Off the social network

A few months ago, I closed my Facebook account. This happened to fall not too far from the beginning of Lent, and so became related to a Lenten practice of intentional relationships (an experiment that failed utterly, but I'll blog on that later).

I know other people who have left Facebook--some repeatedly--and I usually hear it described as a sort of "breaking free." Like Facebook was a drug, an addiction, and quitting was a wrenching but necessary experience. That's how the story tends to be told, anyway.

For me, leaving Facebook was more like letting an unused gym membership expire. I occasionally posted, seldom read, and never responded to messages. Any question I was asked that began with "Did you see so-and-so's post on Facbeook..." could always be answered in the negative. So closing the account wasn't an accomplishment at all (though I did accept some accolades).

I have said fairly consistently that I think I will eventually re-open my Facebook account, once I figure out how I intend to use it. But in the interim, here are some observations I have made about life off the social network:



1. I miss out on things.

Facebook has become a primary hub for our social activity. It's where we go to have discussions, start social movements, and update each other on the major changes in our lives. Gone, or fading fast are the e-mail updates and whatever else we used to stay in touch (AIM?).

Most obviously, I just don't know what's going on. I'm sure there have been engagements, babies, career changes, and more that I am clueless about because they were communicated via Facebook. I do have a spouse who remains networked, and so I'm not quite sitting in a cave with my fingers in my ears, but I am not nearly as informed as I used to be (even in my limited use of Facebook).

I also don't show up as an optional invite when people are having an event. Again, the spouse helps there, but it's something.

Both of these things have their replacements and workarounds. Ideally, I would learn what I need to know about others through direct contact. The stuff I was trying to replace Facebook with during Lent. If that fails, there's the spousal connection. Same two options apply for events: I either get special e-mail invites from people who know I don't have Facebook, or I get in as a plus one.

The thing there's really no replacement for is the collective activity that happens on Facebook. For example, I'm part of a theology discussion group that meets weekly in person, but converses in between via a Facebook group about what topics might be interesting to bring up. That's something I can't participate in. It's something that may not have really existed before Facebook, but exists now, and it's something I lose out on when I leave the network.

The inevitable question here is whether those things I'm missing out on are things I really needed. I haven't stayed up at night crying over Facebook or wondering if people I knew in high school are married (or still married), so I'm leaning towards no. But even if I don't need those connections, they're connections that society pretty much assumes everyone has, which means...

2. I am not a relevant or important person.

To an extent, one might argue that Facebook--even for the majority who aren't "using it professionally"--is kind of a mechanism for building a personal brand. We put our names out there, get our thoughts into the world, converse on issues of import and join groups to achieve social goals. More routinely, we post status updates letting others know what we did. Mine is now not a name that will float across peoples' news feeds, which inevitably means I am less relevant in those peoples' lives.

I can pretend that doesn't mean anything--don't we all--but stop for a moment and consider that when I had Facebook, I used it to post more than I used it to read. Consider that I still have a Twitter. Consider that I am blogging, right now. Obviously I have a need to be relevant to others, and that's something that suffers when one does not have Facebook.

You may think that if you leave Facebook, you will become more mysterious and everyone will long for your presence all the more, but I'm not convinced. To those on Facebook, aren't people who aren't on Facebook more annoying than mysterious?

3. If I want people to know something, I have to tell them.

Part of the genius of Facebook (and other social media platforms) is that it lets us feign a degree of modesty. With Facebook, if I win a prestigious award--not that this is something that happens--I can post about it on Facebook. I'll get a few comments and a dozen "likes." Friends (the kind I also see in real life) will congratulate me in passing, and I can chuckle and pretend to be embarrassed and say "Oh, thanks."

Without Facebook, I have a choice. I can risk people not knowing how amazing I am, or I can tell them directly. No faking modesty there. For example, the five people who know about this blog so far (I'm contemplating how to improve my reach) know about it because I e-mailed them and said "Hey, here's my blog." No pretending I don't care whether or not they read it.

4. People talk about Facebook, all the time, and it's really annoying.

Until you don't have Facebook, you have no idea how much conversation revolves around what people are posting on Facebook. If you close your account, you will notice. And it will be infuriating.

Part of the reason it's infuriating is simply because I made a deliberate choice to leave Facebook, and Facebook has followed me into the offline world. I just can't escape. And because I am tainted by that obnoxious elitism that everyone without Facebook seems to have, I totally judge everyone for talking about Facebook all the time.

But here's what that's really about: it's about not being in the know. We all know and loathe the feeling about being in a conversation where everyone else knows something, but we don't. Not being on Facebook means that happens to me all the time. And boy does it put a dent in my self importance to always be the least informed person in the room.

5. Not being on Facebook enables my social isolation.

Like I said at the outset, I was never the Facebook addict. At least, not since back when Facebook was cool. So closing the account was, to an extent, a cure for a non-existent disease. And the thing about cures is they can come with some nasty side effects.

Facebook wasn't taking over my life, but it was keeping me in touch with people that I otherwise would not be in touch with at all. Like a friend of mine from elementary school, who moved away when I was about nine years old, and who I found on Facebook. Or people I was close friends with in Mexico, but will likely never see again. Or a couple of second cousins I haven't seen in probably close to twenty years.

These are the more extreme examples, but it really applies to pretty much every Facebook friend I have; as a confessed introvert, I really would be (and am) a lot more socially isolated without social networking. The negative extreme of the social network user is the person who tries to be best friends with everyone, which is pretty much psychologically impossible, but that isn't my problem.

Expand the conversation beyond Facebook, and the internet has done a lot for me socially. Back in middle school and high school I spent exponentially more time talking to people on AIM than I did in person (even though most of those people were people I knew in person). And just because introverts thirty years ago didn't have that doesn't mean it can't be good.

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The interesting thing is that all of these observations kind of seem, at face value, to be negative. But I'm not sure it's as black and white as that. Do I need to spend that much energy tracking who is engaged to whom? Do I need everyone and his brother to know my thoughts about everything, or to think I'm an impressive person? Is the authenticity of admitting when I am proud such a bad thing? Shouldn't I get over wanting to be in on every scoop? And, since I do have great friends, do I need a whole extended network of them?

A lot of people write a lot of blog posts (or make videos) about how social networking is "bad." And a lot of social network defensively cry that it is "good." But I don't think it's really either. I think my life is every bit as rich and fulfilled without Facebook, but it's not necessarily more so. And conversely, if I returned to Facebook, I don't think I would feel my life was particularly better or worse.

I don't know if, or when, I'll return to Facebook. But not having it has been a great experiment so far. And it's entirely possible I'll have more thoughts on it at a later date.