Monday, September 9, 2013

Why I left facebook

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Before I begin, let me make something clear: I don't think facebook is evil. When I came back to Brazil, facebook was the only quick and easy way to contact my Georgia friends, and I did enjoy getting news from them all.

However, somewhere along the way I think it lost its charm. It went from something that propagated important info and reached out to old friends to a pile of status updates on what people had for lunch, memes and youtube links on them.

I could probably write a long post on how the tagging device was it's death sentence to me and how people who spend countless hours on it liking every post and base their entire conversations on what others publish make me cringe. However, that would be a useless rant (and not very fun reading). So instead of focusing on its faults, I'll just share why I chose to remove myself from it altogether. 

First of all, I became aware of how people tell themselves they are socializing. They like a post or make a one sentence comment, and they feel connected to someone else. But what happened to picking up the phone? Meeting up for coffee? Offering a hug? There is no need for that anymore. And personally, I think that is just sad. I think the internet is great and I think there is room for both in-person and online relationships, but one should never take over the other. 

Secondly, I thought about what it added to my life. Was it truly important to watch a video of a child on a bike, to know my friends are stuck in traffic or to see pictures of someone in a Caribbean cruise? These things are nice, but how relevant are they? Do I really want that to be the description of how I spent my day?

And finally, I thought about what I would do with the time I used to waste on facebook. Read more. Spend more time with my husband. With my dogs. With the Lord. And that was a no-brainer for me.