Eliminating Facebook from our lives?

[sizzlinkola]

I'm reading "Deep Work" by Cal Newport,...

I have read his book too and I wholeheartedly agree. Use Facebook in a way that it gives you the most value of any other options you have at pursuing your goals in life.

For example, when I was in college, Facebook was how I kept up with all the different clubs and events on campus, in addition to meeting new people and developing my relationships. I was also on Instagram and Snapchat. I'm a young professional now and that value is no longer needed in my life. Sure, social media can help you maintain your relationships by keeping you in the loop, but there are much better methods to do that. You don't really need to know what someone is up to all the time.

I only use Facebook for its' Messenger app now, for texting my long-distance SO and friends. Instagram and Snapchat have minimal value for me, such that I can have conversations with select friends based on their posts/stories. However, I find that it can quickly become a rabbit hole of scrolling endlessly, which I think is not worth the having the app.

[FruGal61]

"I see kids checking their FB, Instagram, Snapchat, etc apps every 8-15 seconds, and it makes me sick. It reminds me of Harrison Bergeron, the Ray Bradbury short story, where the naturally intelligent character has a bell inserted in his mind that rings every 8-15 seconds, so he can never have long form thoughts and becomes stupid."

Yes. It is very sad for us older folks who know who Ray Bradbury is to witness this. It is also sad for this older...well, OK, as they say in France: "une femme d'un certain âge" to witness what has happened in the last 10 years with Facebook hijacking our lives and how we communicate. Bien sur, some of us are willing participants. I was reticent for a long time but peer pressure prevailed and about 10 years ago I opened an account. My natural shyness notwithstanding, I started posting and oh boy, people from all over were giving me attention! It was instantaneous! Woweee, so many compliments when I changed my profile photo - my id, superego and yeah, my ego too were getting all sorts of massage! And it was free! I got hooked. Still, I was (and am) a rather private person so I was a bit discreet, was not the type of person who would post what I made for dinner.

Then...after about 9 years....456 friends later, the fleshy white underbelly of Facebook sickness continued to reveal itself. I was really starting to dislike people I would normally LIKE in real life. Their online Facebook persona was a turn off. The daily obligation to "like" and then "love" "Wow" and "sad" became a chore. Resentment set in. And yes, this included family members. The constant posturing, bragging, pontificating, begging for validation by - um, middle aged people. People of a Certain AGE. Like - WELL over 50. The narcissism. DEAR Lord (if there is one) - I wondered - do I KNOW these people? What the hell is GOING ON??? I want my life back before FACEBOOK took over! I want these people back when I only got to think about them, oh, maybe about twice a year and now I'm obligated to spend each and every day acknowledging what they cooked for dinner, their promotion at work and giving them the obligatory "LIKE" so they can puff themselves up? OH MY LORD - this is getting out of control.

And wait, there's more! Do I have to GO ON people's vacations WITH THEM? Each and every day, dutifully approving of their travel photos? Jeezus H. Christ. Yeah, your vacation looks awesome but are you really enjoying "being away from it all" while you're spending your precious time at (exotic location) bragging back to the people back home? Doesn't sound like you are getting much R and R.

Clearly, I HIT THE WALL. I'm done. I am not your cheerleader, person I went to high school with who I haven't seen in, oh 40 years. I do not have 1-2 hours free to "Like" your every thought, your every photo, your political view, your accomplishment, your meal.

Phew, I feel so much better now. I vow to spend more time in nature, breathing, looking at the clouds, smelling the flowers, more time talking - with the human voice - to people, real humans, more time reading books, more time relaxing and not hitting the "like" button. This is MADNESS.

"I am so honored to announce I have been named "blah blah blah blah ". Dear Lord. Is this your 15 minutes of fame? Don't you see how effin' pathetic you ARE? I am SAD.

Facebook is.....(fill in the blank). I think you know I feel.

[FruGal61]

Oops, except it turns out that Harrison Bergeron was a Kurt Vonnegut (another great mind) creation.

[J_]

@Frugal61: thanks,it gives me insight. I have never tried FB and such.Whattsapp is what I use for a small circle of family and dear friends. It is sufficient for me.

[TopHatFox]

Read a book titled Kids These Days: Human Capital and the Making of Millennials.

One of its arguments is that social media has acted as a platform for people, especially young people, to boast their human capital. For example, a toned body, pretty face, exotic vacations, education, new job, etc etc. This has lead to people's self-worth and egos becoming entangled with the number of likes they receive, or don't receive.

Just another reason to avoid the whole fiasco. That said, I think FB, Twitter, and especially Intagram are the main culprits. I have found Meetups to be pretty good for finding like-minded people to spend time with IRL.

[Paula]

The man behind the curtain.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6HQC01qrxVc

[RFS]

@TopHatFox - Snapchat has filters now that edit your face to make you appear more beautiful. Bigger eyes, bigger lips, sharper jawline, exfoliated skin, all that stuff. You can see exactly who viewed your story (a batch of your clips that you curate for the public), too. I see students make stories that are 90% edited selfies, then check their view number constantly. It must be indescribably harmful for a developing brain.

I really like this Bo Burnham bit on social media. Ironic, given that he first blew up on YouTube.

"I was born in 1990 and I was sort of raised in America when it was a cult of self-expression, and I was just taught, you know: express myself and have things to say and everyone will care about them. And I think everyone was taught that, and most of us found out that no one gives a shit what we think...They say it’s the ‘me’ generation. It’s not. The arrogance is taught or it was cultivated. It’s self-conscious. That’s what it is, it’s conscious of self.

Social media is just the market’s answer to a generation that demanded to perform, so the market said “Here, perform everything, to each other, all the time for no other reason.” It’s prison, it’s horrific. It’s performer and audience melded together. What do we want more than to lie in bed at the end of the day and just watch our lives as a satisfied audience member? I know very little about anything, but I do know this: that if you can live your life without an audience, you should do it."

[thrifty++]

Facebook doesnt create any issues for me. I am in it because there are some useful chat forums I have joined through it and also to keep in touch with family and friends. I adjust my privacy settings to increase privacy when I want it. I also hardly post anything myself as I would rather people dont know what I am doing and give no shits about what other people think of me - no desire to brag. I also enjoy some of the random and interesting things that come up in my news feed. I often discover about lots of events I am interested in as well as invites through it. I ignore the bragging and often when I get annoyed with people being narcissistic I take the piss. Like when I get sick of someone posting selfies I will put a funny photo underneath it. Food selfies bug me more so when people do that I sometimes post something disgusting underneath the food. Overall I find it useful and it doesnt get me down as I dont care about the stuff that gets others down.

[Kriegsspiel]

I haven't used FB in a few years, but I haven't deleted my profile. Unless something changed, I believe when attention whor... people post up all the pictures they're taking, they are able to tag people in them. I don't use my real name on my profile, so my hope is that they're going to tag my pseudonym, instead of thinking "oh, he doesn't have a profile, I'll just write in his real name so that he can bask in the glow of having his likeness attract all this delicious, gooey attention!"

[7Wannabe5]

I know very little about anything, but I do know this: that if you can live your life without an audience, you should do it."

"First let's go see a football game. A professional football game," Frances said, because she knew Michael loved to watch them. "The Giants are playing. And it'll be nice to be outside all day today and get hungry and later we'll go down to Cavanagh's and get a steak as big as a blacksmith's apron, with a bottle of wine, and after that, there's a new French picture at the Filmarte that everybody says... Say, are you listening to me?"

"Sure," he said. He took his eyes off the hatless girl with the dark hair, cut dancer-style, like a helmet, who was walking past him with the self-conscious strength and grace dancers have. She was walking without a coat and she looked very solid and strong and her belly was flat, like a boy's, under her skirt, and her hips swung boldly because she was a dancer and also because she knew Michael was looking at her. She smiled a little to herself as she went past and Michael noticed all these things before he looked back at his wife. "Sure," he said, "we're going to watch the Giants and we're going to eat steak and we're going to see a French picture. How do you like that?"
-"The Girls in Their Summer Dresses"- Irwin Shaw (1939)

The internet is the city.

[TopHatFox]

Try this on for size, social media as a pathology creator:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?reload=9&v=dmXcjvL9VSc

[TopHatFox]

From the video, there are a slew of studies concluding that social media increases mental health maladies like suicide, narcissism, anxiety, depression, and more, and is best avoided completely.

The follow-up point is that the large influx of anti-social behavior IRL over the past decade is as a direct result of 2 billion people using it. The speaker makes the case that there is a massive chasm between those that regularly use SM and those that don't at all.

He finally suggests to seek out enclaves of people that are in the no-use camp. Some of those groups included people in theater, academia, and a few others.

[vexed87]

I have been Facebook free for a year (deleted my account) after being inactive for a year prior to that. I've noticed no significant detrimental effects on my social life. I occasionally miss out on inane group chatter and meme sharing on the 'messenger' app, but keep abreast of the more serious discussion during social gatherings with those same friends regardless.

There was a time when my friends were not used to my absence, and forgot to extend me invites to gatherings, though they quickly got better at pinging me a text/calling instead. I much prefer that. I did try to get my small group to switch over to Whatsapp or Signal, but there were a couple of stubborn participants who refuse to leave Facebook and try something new, it never took off, I cope OK without it.

Pros:
I have noticed much reduced desire interact with my smart phone, part of that resulted from a decision to mute most notifications, I only get text or call alerts. That goes a long way to reduce unwanted or irritating distractions or late night awakenings, technically not FB related, but push notifications are evil and getting rid of FB was an important step in getting there, as there was no longer a need to be hooked into the news feed.
No more participating in echo chambers or witnessing politically polarising topics and idiotic debates between past acquaintances.
No adverts or temptation to engage hedonistic activity for the sake of it.
No one has access to a trove of data and photos of my misspent youth.
No more third party profiling/harvesting.

Cons:
No doubt I have now completely lost touch with some distant family and old friends, however those were nothing more than superficial interactions anyway. I don't think that will bother me much on my death bed. Those that still want to make contact can, by other means.
I can no longer follow people or groups that have interesting or meaningful discussions and interactions on the platform.
Lots of photographs are no longer backed up in the cloud (if they did get lost, I wouldn't really miss them anyway).

I recently also deleted my twitter account. Though I didn't use that to interact with friends, I did use it to follow a few interesting people. Instead I'll be doing that only with plain old bookmarks to reduce the effectiveness of cookie tracking/profiling.

[jacob]

I just managed to log into twitter again after several years. Apparently I now have 6000 followers although I'm not sure what exactly they're following

As for facebook, I'm on again after a ~6 month hiatus. Pro-tip: The "snooze" function is very underrated.

[cmonkey]

The best time to not have a FB account is from the very beginning. DW has one but never updates it, just stays up to date on old friends and distant family.

Skype is much better for keeping in touch with family.

[theanimal]

I use Facebook mainly for the messenger feature. Often times I'm in areas with no cell service and it allows me to stay in contact with family and friends. More people, including myself, are willing to use messenger rather than email or some other equivalent. The conversations one has on there are ones choosing as well, oftentimes conversations can become quite nuanced and avoid superficialiaties.

I love twitter. A well curated twitter account is an aggregator for resources that challenge you and help you grow. I experience almost no negativity from that site.

[Smashter]

I love twitter.

Me too, and for the same reasons. But still, if I'm being honest, I use it more for procrastination than for personal development. Sometimes I just scroll and scroll, nodding along to the wonderful things other people are saying but not really digesting anything, let alone engaging with anything.

Do you get caught in that loop? Do you try to fight it?

[TopHatFox]

Did any of you watch the video? lol

[daylen]

I am watching now. Very interesting!

[daylen]

That video connected many thoughts I had previously on this subject. Glad I ditched non-curated digital networks after high school.

I had not considered the distinction between addition and conditioning much before he elaborated on it. Addition has an embedded goal (e.g. to get high), and conditioning is simple and avoids complexity. Social networks are conditioning people towards anti-social behaviors. Social media is an epidemic that conditions a fear of love. A significant proportion of the youth are replacing reality with a simulation that incentivizes hate, and this is a type of business where the customers are also the employers; every user is simultaneously a content creator and promoter.

This situation is analogous to viral epidemics except for the fact that it is not limited to any geographic area, socioeconomic class, or age group. The older population has more experience with real interaction in the real world so they are less susceptible. He estimated that at least 2 billion people are infected worldwide.

Another interesting note is that viruses do not to spread to the whole population, because this would ensure their own demise. Hence, the human population is being split, quite sharply, between two groups.. those who use social media and those who do not.

Love/intimacy is the only antidote.