There was a time in my life when I actually did not have a Facebook. Well, not counting the first eighteen years of my life, that is. Those were the days, at least the later years, of MySpace. Now that was the shit - top 8 walls, a personal song on your page, a cool bio... but I digress. I am talking about sometime between 2009-2010. I actually went onto Facebook, deactivated my account, and went a whole year without logging back in. Don't worry, this post is not some personal pat on the back or a look back on a former New Year's resolution. I am just here to tell you that I will be doing that again, starting today.
Why?
I believe there to be a couple of reasons. For one, we all know it is a complete and total waste of time. I can go a good couple of hours in the office working away, but then I am usually back on Facebook for the next 15 minutes; doing mindless shit. Commenting on statuses, posting a "cool" music video, or going through Rico Barnes' profile pictures. Besides that last one, I won't miss much of the mindless time-consumption. I will admit, collecting meaningful and memory-filled images will take some time, so I guess I'll officially delete it when I am done with that. Any pictures taken after today though, I get to start using the "I don't have Facebook, e-mail them to me at fill in the blank e-mail address" saying I came to love that entire year I did not have the Book.
Another reason I cannot have Facebook any longer are precisely because of the status updates. I am no martyr here, but the next status I see about some political debate or socially conscious topic from someone who can barely finish a New York Times article is going to make me nauseous. Get over yourself, you're not that smart. Read a couple of books before you update your status with witty prose and release it to your 834 friends. I will never judge or blame anyone for having a political opinion, but let us work on becoming the most informed citizen we can before proving to the internet we know what we are talking about.
And what is with the concept of a Facebook friend anyway? What, I didn't accept your friend request within the first 10 minutes of your invitation and now we're not friends on the street corner? I honestly have experienced people who stopped me while I was out and asked if I had checked Facebook recently. Is this where we have gone as interactors and interactees, as it were? Cool story, bro. Or gal. Anyway, you get it.
At the end of the day, I can complain all I want about my personal beef with the Book, but for the most part we can all agree to how stupid it is. However, can you believe that people actually end friendships over that thing? C'mon man. Kids are up until 4 a.m. in the morning blasting chat messages to someone about how much of an asshole they are. Really? And I mean really, chat wars are one aspect, but actual comment debates for the entire public to read... ugh. Like I said, I am not the martyr, we have all been there, I just do not want to do it anymore.
Also, think about all of the other ways we can stay in contact and communicate with each other. Social Media websites such as Twitter, LinkedIn, Yammer, and even Four Square are all ways for the general masses to stay in touch and keep themselves relevant. Okay, okay, Twitter is pretty much overrun with bullshit nonsense, as well, but I have found at least LinkedIn and Yammer to be useful, productive ways of online social interaction.
I like to consider myself as at least a partially enlightened individual, maybe I am giving myself too much credit there. I am not sure. The point is that I honestly think there are about ten other activities I could partake in (non-alcohol related) that would better ways to spend my time. Reading more, visiting old record shops often, frequenting my front yard; these are all perfectly suitable substitutions for liking a photo of a handle pull that was uploaded at 3:30 in the morning. Who knows, maybe this lack of Facebook will allow me to write more.
I know what you most of you are thinking (well, at least the ones who know me personally), "here goes Morton again with another almighty decision. Let's see how long this one lasts." I get that. Hell, I probably deserve it. However, I can assure I made it a year the first time I tried ran this race a few years back and I feel confident enough in myself to partake again. For those trying to read into this, stop. This is not some personal vendetta I am avenging or some hipster reaction to apathy. At it's core, this is just what I want to do and I felt compelled to write it out for you.
So... Is there anybody coming with me? Did anyone of the 14 people who actually read this feel empowered to say, "down to Facebook! No longer shall we sit and watch a two and a half hour film about the downward spiral of interpersonal communication!" No? Nobody? I didn't think so. Well, this is the only idea of mine that has come close to a New Year's resolution. So here goes nothin'....
1 comment:
Loved the post and its points here. Although I understand how people can condemn one for making the claims, I on the other hand find it refreshing to read because I think as days go by we all start to have more of these sentiments about social networking.
I did it when in France for 7 months and those were 7 of the most liberating months of my life, hard to say what variables were due the credit but I agree that a large factor is making the time and attention for other daily items as our mental and temporal resources are always limited after all.
Through the lens of the social psychologist, it's always interesting (and frankly often sad) to look at social networking and the ways it has made human thought and behavior far more transparent (for better for capitalist industries, for worse for all of us) than it has ever been before. It's really great to see someone's speaking up about this rather than keep in sealed away in the ol' headspace as most of us tend to do.
Glad to see we still seem to be like minded after all these years man, keep up the solid writing and stay in touch one way or another (matthewjlbrand@gmail.com).
Post a Comment