Does anyone remember life before facebook? Before it consumed your day, allowed you to chat with your mom, or farm a virtual farm? I can hardly remember life without facebook but I do remember when it was for college students only and I miss those days. Now that anyone can have a page, I feel like facebook has become a bandwagon. My nine year old cousin, Ellen has a facebook page. She told me she just has one to play the games, such as Farmville. Do I think a nine year old should have a facebook page? No but now my aunt Susie has a page so she can monitor. Now that Susie has a page, most of my family has jumped on the bandwagon. I now know what my family is doing through their status updates or new pictures posted. Facebook has allowed me to see pictures of my 3 month old nephew and keep in contact with my cousins. But some people jumped on the bandwagon thinking facebook was a private place to post as they please, well they learned the hard way.
Some facebook users are not like my family and I, these users post things that put facebook in the news. The status updates on facebook are supposed to be your thoughts or what you are doing. An Israeli soldier posted plans for an upcoming raid in his status last month. This may have been his thoughts at the moment but he posted them for the world to see. This made national news and I think we are all more careful with our status posts. Another thing facebook allows us to do is make groups. Groups are usually made for promoting a cause or complaining about an issue. A high school student in Florida made a group entitled, “Ms. Sarah Phelps is the worst teacher I’ve ever met.” Hundreds of students joined this group and wrote very hurtful words. Once again facebook is painted in a bad light for bad choices made beyond their power. People need to think before they post because the world is viewing what you write every day. I think these two people made these choices because facebook was their only way of being heard. Facebook became a way to express themselves without actually having to say it out loud. I think this happens to a lot of us on facebook and I have a friend that has encounter this head on.
Caryn Vincent, a close friend of mine has recently deleted her facebook. When I asked her why she would do a crazy thing like that? She replied, “I am just over it. People are way into themselves and have no clue about the world around them. I feel so liberated.” It would take a lot for me to delete my facebook. I just defriend people when they get on my nerves. I told Caryn this and she replied, “It was easier to just remove myself instead of friends. That way I don’t get yelled at for defriending them.” Removing yourself from the situation is what we would do in the real world, so why not do it in the virtual world? After talking to Caryn about facebook I can see that facebook has consumed our culture and it is leaking to many other places. I don’t want to say facebook has consumed me but at the end of the day, I am usually checking my page.
Contact Info:
Ellen and Susie 402 488 4531
Caryn Vincent: 402 366 7430
0 comments:
Post a Comment