15 Minutes on Facebook

For brilliant people who use technology with relative ease, we have been sucked into a brain-wasting exercise called Facebook.

I admit that I am a member and the reason is that I am addicted to Scrabble and Facebook has a game that allows me to feed my addiction.

I am comfortable with both adding and removing 'friends' on this social networking site and don't feel particularly bad when I have to part ways with someone on the lunatic fringe.

Beth and I were talking about Facebook and she confessed she had opened a Facebook account last night. She concluded that bold statement by saying "It was the most horrible and worst 15 minutes of my life!"

She had opened, refused friends, and become frustrated and deleted her account --- all in the space of 15 minutes.

It isn't an exercise in ADD, I promise. And usually Beth isn't a hermit. She just wanted to 'friend' the zoo and the Botanical Gardens. But then reality set in...when you 'friend' people or entities on Facebook, you are no longer anonymous.

Beth said "I don't want friends! I have you!" in speaking to me about this. I'll try not to take this personally as I am relatively sure what she means. She means she doesn't want stupid lunatics (other than me) taking up her valuable and generally useful time. Sadly, she is stuck with me like toilet paper on the bottom of your shoe at a social function. So upset was she at this exercise in digital frustration, she didn't sleep.

I can truly understand.

I worry daily that people who I DON'T want to ever have any contact with again in this life or the next will find me and become the leeches they once were before I cut them off at the knees.

But inevitably, those are the very people who show up wanting to be my bestest buddy for the rest of my unnatural life.

I am thankful to reconnect with friends who are worth knowing and worth sharing time with over the miles. But the hazards of Facebook are worth noting. Did you know there is a group that advocates Facebook stalking???

I'm sure the spectre of revealing her life in oft shared detail prompted the deletion.

She confessed that she even signed up with a name she doesn't normally use (doesn't
everyone have an alias???) just so "no one would find her".

I said "Does this mean you DON'T want me to 'friend' you?

The laughter was unrestrained at this point.

We tend to think that social media is our friend. I am convinced, however, that Beth may be onto something here that the rest of us are missing. Too much detail will never be enough for people who are seeking to know the minute detail of our lives for the specific purpose of holding it against us in some future time.

Perhaps the remedy is at hand and we just don't realize it... Anti-social media just needs a kick start to make a go of it on the world-wide web.

Buttbook, anyone??