewhat surprising, particularly when you consider how many said they’d be mad if the same was done to them,” Rebecca Huggler, co-founder of MyMemory, told the Telegraph.

There really isn’t much more to say about this other than haters gone hate, and the term “friends” in relation to people you connect with on Facebook should be used loosely. Unfortunately there isn’t much you can do if someone tries to play you with a busted Facebook photo other than untag yourself but hopefully you don’t have any shady people around you like that—or you’re not one yourself.

Have you ever been a victim of Facebook photo sabotaging? Have you ever posted unflattering pics of friends on purpose?

Brande Victorian is the news and operations editor for madamenoire.com. Follow her on twitter @Be_Vic.

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Today, Damon Young (aka The Champ) made history at Madame Noire with our first live chat. For more than an hour, The Champ answered a gang of questions about love and relationships from our Facebook friends. You know it was a lively discussion. Check out some of the questions and answers below.

D.B: What does it mean when a guy is calling you constantly, wants to hang out all the time (always pays whenever you two go out) but claims he doesn’t want a relationship?? This is happening to me and I decided to fall back since I am looking for a relationship but now he is calling me everyday and wanting to hang out all the time! Confused. Does he just want some of my Jamaican jerk sauce??? LOL.

Damon Young:  It means he wants to do “relationship things” (have sex, companionship, etc) without the commitment of a relationship

Missouri takes a stand on teacher/student relationship outside of the classroom with a new state law that limits teachers contact with students on social networks.

The law births from investigations involving Missouri teachers who lost their licensees because of sexual misconduct, some of which involved exchanging explicit online messages with students.

The law takes effect Aug 28^th and will require local school districts to create written policies that outline “appropriate use of electronic media such as text messaging and internet sites such as Facebook, Twitter and Myspace. Read full story here…

Are you in favor of this ban? Do you think teachers/students should even be “friends”?