Minnesota, USA -July 29, 2011 - It is no mystery that social groups are growing quickly on social networks such as Facebook; however, the intention is not always fun, sweet, or even positive. In fact, it can be malicious. Undoubtedly massive groups around the world have formed by other means in the past, but social networks are making it even easier for those to connect to others with similar intentions or express the same hate more vocally than ever before. Although online chat platforms will likely always be the 'favorite' place to recruit members -the extreme case being for terrorist groups such as Al-Qaeda -, there is a chance that there could be a switch to social networks. By no means is it any reason to put a halt to social networking -rather a reason to watch our family and friends more closely as to ensure that no one gets wrapped up in this activity intentionally or unintentionally even if it is not considered 'terrorist activities'.

Social media is powerful in bringing together people no matter the distance; as wonderful as it is that we can connect with loved ones and form new friendships even without meeting someone in person, it is just as scary. Perhaps people are more easily influenced by others or they trust others to the point where they no longer question others' beliefs or online behaviors; either way, we are in a dangerous spot in social networking since the pool of groups is so large that some evil groups may slip under the radar.

Remember, I do not only speak of terrorist groups; there are many forms of 'terror' that many tend to deny, ignore, or completely disregard as being important: racism, sexism, religious and political-based hatred, age discrimination, sexual orientation hatred, and much more. In this digital age, we are throwing around words easily that we did not do in the past. For instance, we are more opt to telling someone we 'hate' them or use unkind words towards them to deface them online.

It is easy to search nearly any topic on the Group Search page of Facebook and discover many groups that are appalling; unfortunately they are typically not discovered until they grow large enough or someone reports the group to Facebook. With even the search of "hate", I discovered a page which describes itself as, "hating your fellow man, and generally disgusted with society" This group only has 25 members right now, yet that does not make it any less of a concern.

After reading a few posts on the "Hate" page, it does not even resemble a joke in any way; it is not to say that hate can be a joke. Most of everyone is part of a group that jokingly states something that is not real and this is not the case for this group - for your information, this page will be reported very soon.

It is time that we look at what our friends and family are saying on social networks; even scroll through the large list of groups and interests to ensure that they are not participating in harmful activities like this. After all, it is just as harmful of an activity to the participator as it is for the victim; as always, the victim is in the worst position. However, we must keep in mind that hate and ignorance tend to breed hate so those that participate in this will teach this to the next generation.

We can play an active role and be silent monitors on social networks; we can take the evil groups down before they can even get started with spreading the 'hate'.