Twitter is a wonderful place to meet people with the same interests, make short and entertaining posts or even share your passions (like art) in an easy to see platform, but, like any social media site-there’s a catch. Anyone can see what you do or say. Some of the most famous, influential people in the USA have been caught and humiliated on twitter-to the point of deleting their account, or even resigning from their jobs “IRL.” Twitter even has a hashtag, or a category to search things under, called “scandal.” Scrolling through that hashtag- you might be surprised at what you find.

Most people know handsome Ashton Kutcher, right? In fact, according to CNBC, he was the first Twitter-user to have over a million followers, beating CNN’s twitter, which was close behind. But, that’s not why members of the site with the blue bird mascot remember him. When Penn State coach Joe Paterno was fired for grossly inappropriate conduct at work- Kutcher went out of his way to voice support for the ex-coach. Twitter was up in arms in milliseconds, blasting the celebrity with messages and posts calling him out on his error- enough backlash to have Kutcher realize his mistake and make a post amending his wrongful opinion.

We all know Alec Baldwin too- he played Liz Lemon’s boss in the hit show “30 Rock,” and acted in the live-version movie of the Dr. Seuss book “The Cat in the Hat.” His voice can get low and menacing, as seen in most of his acting- but, apparently, so can his twitter posts. Baldwin was prone to outbursts on the site, as is seen by multiple examples. His twitter handle used to be “@ABFoundation”- which posted low-brow commentary such as “I think we need to call Hank Williams Junior what he is… A broken down, senile, racist old coot,” and, the priceless, “Flight attendant on American [airlines] reamed me out for playing WORDS W FRIENDS while we sat at the gate, not moving. #nowonderamericaairisbankrupt.” Baldwin may sometimes speak without thinking, but in the end of those streams of posts, he did apologize, and took steps to prevent them from happening again, by deleting his account.

And, without a doubt the most scandalous twitter occurrence to grace the site- Anthony Weiner. Anthony Weiner had a stunning track record in his time in Congress- with credentials like 100 percent ratings from supporting foundations that funded his campaign and rallied for change, like the Human Rights Campaign, but, once again, twitter is shown to reveal the darker side of a user trying very hard to not mix work and fun. Weiner was caught tweeting a link of a private area to a 21-year-old in Seattle, and sent twitter promptly into an uproar. This scandal was top news for the weeks he denied and denied it happened- until finally, he confirmed his mistake and resigned from Congress.

Twitter itself is a beautiful, modern platform to express ideas, art, music and even comedy. It’s your chance to get noticed by someone famous- due to its hashtag system of organization, posts with less likes are sprinkled in with posts with more, the deeper you go. There were 330 million active users at the beginning of 2017- and that number had definitely increased since then, but, as with any media site, be careful what one posts- twitter is a powerful force, creating a worldwide opinion of someone, a legacy and a reputation-but only if you tweet the wrong thing.