The Social Sadness

 

It's been a while since I last logged in my Facebook account. Why? Because I was spending too much time on it, I was involuntarily checking the page every 15 minutes for updates, craving for news from people that are currently not part of my life anymore. That is the negative effect Facebook was having on me: forcing me to spend time and energy with more people that I can handle, all together, and was not giving me the reward I always got, which is to become more intimate with each individual, have the feeling of being part of someone's life and have someone be part of mine.

Millions of users access the website daily for many different purposes, and I was already starting to wonder if I was alone in my dilemma. Turns out there are many of us, books have already been published on this topic, I would not be surprised to find a Facebook page dedicated to this. I will share all the different ways Facebook seems to be affecting people on the next lines, and if you agree, well... I guess it is not coherent to ask to share the link on Facebook is it? =D

Friends

According to Huffington Post's text, one of the major problems is precisely what I just did describe. It is unfortunately a fact of life that some relationships grow stronger and some get weaker as we live our days. But this disconnection is not possible online, and you end up with "friends" who are essentially strangers.

It would not be a major problem, only if we were honest and realistic online as we are offline. People tend to exaggerate the good things that happen to them online, probably looking for self validation, and this kind of behavior is really annoying if coming from someone we simply do not care about.

Games

Another important aspect of the behavior of people online is that you can play roles, just like in one RPG. The person described in your profile is hardly exactly like yourself offline: one can build the way he wants to be seen from the outside, decreasing all the flaws, unhappiness and other bad things and increasing qualities, virtues and happiness. What is the problem with that? Well, people are not (that) stupid, and can perceive something is not right in this virtual happy world, which prevents deep meaningful and intimate relationships to take place. This way, we end alone, despite having thousands of friends, as is portrayed in the book Alone Together.

An interesting quote by Montesquieu (which I obviously did not check the authenticity) show that our problem with happiness is quite old: "If we only wanted to be happy it would be easy; but we want to be happier than other people, which is almost always difficult, since we think them happier than they are."

Envy? No, it is just a matter of fairness...

...and More!

Despite all those problems, Facebook can also destroy relationships because of jealousy, can threaten friendships because of envy, and even make you an involuntary test subject like they did in 2012. However, is there a way to use Facebook responsibly, just like one learns to wield the power of beer as one grows old? This post by The New Yorker offers a valuable tip: do not open Facebook unless you are willing to interact with it. We tend to get more frustrated and unhappy when we passively scroll trough the news feed and do not interact, comment and even "like" some news. Users tend to feel worst after accessing the website if they are performing some heavy multi-tasking, and are unable to focus on what is happening enough to comment and interact properly.

Last but not least, an ongoing research suggests college students starts going "crazy" if put together in one room without access to internet and other gadgets. In the words of New Yorker's Maria Konnikova: "Whenever we have downtime, the Internet is an enticing, quick solution that immediately fills the gap. We get bored, look at Facebook or Twitter, and become more bored. Getting rid of Facebook wouldn’t change the fact that our attention is, more and more frequently, forgetting the path to proper, fulfilling engagement. And in that sense, Facebook isn’t the problem. It’s the symptom."