A while ago, I went to my friend’s house and set up a Facebook page for her. She’s 76 and resisted Facebook for as long as she thought she possibly could, but finally her Girl Scout contacts moved from horrifically long email-lists to a Facebook page that’s been active for several years, just not very well upkept. While I was doing so, it occurred to me that this 76 year old woman was arguably more immersed in 21st century media than I, a 19-year-old college student, purely for the reason that I have avoided Facebook like a vampire avoids the sun.
During the height of Facebook’s “middle school years,” where Facebook was growing rapidly and everybody thought it was hot stuff--only to be confronted by decline as the dystopian high school years set in--I was also conveniently in middle school, and had a Facebook for about three months. I hated the feeling of compulsion that came along with it (something I hate about all social media, that it worms in you and makes itself feel necessary when it’s really garbage), and I hated the idea that whoever I allowed could know where I was and what I was doing whenever.
It’s probably a fusion of paranoia, anxiety, and depression, but with being on the Internet there’s a feeling of not wanting anyone to know me. Facebook is all about keeping track of people, seeing what’s going on in their lives, selfies (which I’m bad at), sharing, news, etc.. All things I’m not into, which is fine about ten months out of the year, but becomes awkwardly disabling the first month of the new school year and the last. The first month of school, halls have Facebook pages, dorms have pages, all your neighbors and your roommate have Facebooks and I have to be that person that says “sorry.” The last month, all your new friends want to keep track of you over the summer, and if you made any international friends it might be the only way they can keep in touch. At the risk of sounding like an old person (which I am in my heart, I just have okay skin), I don’t want anyone to passively look over my life. It’s creepy, and the idea that “Facebook stalking” is something people just casually do now freaks me out.
This doesn’t mean Facebook is necessarily bad; it helps companies to advertise, helps keep friends and family in touch, and is an important place to make and build connections for small businesses and freelancers. You’ll just never catch me making one.
