Facebook.com. Its increasing popularity has caused it be in the forefront of the news for the past year.

Now it’s back in the headlines, this time because of its potential for advocating Internet racism. In today’s BG News article, potentially racist and discriminatory groups were uncovered and the question now is what should be done with these groups and their administrators?

Some have suggested bans on the groups and removal of the groups already in existence. Some have said nothing should be done, Facebook.com should be protected under free speech laws.

The BG News would like to suggest an alternative option: that students practice a little self-restraint.

We understand many groups which appear at first glance to have hateful, racial undertones may have been meant to appear humorous. Like the group “Are you an Asian? Then you’re a ninja!” Given the benefit of the doubt, this may be an inside joke of a few students, but it comes off as racist.

Therefore we suggest that you think twice before naming your group “All y’all white people look the same.” It’s inconsiderate to assume people are in on your little joke.

And, unfortunately, we realize that many of these students are fully aware their actions are hurting others, and it’s because they intended it to.

To those people we have to remind them of the difference between free speech and hate speech. We are no longer living in a time where it is acceptable to put others down based on their physical appearance. It’s ignorant and it can get you in a lot of trouble.

But as much of a problem as this has become, we agree it should not be up to the administrator of Facebook.com to be seeking out and destroying all of these groups. It’s up to the students to be responsible for their actions and the consequences that result.