Get a life
Alternate title: stop talking about facebook, you loser.
I’ve begun to take more and more notice of the amount of conversations (remember those real-life personal face-to-face moments?) revolve around this absurdly popular social networking medium.
It makes me laugh every time I walk past a group of people at uni chatting, and you overhear ‘So on facebook last night …’ or ‘Yeah she posted that on facebook!’. It makes me cringe that we really can’t think of anything more valuable to discuss than the latest status updates and photo comments, as though they’ve replaced genuinely enquiring how somebody is and complimenting them.
Facebook makes us feel popular. I think thats one of the secrets to its success. Every time you comment or like, you’re interacting with somebody else: their notifications and friend count are the quantification of how many people think you’re significant enough to warrant a minute of their 24-hour day.
Facebook is also for the lazy. I can say that, because it incriminates me too. Its incomparably simpler to send someone a wall post than to go for a coffee, and its lots easier to hide behind a chat window than it is to gather enough courage to mould an interaction. I think it can be helpful: all of my best friendships have an online component, and many of them began as acquaintances, were developed online, with intimacy transferable offline. But I think its the lazy person’s way of saying I care for you: I can maintain the facade of good friendship by telling someone I miss them. It can be a good mechanism to reconnect. All too often I see it ending there, both parties satisfied that the friendship can be retrieved – when necessary.
I’ve been contemplating the depth in the way I converse. What I talk about with the people I say I love. Ourselves, hopes, dreams, fears, desires? Or her, her boyfriend, his weekend, that breakup, their relationship?
Congratulations Zuckerberg: you revolutionised friendships.
