I’m not usually one to voice my opinion on issues with social media or how people treat one another on it. In no way do I want to offend someone or be hypocritical with my views. But that’s exactly it. The fact that offending someone or being seen as hypocritical nowadays is so easy is due to social media. Social media has created an outlet to voice opinions and ideas that we normally wouldn’t voice elsewhere. Although it can be a positive outlet, often times people use it as a place to cover up who they truly are or pour their whole self out to the world. There is no way of truly knowing who a person is. And that is one of society’s greatest issues today.

One of the key issues with social media is having the ability to block our “friends.” If you don’t like what someone is posting, if you’re angry with them, or you don’t want to have them in your life anymore, you can just click a button and have them be gone. It’s as simple as clicking a button and you can practically erase someone from your life. Blocking has eliminated confrontation and real human relations. We have resorted to not facing our issues with one another, but rather avoiding it altogether. We have stripped what a real relationship with someone is supposed to be like. If you don’t like what someone is posting, talk to them about it but also recognize that we are all entitled to our own feelings and opinions. If you’re angry with someone, don’t resort to the silly action of blocking them online but rather sit down, talk with them, and compromise. It’s better to save a valuable relationship than to make it worse. And if you don’t want someone in your life anymore, then go ahead and block them but make sure to reevaluate if you truly want to live without them.

Blocking is a lot more than just clicking a button and not having someone see your posts anymore. Although most people won’t admit it, blocking hurts. Finding out one of your friends or someone you knew has prohibited you from seeing what’s going on in their lives is like a stab to the heart. An overwhelming feeling of sadness invades your mind and makes you question what ever went wrong. What could be any validating reason for someone practically erasing you? And why couldn’t they just talk to you about it in the first place? Blocking tends to open up wounds and leave you feeling unloved and unwanted, no matter the circumstances on which it occurred. It can often create more damage than being ignored in person ever could. Because when you’re blocked online, that person has made the decision to block you out of their entire life and is most likely not planning to let you back in any time soon.

Social media can often be a hazard to humanity and is creating a void in any genuine relationship we can have. The concept of blocking someone has become more than a simple tool to keep people you don’t like off of your profile. It has become toxic to our relationships and our lifestyle. We're all human and any sort of rejection is painful. So why do we continue to develop ways to fortify rejection when we should be diminishing it? We need to stop hitting that "block" button because it’s the easy way out. And we need to start valuing the importance of loving the people in our lives.