Facebook 'Hate' Thread

Greetings fellow ATSers.

This thread is for people to vent their feelings about Facebook.

Love it or hate it, Facebook is now a part of our world that is almost unavoidable. Sure, you might not have an account but maybe your spouse/partner does. Probably a lot, if not most, of your friends have Facebook accounts.

Maybe you love Facebook. A lot of people use Facebook for networking purposes, or simply to keep in touch with friends or relatives who are far away. Others use it in conjunction with business endeavours, the music business for example, it can be a useful tool for entrepreneurs and so on.

From my experience, the vast majority of Facebook users maintain profiles for no other reason than the fact that everybody else they know does. The mundane drivel that is their daily lives is put on display for all to see. Sounds bad doesn’t it? That’s how I see it.

My personal theory about Facebook is not a conspiracy theory, it is more of a plausible explanation for the insidious grip this social media site has on people’s lives.

It is fairly obvious that how most people interact on Facebook is different to how they would ‘vis a vis’.

Let’s face it, we all have an ego. There are positive and negative aspects to our egos. What a social media site like Facebook does is provide a platform, or a stage, for our egos. It’s basically a form of perception management. We can present ourselves to the world in a way that we would like to be seen by others. I find that people with ego issues tend to have a distorted view of themselves, compared with how they really are in the real world. We can espouse values, ideas, lifestyle choices, tastes etc, we can condemn, rant and join the mob in tut tutting, we can take a hundred ‘selfies’ until we get the perfect one to post for others to view, but in the end it’s all fake, it’s how we want to be seen by others, not how we really are as individuals. This can be very appealing to people on a subconscious level, social interaction can be awkward and difficult for a lot of us, Facebook provides a solution.

A great example of this is that person who adds you as a friend on Facebook and interacts with you in some way from time to time on there, but when you see them on the street they look the other way. This is perception management in full swing. On Facebook they can manage how you see them visually and basically what lifestyle they lead, actually have ‘designed’ for themselves and so on. But in reality the truth is different, when you meet this person face to face they cannot control the situation, it’s easier for them to pretend they didn’t dee you on the street. The real ’them’ is not the same as their Facebook persona. I honestly feel sorry for people like this, but I know quite a few people like this.

As I see it that’s what Facebook is really about: “Perception Management”

I’ll admit that I myself am susceptible to this form of self indulgence, indeed we all are to some degree or another, it is part of the ‘human condition’.

What do you think?

a reply to: seabhac-rua

Sorry mate,

Facebook is now a part of our world that is almost unavoidable

Totally unavoidable would be more accurate.

Kind Regards
Myselfaswell

Ive not used it for years now, im still alive. How about that?

Do i have an account? Yes. What is it for? Mostly a glorified phone directory.

I have all notifications turned off, no one can post cat pictures on my wall, all off. Bloody thing drives me mad. So i do hate facebook, but i dont so much hate it for what it was, its for what it is now. Automatic videos, a layout that changes every 6 months, its just a pain in the arse. I suspect they make so many changes, so people HAVE to spend more time on it learning to use it over and over.

I also hate the way that once you have logged in on a machine, anytime i go to a completely random site thereafter that has a "like this through facebook" type window, its got my name and face on it. Thats just creepy.

I've never had a Facebook account. I don't plan on getting one. I don't see why anyone would be interested in the details of my hum-drum life. Sure, they might be interested in that party I threw on my yacht where I accidentally invited both Jennifer Anniston and whats-her-name that played Laura Croft, but who cares about that time when my pilot forgot to fully fuel the Lear jet and I was forced to spend an extra two weeks in Tahiti. That was just embarrassing.

I think in the long run facebook will teach us a lot about ourselves irregardless of any bad things they do or how some people behave.

I actually understand facebook fairly well, I have more people attached to my pages than the city I live in at this point in time and find it an incredibly useful resource, one of the first things you notice is that (sorry to internet meme) there really are only 2 kinds of people... Those who are open to communication and those who's personalities are egg shells.

In other words within the debate of privacy comes something I have to be very honest about, a lot of people are 100% full of bull, now I wont lie, in forums like this it's easy to be full of bull, I have in the early days of the net (lol a few years ago) been full of bull myself, there is a temptation when no one knows you to maybe exaggerate or elevate ones self, understandable, but when you spend huge amounts of time working with social media you inevitably see the truth, that a lot of peoples lives are charades, their personalities in "walking life" are full of bull... not just in social media but like the example of the person who pretends to not see you on the street, these people have highly constructed personalities even in daily life...

These are the folks who are very concerned about privacy... the opinions they speak n public and private in public and private differ, their sexuality is hidden in rl, and that's just a start, a lot of people real are what is referred to as "the walking wounded"

In reality, to build a large following I had to leave myself very exposed in many ways and at the same time do so while being able to look into the private lives of 10's of thousands of people at will... somewhere in there (and no I had no defining moment or revelation) the idiocy of being fake fell away because in a sea of 7 Billion people there are Millions who like the same stuff you do etc etc and it's just self destructive to wear a mask I suppose... it became to me ludicrous to be shut down and afraid, things like national borders began to seem insane when I started to have conversations with people all over the world

sadly there are whole sections of the world within America and our govt too who have masks on, the world is about their ideas, information needs to be halted etc etc... from the typical joe who doesn't want their "interests tracked" because god forbid the ads that pop up when someone uses your computer actually reflect who they really are lol or to a govt that has to present a certain image and wants the public in line with that....

well, half of humanity is actually insane, shut down locked into paradigms of who they are supposed to be the "self" completely separate from their perceived and portrayed identities, in essence split personalities with no way to resolve into a singular being and terrified of even being asked to...

but within the social media phenomena is absolutely the potential to resolve these conflicts

one of the easiest ways to "see" the fractured human mind is actually to look at facebook, pay attention to how many people don't have actual "interests" they pursue, sure they "like" all sorts of stuff they think other people will think they are cool or respect them for "liking" but the vast majority of people spend them time on uselessness and have no "purpose" no DO, no ACTION they take which is how a real "interest" is actually identified... you can for example "like" poetry and go three years and never write or attempt to write a poem, that action would be personal exposure to something deeper, it's revealing, it conflicts with the mask and requires you to "un-fracture" your personality i.e admit you don't know jack about poetry lol then admit to yourself you have no depth.... which is where "growth" and healing begins

I guess what i'm saying is.... for social media to work for a person, for it not to be something scary, a person has to start to heal... to fix themselves from the insanity of both the Industrial age, religion and personal trauma of being raised in sort of screwed up world, you have to get rid of your ego... or at least reconstruct it, because showing yourself to the world means being naked, everyone looks good in the right suit, taking it off is revealing, so you do 2 things A: try and keep the suit on even though essentially your behind an xray machine or B: say hey look at what a freak I really am, check out these love handles anyone have a page to help me be rid of these?

so, personally, I give facebook a "like" not because of what it is or who runs it, but because of how it can be used if you let it...

I have a feeling there is no "dislike" button because even the internet could host that much hate. It will be hate critical mass and...

ok I'll go have my meds now.

Manage just fine without farcebook.

If the spooks want to know what Im up to then they will have to actually work to find out rather than me update them every five minutes.

A freebie for the spooks : Im lounging in my hammock with a cigar and a drink giving the international gesture of greeting to your satellites ..

originally posted by: seabhac-rua
From my experience, the vast majority of Facebook users maintain profiles for no other reason than the fact that everybody else they know does. The mundane drivel that is their daily lives is put on display for all to see. Sounds bad doesn’t it? That’s how I see it.

I do not have a profile and I am not old by any means.

My philosophy is if I have not spoken to you since high school there is probably a pretty good reason I do not want you contacting me.

originally posted by: Expat888
Manage just fine without farcebook.

If the spooks want to know what Im up to then they will have to actually work to find out rather than me update them every five minutes.

A freebie for the spooks : Im lounging in my hammock with a cigar and a drink giving the international gesture of greeting to your satellites ..

Priceless, could not have said it better.

Really? why do you care what the "spooks" even think of you? personally when I hear that sort of thing I think to myself "delusional" because your "likes" are at best a line on someone's graph with a job that kind of sucks... if your posts are actually read ever, it's because your "that guy" who goes on FB and posts radical stuff the same way people take pics with their car or whatever so that people identify you as "mattering" to something

And the irony here... is your posting on ATS but acting like being on FB will have someone invade your privacy, lol... I don't care what kind of privacy capacity you think you have lol, if the NSA wants to know who you are and your data goes across the internet they DO.

Saying you value your privacy and wont Join FB because the "spooks" will examine you, but then coming on ATS and talking is akin to being the sort of nutter that whispers his "controversial" opinion to a friend in a crowded bar with the band playing then goes outside walks down to times square stands on a soapbox with a mega phone screams it to the world and dares the cops to arrest him...

LOL, if your worried about the "spooks" seeing you why the hell would you post here? Attention whores I swear to god...

I mean seriously, lol

"Can't go on Facebook, I don't want the spooks to know what I had for lunch"

"Better go log into ats and talk smack about the president and his connections to the Illuminati and Lucifer""

"But i'll be God damned if they get the dirt on my love for Tuna Fish and Family guy"

I'm crying lol

Never joined bookface, or twatter, no cell phone, no strawberry, yourpad, or any other crap, I sometimes wonder how I survive! And I'm over the biblical allotment of years.
If any of my family or friends, think I really need to know something, I will get an email.
How many noodles someone ate for lunch is something I really do not need to know.

It's avoidable.

Totally.

How is it unavoidable?

I've only ever had a fake account that I use when teaching the generic "Facebook" class at the senior center. Everything on that account is fiction. It's used once a month at most to teach the class.

All it is now is a place for grandparents to keep in touch with their grade-school aged grandkids. Teens, young-adults and professionals are abandoning it in droves.

Nobody who knows better has a Facebook account. They're pointless. Facebook is like cable TV and land-line phones. Died years ago but they just don't know it yet. There are much cleaner, faster and more private tools for 'social networking' if you must participate in that nonsense.

Facebook? What's that?

OMG! Is it essential? Will I survive without it? I had better check with my friends, the ones I talk to face to face or next time we talk on the telephone.

The only thing that annoys me about facebook is that, as Biigs says, there are random sites on the internet that I am supposed to like through facebook. There have even been sites that are not facebook but which will only provide me with products, information or further interaction through my non-existent facebook page.

If your site is NOT facebook but you have a product to sell/share/want me to interact with then don't force me to do it through another site that is not yours. On second thoughts, I can survive without your products too.

I actually like that vid TH2356

It's kind of what I talked about in my first post, you can't actually bs forever, it's going to show through at least if to no one else it will to you...

They say it can depress some people, I say the road to enlightenment is the destruction of Ego

"My life sucks" GOOD, now what are you going to do differently?

originally posted by: criticalhit
Really? why do you care what the "spooks" even think of you? personally when I hear that sort of thing I think to myself "delusional" because your "likes" are at best a line on someone's graph with a job that kind of sucks... if your posts are actually read ever, it's because your "that guy" who goes on FB and posts radical stuff the same way people take pics with their car or whatever so that people identify you as "mattering" to something

And the irony here... is your posting on ATS but acting like being on FB will have someone invade your privacy, lol... I don't care what kind of privacy capacity you think you have lol, if the NSA wants to know who you are and your data goes across the internet they DO.

Saying you value your privacy and wont Join FB because the "spooks" will examine you, but then coming on ATS and talking is akin to being the sort of nutter that whispers his "controversial" opinion to a friend in a crowded bar with the band playing then goes outside walks down to times square stands on a soapbox with a mega phone screams it to the world and dares the cops to arrest him...

LOL, if your worried about the "spooks" seeing you why the hell would you post here? Attention whores I swear to god...

Sooooo I am wondering if your a little short on meds this month, is there anything I can do to help you overcome this angry monster you have unleashed, because you're bringing down the curve of the entire country let alone ATS. Whatta ya say we try a little civility first before the fireballs start.

a reply to: MarlinGrace

Angry, no.... why would I be Angry, i'm just laughing at you guys.

Your on one of the most watched websites in America complaining that someone might "investigate your information" in a place where people post pictures of cats...

and I stick with the word delusional, your going to throw "fireballs" on an anonymous forum, ooooooo scary, almost as scary as associating with real people you know from your past and letting them see who you really are lol

Before you throw Fireballs rofl...

Let me guess your a wizard?

I do have a Facebook. I used it a lot at first more to keep up with other people, but then I realized it was all I was doing. So, I still have my Facebook page, but I haven't touched it in over a year.

However, I realize that if I am ever to get into my publishing dreams or if my husband I are to do so, then we will need to use social media to help market. So, we stay with Facebook.