i have one thousand one hundred and seventeen pictures of me on facebook. *smh* mind you, these are only the tagged ones (because i work at my school, many have been untagged, not to mention the pictures we all naturally un tag of ourselves...) but see, that's what facebook is for. it's all about the pictures. we've heard it all before, all throughout the night. all the "omg, profile pic!" or "i can't wait 'til you put up this album!" or "haha, i can only imagine the comments i'm going to get on that picture!" So is it reeeeally any wonder why people become so involved in your life?
i've found myself deleting my facebook more than a couple of times...it's refreshing. hell, it'd be deleted now if my job didn't encourage people to communicate with me through facebook. i've found myself caught up in so much unnecessary drama via facebook. it's ridiculous. "omg, did you see so and so wrote on makensy's wall?" umm...yeah, hi, is that not aloud now?!? isn't that the INTENDED PURPOSE of facebook, to facilitate easy communication between two or more people. it's always bad when a group of people are given a way to read a conversation between two people. they will always find ways to read into it more than necessary. it's almost like people look for the drama in a situation. i've found myself in situations where people gossip...yes gossip...about me calling a person of the opposite sex "too cool for school" or saying 'i know i haven't seen you in forever, we gotta fix that lol!" ...on their facebook wall. i dont know, maybe that was crossing the friendship line...defintely sounds like something gossip worthy to me....not. it's absurd, really.
so i was watching m and j...some weird talk show trying to be like a younger regis and kelly. they were talking about facebook and relationships and how it's the easiest way to make a relationship go down hill. there was this girl on it. apparently her boyfriend broke up with her simply by changing his facebook status from in a relationship with [her name] to single. lol. how fucked up, right? they hadn't spoken about it, they weren't fighting, he just changed it and they hadn't spoken since... the weird thing is, they're still friends on facebook. i dont know how she does it. maybe i'm just used to people that are super quick to delete someone when a given relationship goes awry........anyway, on the show they also had this relationship expert explaining all the reasons why facebook has a negative impact on a relationship. one being, via pictures, you have insight to all aspects of your partners life - how he is when he's with you, when he's with his boys, when he's at a party, when he's around other girls. and as someone in a relationship, anything that isnt 'right' to you, is a means for automatic drama. questioning "who's she...how do you know her?..how often do you guys hang out??" then as soon as you see that same girl's name appear in a mini feed or writing on your man's wall, she becomes a point of concern...or anger. as if we don't all have friends of the opposite sex who are honestly just nice friends. secondly, when you're in a relationship with someone and you write on that persons wall, you're giving the entire facebook world (your 500+ friends) insight into your relationship. they know what you say. what you did, etc...and they judge you for it. "i dont know man, makensy had this 4 comment long conversation with oh dude..this seems sketchy, she hasn't written on her boyfriends wall in 2 days..." and then rumors start to spread. and if you're saying i love you all the time and exchanging sexual innuendos with the person you "should" be talking to, then you're doing too much...too much PDA. but if you're not writing on each others' walls people are questioning if you guys are even on good terms.. "are you sure they're still together?" you'll have people looking through your pictures trying to figure out which guy in your 100+ pictures is your boyfriend. if you have too many pictures with your boo thang, you're too involved in your relationship. if you dont have that many pictures, if any at all, then you go out too much and shouldnt be in a relationship and people who notice these things are actually telling on you?!.......this shit gets too annoying. but i can't even really blame facebook, because sometimes its simply just the stalkerish people.......after all they do call it "facebook stalking"
facebook practically gives people the right to judge you and your lifestyle. and i hate that because no one should be doing that . why are you so wrapped up in my life instead of living yours??? how do my pictures, my conversations, my relationship status affect your life in any way....especially to the point where you need to report my every move? honestly. i've made it a point to cut out as many possibilities that would lead me to facebook stalk people, i'll be the first to admit that it becomes a habit once you get used to having to do it..especially when you're in a relationship and your boo is on facebook...all the females commenting on pictures saying 'that was a fun night..you look good :)'....lol, what you mean he looks good? don't tell him that! he doesnt need to know you think that...now he's gonna have a big head and i'm going to have to deal with that shit. lol................anyway, i'm writing all of this to say i've changed my social networking site ways. i don't want to be that person that checks other peoples' facebooks to see what they've been up to, who they're talking to, what new pictures they've put up. that's creepy. the same goes for twitter. however, since twitter is a site of status updates, it's a bit harder to not automatically be kept up to date on certain things when you check your home page...but i've made it a point to make sure @replies (those twitter users know what i'm talking about) do not show up on my home page (it's an option under settings, i'd advise it.) this keeps me away from a lot of the need-for-inquiring drama. i dont need to know who other people are talking to - that's between the two or more of them. especially on twitter, because wall-to-wall is not an option, you have to check the times and go from one profile to another and back and back again to understand a conversation....wtf. you are doing wayyyy too much. i try to stick to using twitterberry versus my computer because i feel like the computer just asks you to just click on that @[name] link and see what people have been writing all day and to whom. twitterberry doesnt go for that - you see what people write and only YOUR @replies. i love it. it keeps me happy with the people i surround myself with and the names i hear that don't have a face...happiness is key and ignorance is bliss.
i realize to that in order to live life that way you have to have a lot of trust. if you don't have that trust with a friend or boy/girlfriend then what are you doing with them anyway?
