Leaving Facebook
In college, Facebook equates to the world.
When you meet someone, there is a requisite Facebook-stalking session to see what they're all about. When you're organizing a party or throwing an event, you better have that Facebook page with the details. When you find that (temporary) special someone, you damn well know you're updating your "Relationship Status" as soon as possible so EVERYONE knows what's up.
I was wary of Facebook then -- but now, as an "adult", I hate the damn thing.
There have been more threads than usual here on WSO as of late on the topics of quarter-life crises / depression / jadedness / disillusionment. The WSO demographic caters to folks who are generally better off, in many ways, than the Average Joe -- it's self-selected in a pretty special way. People who are successful, from upper-middle-class backgrounds, and have a high likelihood of "making it" in life shouldn't have these problems, right?
Enter Facebook, a tool that has revolutionized the way we communicate, but in a lot of ways has done more harm than good.
I would argue that, for many things, Facebook is a useful tool -- though not as useful as other technologies that are available to us.
1. As a news source, it's simply OK...clearly overshadowed by mobile apps like Zite and Facebook's more agile evil brother, Twitter.
2. As a means of communication, Facebook is only great for keeping up with acquaintances. For professional contacts, LinkedIn will suffice, and for close friends -- well, I hope you value your close friends enough to at least pick up the phone and call them instead of dropping a "hey omg i miss u lol" message on their Wall once a year.
3. As a tool for organizing/mobilizing/enacting social change, Facebook has some pros, but at the same time things seem to go viral far less quickly on Facebook than they do through hash-tags on Twitter. But I think Facebook is necessary in this instance, and probably a good tool for this -- though I'm not much of an organizer or activist, and neither are most folks on WSO. ;-)
On the other hand, there are also many things Facebook is INCREDIBLY successful at doing:
1. Wasting your time. How productive would you be if you didn't have the News Feed? How many hours per day are wasted refreshing for absolutely no reason?
2. Making you feel like you're doing something wrong. Everyone's life on Facebook is perfect: the perfect picture with the SO, the perfect vacation blog/note, the perfect profile picture, the perfect job titles, etc etc etc. Feel like you're not keeping up? Guess what -- you're not alone. Why do you think people spend so much time taking the "perfect" shot and refreshing the News Feed to see how many "Likes" they get?
3. Invading your privacy. Everything you put on Facebook becomes someone else's property. There are also countless stories of people losing jobs, getting into huge trouble, or creating situations of misunderstanding through Facebook. It can be used wisely, and somewhat safely, or it can be used recklessly and quite dangerously. There is no truly "safe" way to use the 'Book.
4. Making it so that one is odd if he/she does not have a Facebook. This one is pretty clear -- if you're in your twenties, or even just starting out college, people will find it very strange if you're 'Book-less. I know this sounds silly, but think back to the last time you met someone who didn't have a Facebook...now you see where I'm coming from?
The bottom line is that Facebook creates the perfect environment for a measuring contest. Everyone wants to have that vacation shot, that significant other picture, that job title, and everything in between. In some ways this is probably a good thing, though I would be cautious in saying that motivation coming from Facebook is healthy, but it's motivation nonetheless. In other ways, the News Feed is a constant reminder of things that you "should" be doing because other people are doing them, and in almost all cases, doing things just because other people are doing them will leave you feeling somewhat unfulfilled (best-case scenario) or in a "WTF AM I DOING WITH MY LIFE?" (worst-case scenario) crisis later on.
The time-sink aside, the gain I receive from Facebook in terms of communication probably doesn't offset the fact that it's incredibly distracting (in more ways than just clicking "refresh"). Like one user said a few days ago, I'd probably pay a small fortune to never see the News Feed again.
Thoughts? Would you ditch Facebook? Is it a necessary evil? Do you dislike using it, but still return to it everyday? How addicted to Facebook are you?
Thanks for reading.






Comments
good points DV, just caught
good points DV, just caught this from another thread (http://www.wallstreetoasis.com/forums/im-miserable...) - relevant points in bold
I'm pretty impressed by the outpouring of support from the community. Nicely done, WSO. Now it's up to the OP to listen, and get his life back on track.
I've gone through a lot of shit, and honestly never imaged I could have gotten to where I am today. One thing I'll say, life is all about momentum. It can move in either direction, and once it gets started, it's hard to break free. When you are locked in that downward spiral, you feel powerless to do anything other than the same old destructive routine, day after day. It takes courage and strength to bust out of those patterns. It takes a lot of willpower, but it can be done. Remind yourself that it is possible to have momentum in the opposite direction, where success begets success, and your confidence keeps growing as you achieve things one by one. You have to start small, see that it feels good to make changes, and keep building on them. If you really want it, I know that you can get there.
as soon as you admit to them, you'll see that no one gives a fuck about how much of a boss you're supposed to be - they have their own shit to deal with.
This. Everyone. EVERYONE has their own shit to deal with. Some worse than others, but everyone has some shit. People just don't like talking about it. But, I bet as soon as you do, your friends will understand and, if anything, tell you that they've got shit they deal with as well. You're definitely not alone.
This is absolutely when I feel like things like Facebook are poisonous. If you've got crap in your life like the OP does and you spend even a second on Facebook, you'll end up feeling like the only person on Earth with problems. Only, that's not the case, but no one posts anything "real" on the book.
This, a thousand times this. Everyone just posts a highlight reel of their life - perfect photos with their significant others, crazy parties, extravagant meals, picturesque vacations. Everyone assumes that they are missing out because their lives aren't as great as the ones portrayed on their newsfeed day after day. It's such a facade, a self-perpetuating cycle of insecurity and anxiety.
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After leaving college I find
After leaving college I find myself using FB less and less... and it seems most of my friends who graduated are doing the same. I don't love it but I also don't hate it, mainly for the following reasons:
Instant messaging: AIM is dead and FB chat has taken over as the online IM tool, at least for me and most people I know. I understand that there are other ways such as Skype to talk to your friends when you have some free time but the chat helps me stay connected in a way
Birthdays/events: Useful for remembering people's birthdays and organizing get togethers, especially with a good amount of people (like a reunion with a big group of friends). I'd rather use FB to organize something instead of a group text with 20+ people and your phone buzzing every two seconds.
Pictures: I miss school. Every once and a while it's nice to go back and take a look at some party/ sports game/ random pictures with your friends. Instagram may serve that purpose as well but I don't use that at all.
Now the News Feed I agree sucks and is a perfect tool for people to measure up against each other. But if it annoys you so much to look at everyday, why not only limit the updates you see on the home page to the people you are really interested in, such as your close friends? No reason to be a prisoner of the circumstances; if you can't stand a person, just ignore them or block them.
This is something I've really
This is something I've really been thinking a lot about lately. Honestly, I'd really like to disable my Facebook because 1) It's a huge time-waste, 2) Everyone I know from high school (especially those STILL in high school) are very annoying but I feel obliged to keep them friended while I have one, and 3) I'd feel sufficiently more private. I might even feel happier. I remember reading some articles/posts that touched on something you were talking about: everybody seems so perfect and happy because that's how we TRY to portray ourselves on it. Going through these pictures and statuses can leave us with a bitter taste in our mouth of a strange mixture of envy and depression. Hard to describe, but some might know what I'm talking about.
I am strongly considering disabling it, though, especially for the points you've discussed OP. All that is holding me back is being afraid of being one of "those guys" who doesn't have a Facebook, and that I'd be missing out on a lot of activities.
Has anybody here made the jump away from Facebook? And I don't necessarily mean to another social sharing website.
Oh, and OP: You got one of my three starting SB's. Thanks for the thread.
This is very convenient
This is very convenient timing. I am just now climbing out of a "quarter life crisis", and one of my developments over the past few months was the deactivation of my Facebook account. Took about a week or two to lose the addiction, and it's insane how much more time I have left to fill in a day.
I do miss being plugged in though. I don't miss the incessant and compulsive refreshing of the news feed and knowing every detail about everyone. FB groups were pretty useful. And a lot of companies are plugged into FB unfortunately which makes it hard to access and take advantage of some things.
Ditched my Facebook account
Ditched my Facebook account in March 2011 and havn't looked back. The people I want to keep in touch with, I do either in person, by email or by phone.
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I've been clean for 2 years.
I've been clean for 2 years. I used to be huge into it (think one of those people with lots of pics/"friends"/wall traffic), but then I started feeling/noticing the things OP touches on and decided to cut as a new years resolution.
A lot of my anxiety lifted, and I felt freer. In the beginning I was a bit disconnected from my friends but over time we evolved to emailing, and my real friends always make the effort to email me. Now technology has moved along so far I don't even feel disconnected as many Facebook substitutes have come through. Someone mentioned how FB is good for instant messaging, the best substitute for this now is whatsapp. Ever since I got a smart phone a lot of my friends have got them too, so I can instant msg with a lot of my friends around the world and its completely free. For those who don't know whatsapp, its worth checking out.
Here is an article about about how it totally killed on NYE: http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2413802,00.asp
Anyways, in short, life is freer without facebook and with all the tech that's coming out now you can recreate the aspects of FB that you like while avoiding the ones you dislike.
I don't have Facebook, I've
I don't have Facebook, I've never had it, and I will never have.
My privacy is a concept much higher than my sociability or my possibility to reach to someone by the Internet.
Life already existed before Facebook.
As annoying as I find the
As annoying as I find the fake stories, and "highlight reels", I check Facebook daily for one reason - motivation. I came from a lower middle class public high school, so ~50% of my Facebook feed is posts about "getting a job at the new plant that pays $13/hr!!!" or "just got out of jail, hit me up", or "called off work to fake sick haha" etc.
We all need daily motivation to get out of bed and go through the grind, and this, as perverse as it may be, is mine.
I recently deleted my
I recently deleted my account.
Loved having it in college -- I would argue that it's probably essential, since it's really more of a 'tool' than a stalking platform (okay, in college it's both a tool and a stalking platform). After college, I think it still retains a bit of its utility, but the negative aspects (which the OP did a great job of summarizing) far outweigh any residual benefit (at least for me).
I have loved -- loved -- not having Facebook. For anyone who's going through a Q-life crisis, I would highly recommend shutting it down. Although I think it's pathetic that an Internet app has had such an effect on my life, I think it would be far more pathetic to not be honest about -- and more importantly deal with -- that fact.
onemanwolfpack: As annoying
As annoying as I find the fake stories, and "highlight reels", I check Facebook daily for one reason - motivation. I came from a lower middle class public high school, so ~50% of my Facebook feed is posts about "getting a job at the new plant that pays $13/hr!!!" or "just got out of jail, hit me up", or "called off work to fake sick haha" etc.
We all need daily motivation to get out of bed and go through the grind, and this, as perverse as it may be, is mine.
I like this approach...
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I've been on the fence about
I've been on the fence about this for a long time now. I think I'll stick with it because it makes it easy enough to keep in touch with friends who live out of town and whom aren't big emailers. I don't think there's much harm in that.
One thing I recommend is to unfriend people who don't pass muster. Generally, my theory is that if I wouldn't stop and chat with someone if I saw them out and about, then they get cut. If you have more than 150 friends, something is likely wrong. Given LinkedIn's professional network status, there's no real benefit to racking up a ton of FB friends.
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I think the worst part of
I think the worst part of facebook is the news feed, and not just because of the "comparison" element. It is essentially an addiction mechanism because it targets your brain's affinity for "newness," which is as the heart of all internet addictions. Any electronic means of refreshing something in search for newness triggers a small dopamine response, which starts an addiction train and all the deleterious effects therein. This is why people constantly sit around checking their email / texts on their iPhones, why people constantly refresh news sites for new stories, and constantly check facebook feeds.
I think if you really want to slay the beast, you need to stop ALL compulsive internet surfing, which includes constant email checking, news checking, WSO checking. I've recently tried to start doing this, but man is it a hard habit to break.
Frankly, although Facebook
Frankly, although Facebook can certainly be depression inducing, the issue is more of a cultural one and how we define ourselves through others rather than worry about what makes us happy. Facebook is no different than retouching photos of models for magazines or TV shoots to make sure they are perfect and represent as well as possible. It really is the culmination of a celebrity and appearance driven culture focused predominantly things that, really, at the end of the day don't matter. Do I really need to know that you just ate the most delicious sushi ever at the most famous resort in an obscure tropical location? Not at all, but I on some level knowing that is desirable for any number of reasons. Like any drug it will induce a different response depending on the person and their personality. Some get depressed, some get motivated etc. In a more direct response to your question i think it is a necessary evil because people need something to make themselves feel better because nowadays just doing your job and going home to whatever it is you do isn't nearly enough. We need to be constantly moving of we will fall behind the trend and be reduced to simply watching everyone else move. It doesn't matter if we aren't actually moving and just looking at others move, we need to feel involved. I'm not really saying if it is right or wrong, it just kinda is at this point.
I do agree 100% about the addiction to the news feed aspect of Facebook being absurdly addictive. I mean hell, I refresh my twitter feed every minute or two just to make sure I didn't miss anything that's going on in the world. There is a point, and I'm not sure when but it very well could be now, where we realize that there is a limit to how much information is useful to have available and we take a more muted stance towards the rapid integration and expansion of information systems for a little while until we can actually get a handle on what is happening. I mean just the other day I realized that the article I was reading on a news site were being fed to me from recommendations by my facebook friends which were pulled by my logging into facebook on this computer and then I went over to buy something and I could like the damn product with my account already there. In the same instance I both marvelled at just how awesome that is to be able to do that and horrified at the same time. Anyway.
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I got rid of FB a long time
I got rid of FB a long time ago and I can honestly say I am so happy that I did. All of my friends that still have it do nothing but complain about certain posters and their news feed. I tell them they don't have to and it's like they are enslaved to it.
I honestly wasted a lot of time when I had it clicking on things I didn't remotely care about. I see more and more early FB adopters stepping away from it which I find interesting.
ATrad: I don't have Facebook,
I don't have Facebook, I've never had it, and I will never have.
Amen brother
dropped it 3 years ago never
Deleted my account 3 years
I go on Facebook to see
"Clean" since ~May 11' here.
Champs46: Instant messaging:
In the interest of some
"The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts." - Bertrand Russell
onemanwolfpack: As annoying
If I ever get a job in IB
ranney95: If I ever get a job
ResidentPatient: onemanwolf
Just a sophomore looking for an opportunity to start up this dream of mine.
I don't have to explain to
ResidentPatient: Such a huge
The bottom line, with respect
"An intellectual is a man who takes more words than necessary to tell more than he knows."
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[quote=ResidentPatient] one
Use it for networking and
I do not think that there is any other quality so essential to success of any kind as the quality of perseverance. It overcomes almost everything, even nature. -John D. Rockefeller
upquark: Use it for
"An intellectual is a man who takes more words than necessary to tell more than he knows."
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DonVon: upquark: Use it for
Money Never Sleeps? More like Money Never SUCKS amirite?!?!?!?
Use it to post news links
Insecure much ppl? It's your
ResidentPatient: Champs46:
I've never had a facebook
one trick i use to keep my
ranney95: If I ever get a job
This is easily the only Blog
onemanwolfpack: As annoying
alpha currency trader wanna-be
dazedmonk: ResidentPatient:
.
watersign: onemanwolfpack:
This just seems like a bit of
I think the people claiming
NorthSider: This just seems
I disagree with a lot of
Frank Sinatra - "Alcohol may be man's worst enemy, but the bible says love your enemy."
interesting/relevant story...
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It depends on the person who
DonVon: The bottom line is