So I'm friends with the majority of the people I went to high school with on Facebook. I only talk to a few of these people, and I generally ignore their posts and updates. Today, I went to my homepage and one of them had posted that her life "sucks." Really? I remember this girl very well from high school. She is an only child in a very well-off family. She has basically had everything handed to her since day one. Her recent photos are of her and her family in California for the National Championship football game between Alabama and Texas, which costs quite a hefty sum of money.
Curiousity got the best of me, and I decided to find out why this girl's life "sucked." Maybe she had a death in her family, her dog ran away, her family member lost his job, etc. Nope. She and her boyfriend broke up...Now, I realize I don't know all the background information on her relationship, and I can't really relate to her broken heart because I've never had mine broken, but I can think of many situations where people are worse off than her.
I'm sure people in third world countries would be more than willing to switch places with her if the epitome are her life "sucking" is a break up. It's like when people put up a status asking people to pray for them because they have a test that day. How about instead of that, you ask people to pray for the people in Haiti or people in other less fortunate situations? We've become quite self-involved; and I think sometimes we (myself included) forget that we could have it much worse than we do now.
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I agree with your standpoint on this girl. I've wondered for years now if this new media is furthering narcissism. Facebook, Twitter is about one's self. So by engaging in these sites, are we encouraging this behavior?
ReplyDeleteI think to an extent (commenting on the comment before mine) new media does encourage love of self. I know my FB updates are always relating to what is happening internally, and are used as a way to express myself to the public. Every now and then they will be about a world issure or something similar, but on the other hand isn't FB used as a way to communicate to people you never see.
ReplyDeleteI guess it depends on who actually cares about what is going on in your life. I know I face hard times a lot, but I also know it could be a lot worse. This; however, does not lessen the pain that people feel. It is real.
There comes a point where people say, "Ok. We get it," and the new media user should take this into consideration. But yes FB is a self-indulgent network with the allowance of feedback. I don't think we are encouraging the behavior because FB can be about other people too if you take enough time to navigate away from your profile. I love checking on my friends that I have met away from home. Plus, people seem more at ease behind a computer screen than actually face-to-face.
There's a question. Is it damaging relationships to engage in social media? Does it take away the personal aspect? Can people feel like you really care if all communication is done solely through social media?