Social Media sickness
I'm totally a Good Samaritan!
I thought I could use Facebook and Twitter to create new real-world friendships. And maybe I can – but it hasn’t happened yet, not really. The reason is that it’s so public. People will only let you see that part of themselves that’s advertising.
Case in point: I had someone tell me on Facebook recently that she “just wanted me to be happy.” If that were true, she could’ve made that happen easily, just by sitting down for 20 minutes for a cup of coffee. But what she MEANT was “I want you not to be sad or act grumpy anywhere near where I am, because I want to party and you’re spoiling my mood. Go get yourself happy, and leave me out of it.” See, her intent – whether she recognized it or not – was not to make ME happy at all, but to make herself look compassionate to an audience.
And we all do the same thing. Force of habit. Because we have an audience, and while we’re logged on to Facebook or Twitter or LinkedIn or whatever it is, we value that above the rest.
Or else what? Am I gonna pretend I’m any better? What am I, the Judge of all the Earth here or something? No, I just wanna learn a lesson here: social media can find us potential friends, but we still have to be the right people to earn ’em. It’s just… while I’m learning this lesson, I’m a little sick. A little sick of social media.
It’s good to review our expectations from time to time. My expectations for Twitter and Facebook aren’t big/high, and I’m not disappointed often. I think I’d rather be pleasantly surprised rather than constantly disappointed.
Your observation about people “putting on a face” for social media is one I hadn’t thought about before, but I think it’s spot on. Be careful not to lump everyone in with your disappointment. Look at how many times someone changes their picture and I think you’ll get some insight into how interested people are in themselves…