“You are one amazingly talented person.”
“You’re the most generous man since Shakespeare.”
“I’ve been trying to live my life the way you live yours, and I’ve been happier as a result.”
So devoid of snark and vitriol, the above affirmations emerge from what might seem an unlikely source: the online world of an Ivy League school.
Such outpourings of admiration are the driving force of Columbia Compliments, a Facebook page that publishes anonymously submitted adulations by and about members of a vast and occasionally alienating university.
Like those submitting the epistolary affection, the forces behind Columbia Compliments withhold their identities as a way of preserving the integrity of their project. The site’s overseers include the forum’s founder, a 19-year-old junior at Columbia College, and two Columbia seniors he enlisted to keep up with demand.
“The whole point of this is that it’s anonymous,” explained the founder. “If I knew who was involved, I would be a lot more conservative about what I say.”
The notion that anonymity inspires healthy honesty was popularized by, among others, PostSecret, a seven-year-old blog that shares secrets that have been submitted via postcard.
The compliments on the Columbia page take many forms, some carefully crafted (a haiku in which the final line is “refrigerator”) some hyper-effusive (an all-caps proclamation of “bro” with 73 additional o’s) and some that might seem corny if they were not heartfelt, like this one from Monday afternoon:
I am so glad to have gotten to know Stephen Zhou this year. You are incredibly kind to everyone and your Christmas card made me feel so special and loved.
One of the most acclaimed accolades, with nearly 600 “likes,” simply thanked the staff at JJ’s Place, a campus dining hall. Anything that resembles a compliment is posted, with recipients’ names tagged as a means of notification.
Regardless of the package, the messages – along with the accompanying burstlet of Internet stardom – come as a wonderful surprise to those who receive them.
“This is the first time that I’ve seen the Internet machine used for love firsthand,” said Jack Walden, 20, a Columbia junior. Though he has suspicions about who might have submitted a YouTube video of his comedy showcase, a larger part of him enjoys the mystery. “It’s so much better to have it come as thunderbolt from the gods, that it just happens, that you feel better that day,” he said.
Unsure whom to thank, he chose to pay the favor forward by lauding other friends. “I think I went on a binge of four or five in a row because, you know what, it’s untraceable,” Mr. Walden said. “It’s a little bit like a guilty pleasure. You fall into it the way that people fall into things on the Internet, except this doesn’t hurt your G.P.A.”
The site’s caretakers said that in just this way, one compliment often generates another.
Founded in the weeks leading to Thanksgiving, the Columbia page appeared shortly after one at Queens University in Kingston, Ontario. The idea caught on around the world and compliments boards can now be found at nearly 100 institutions of higher learning in the United States, Canada and Europe; a university in Singapore; and a high school in Pakistan.
And the virtual acts of kindness have also spilled over into real life with a series of uplifting posters featuring a Motivational Owl that appeared on a bulletin board in Butler Library during finals last month.
In a school year that began with a suicide of an incoming student, the Compliments page provides reassurance that learners are not alone.
“My impression is that sometimes, with first-year students, it takes longer to find friends” than at other, smaller institutions, said Helene Foley, a professor of classics at Barnard since 1979.
“There are all these friendships being formed, but you don’t necessarily see them,” said Nina Sabado, 19, a Barnard first-year student who received kind words from a neighbor in her residence hall. Public displays of affection provide that visibility.
The initiative has even touched those who don’t contribute to the site. “Reading some of the compliments has made me proud to go here,” says Aliza Goldberg, 21, a junior studying English and ancient studies at Barnard. It also inspired her to proclaim on her own Facebook page that she didn’t “need the veil Columbia Compliments” to publicly sing the praises of a classmate.
Unveiled compliments are fine, too, the Compliments team said. “If you have the courage to do it person, you’ll do it in person,” said one of the page’s caretakers. “If you don’t have the courage to do it in person, this is a way to do so.”
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