Honestly you can skip this first part- just a strange thing that happened to me before I decided this needed to be a blog post. Feel free to skip to the TL:DR section if you don’t want to read all of this.
I just had the WEIRDEST thing happen to me- I was writing a post on Facebook and it disappeared. While I was typing it. The post was simply me announcing that I intend to get off of Facebook and maybe even all of social media by the end of the year. I’ll re-type a lot of it here, but what is weird is that I was just typing and mid-word my post went poof. On Facebook. Do you remember the last time that Facebook let you leave their site without reminding you that you were in the middle of typing something? Every time I’ve ever typed something on Facebook and then changed my mind about posting it and went to close the browser it has always stopped me, thrown up a notification, and asked ‘are you sure?’. Facebook, a platform that I have had crash on me and then when it came back up it still had my half written post on it and it’s asking me if I want to finish publishing my post. THAT Facebook- just glitched and my post is just gone.
I’ll be honest it is hard to feel suspicious that it didn’t want me to post my little explanation- considering the last sentence I typed before it went ‘poof’ was- that I didn’t like the algorithm because of how it controls and filters what we can see on the platform. Which is an awkward place for the post to just disappear- The website didn’t crash- my post just vanished. Seems really sus.
Are they (the algorithm) reading my posts before they go live, looking for key words to know to kill the post? Is saying the platform is manipulative and shady something that it is scanning your post for? Is the algorithm so shady that it’s pre-emptively censoring? Probably not- it probably was just a coincidence. But still- that was weird.
OK SO As the title suggests- this entry is going to be about my future on social media. Before I go into it too much I want to talk about why I’ve stuck with Social Media as a whole, and more specifically why I’ve stayed on Facebook.
My Past with Social Media
I never used MySpace, I’m definitely old enough that I probably should’ve used MySpace. But I didn’t. I thought it was the dumbest thing in the world. I thought it was weird that anyone would put so much information about themselves onto a site that anyone could find. I had this attitude and I was one of those people who had like 5 blogs on blogspot.com back in the day. (Though I think I had them all set to private or limited to just my friends who I invited to the blogs.)
When the trend of Facebook started I rolled my eyes and had no intention of trying it out. Then a guy friend of mine convinced me to try it. Honestly I CANNOT EVEN REMEMBER how he and I were talking before Facebook. We must’ve had each other’s emails? or something… But I made a Facebook Account and suddenly that became my #1 way of communicating with EVERYONE. Instantly- and let me tell you- 2007 Facebook was really not that interesting. It was, however, exactly what my brain wants current Facebook to be today. Basically an online Journal and Photo Album to share with select friends and family. This is what drew everyone in, and what I think has kept most people. Ultimately I think we all love the idea of being able to announce our lives into the void and know that people that care about us read and see the things we post. Of course it is also wonderful to be able to see the things that our friends and family post as well. It was nice! I’d post my stuff about my life, announced my engagement and marriage, shared info about my pregnancy and kids… And excitedly read everyone else’s info as well. We’d like and comment and largely ignored how the platform was evolving around us.
I’ve tried to walk away from Facebook before- what has always dragged me back is the fact that I wanted to see what my friends and family were saying about their own lives. And if I’m being honest- maybe a little selfish, but this is true- When I’ve walked away in the past I’ve realized that I’ve cut off all connection to others- which means that no one knows what is going on in my life either. The truly ironic thing here is that I’ve almost entirely stopped posting things about my kids- (This isn’t to say I never post about them- but I try to be sparing about it) because it creeps me out that each time I do post about them I’m adding to their digital footprint- AND NOT ONE OF THEM IS OLD ENOUGH FOR A FACEBOOK ACCOUNT.
What’s up with Facebook now?
NOW just because I don’t share as much as I used to- doesn’t mean I cannot still enjoy content from friends and family, right? Well here’s the interesting thing…
About 2ish years ago I jumped into being one of those obnoxious ‘boss ladies’ of the world- joined Usborne Books and began my mission to share great books and literacy with the world. Now one of the things they have you do when you join is to have a launch party- you are supposed to send out a message to 250 contacts inviting them to your launch party- follow up with all of them and try to get them to ‘support’ you by coming to your party and buying for you. At the time I think I had maybe 200 contacts- many of them were married so I think I had 130 messages that I sent out? I have 272 contacts as of this moment. I sent out all of my stupid messages, I did my follow ups and basically did everything my upline said to do. Had my silly little launch party and moved on with my life. Now this isn’t a story about how I harassed my friends and family to buy stuff from this company that I just signed up with (though I could write a whole post about that, I have some strong opinions about these boss-babe style businesses…) this is what happened afterwards.
SO I booked some parties off of my party- and of course I had to go through the host coaching of getting them to also send out an absurd amount of invites- Every. Single. Person. Had the same reaction that I did initially ‘I don’t know that many people’. You’re instructed to look at their friends list- and basically push them to send out the invites- contacts=people known. RIGHT?
Well maybe- ignoring the fact that people seem to collect Facebook friends like some sort of status symbol, how many of your list do you actually hear from? Just a fraction. Now some have abandoned Facebook- but most haven’t.
For me- I get a notification every time some of my immediate family members posts something. Also Facebook has picked out a few of my ‘favorite’ people and made sure I get a notification each time they post. I know how to edit this list- that isn’t my point- my point is Facebook assigned a bunch of people based on the data it has on me. Which includes- posts I’ve interacted with, pages I’ve liked, things I’ve said, my family size, pages I follow, groups I’m a part of, and also external data from apps that I was too lazy to come up with a unique sign up for and have signed in with Facebook AND of course my Instagram (hashtags I use and follow) and Whatsapp (contacts) info. So my family and friends that I hear from? Oh the 30 people Facebook thinks I want to hear from. I mean it’s not wrong- these are people I do care about. The thing that starts to get creepy to me is this- I’m not seeing all of the posts of my ‘favorite’ people. I’m not even seeing half of them. Facebook is showing me *just enough* that I FEEL like I’m seeing posts from my family and friends. The majority of the posts in my feed are groups/pages I follow and ads. Lots and Lots of ads. Oh I’m sorry- I mean ‘sponsored’ posts. When it comes down to it- my Facebook Feed is really impersonal.
You could make the argument that I follow to many pages/groups- and I’d agree with you. However I know for a fact that is not why my feed is so dreadfully impersonal. Around 1 year ago I got sick of the fact that I was seeing nothing but pages and groups- went though and unfollowed just about all of them. Hoping that my feed would correct itself and I’d see friends and family.
Instead Facebook cleared out my feed and told me I needed to make more friends.
So what am I using Facebook for these days??
I’ll be honest I don’t even want to admit it…
In order of how much time I spend:
- Watching TicTok style videos
- Mindlessly Scrolling and watching videos from pages I follow
- Interacting with groups I follow
- Updating my own group/page
- reading/liking friends stuff
- actually posting stuff about my own life
Those first 2 bullet points make up probably 80-90% of my time on the platform.
I’m no longer a user of Social Media- I’m a pure consumer.
The vast majority of stuff that I view on Facebook is by people I don’t know and never will know. The yo-yo that this content causes my emotional state to go through is not healthy. I’ll be laughing then crying then angry- all with in seconds. There is no doubt that this is contributing to my overall depression an anxiety.
My feelings towards Social Media in General
When it comes down to it- I like social media. I don’t like admitting that to myself- but I actually enjoy social media. Not in a way where I actually feel like I’m fulfilled or anything. It’s kind of the same empty enjoyment that you have when you watch that really crappy movie that you love. We all have one- a movie that has no real value at all but fills a kind of entertainment itch where you can completely shut off your brain and just zone out into something fun for a bit. The movie that you’d never show anyone else because they’d ruin it by pointing out that it is indeed a crappy movie. That kind of enjoyment is the same thing I feel towards social media. Only no one points out that it’s crap, and we all just go along with it.
I also hate social media- so much. I’m trying to put into a few sentences how much I hate what social media does to people. By design it destroys relationships. Which should be more Ironic than it is. You end up in these weird bubbles of echoing opinions and when you do see someone’s opinion float through that is different than yours- it makes you mad. I’ve seen it- even the most Zen people I know in real life, I’ve read scathing things from them online pointed vaguely at people that they don’t agree with. This is especially fun when I know both people and know who everyone is talking about despite no one using names and just saying things like ‘and individual I know’. It’s horrifying to read- because these types of posts are actively hurting people. The more conflict that statements bring up- the more interaction it gets- the more interaction it gets, the longer we spend on the platform. The longer we are on the platform the more data the platform gets on us AND the more it can sell us and to us. It is evil and not there to help our relationships. Not even a little bit.
What am I going to do about it?
The majority of this post I’ve talked about Facebook specifically. That’s just because that is the one I have the most experience with- but honestly you could put all of this towards Instagram as well; it is owned by Facebook and has a LOT of the same issues. Twitter is just as bad. As for the rest- I imagine they all have the same issues as well. The truly frustrating thing is that cutting yourself off from social media cuts you off from the world- in a pretty literal sense.
AND THIS is why I’m so frustrated. I can see the problems with all of it. I can see the problems it creates in my life- both with the stupid amount of time I spend on it and the impact emotionally. I can see the effect on my friends, family, neighbors and even members of my church congregation. It’s evil. It’s toxic. It’s an addiction that the whole world suffers from and yet we perpetuate it.
I also don’t really know what to do about it. My initial thought was to get rid of all Facebook owned social media- and of course twitter is horrible as well; so that has got to go. Then replace them with different companies that were ‘better’. But let’s be honest- the issue with social media will be the same no matter who is getting paid for my presence on their platform.
I hate to lose the few connections that I have through social media- there are several people from college and high school that my ONLY contact is through one of these platforms. I don’t want to lose those connections- but is it worth the rest of it all? Is it worth supporting companies that are literally getting rich off of people’s need to be noticed? I know for a fact that me leaving will literally mean nothing to them- they have so many users losing one won’t matter. But will it drastically improve my quality of life? Or will I feel even more like the invisible woman with no friends? (Honestly on that last point Social Media isn’t making me feel like I have anyone who really cares- but at least I’ll get a comment or two here and there)
Of course there is also the stuff I’ve not mentioned at all during this entry- what about my art? or the crafting communities that I’m a part of? Granted my art presence is small and I don’t know that it’ll be noticed if I stop posting (especially because my post schedule has been inconsistent to say the least). I’m not saying I’m a big influence in the crafting communities I’m a part of (I’m not) but I do get something out of the work that people put up. It’s not really stuff I can find other places, forums and websites really aren’t a thing anymore.
Taking it a step farther- if I ditch all Social Media (and after some articles I spent reading this morning I’m ready to burn it all) should I ditch other Toxic companies that I use frequently? (Amazon, Microsoft, and Google). CAN I ditch those companies? Or have they become so rooted into my life that I’m just stuck with them? Truthfully I’m not sure.
I do know that I need to make some changes- I need to make them sooner rather than later. The amount of time I lose to social media, the amount of emotional damage that I self inflict because of social media… and of course the fact that I’m giving power to some of the most evil people in the world… well; I’ve to to take a stance for myself and my family. I’ve got to make a change here.
So…. What? (or the TL:DR section)
I’ve definitely gone over these in one way or another throughout this long essay- but I’m going to re-iterate the biggest reasons it is hard to just pull the plug- even though I clearly feel it is for the best.
It’s those relationships- friends from various points in my life, and professors that I’m still in contact with. I don’t want to lose those points of contact. When I think about just shutting it all down the first things that I worry about are art and college related. I want to share my art- unfortunately while I think I could ditch out on Facebook entirely- I’m not confident that I’ll be able to walk away from Instagram- at least not right now.
For the moment I will be maintaining a Facebook account- https://www.facebook.com/alicia.hawks.art Because as much as I want to just ditch Facebook 100%- there are reasons that I cannot. I am however terminating the account I’ve had since 2007- there is just too much personal information on that.
NOW as far as other social media use- I will be staying with Instagram; I have a few accounts over there for various things. One of which is a private account where I’ll post pictures and updates about my kids- I’m not going to link that one here- if you are someone who knows me personally- talk to me and I’ll give you an link. The other accounts I don’t mind sharing.
- https://www.instagram.com/decidedly_nikkie/ (the companion to this blog)
- https://www.instagram.com/that_dm_chick/ (D&D related stuff, hopefully I can start updating this one again soon)
- https://www.instagram.com/aliciahawksart/ (My art account)
- https://www.instagram.com/millennial_mom_cooks/ (Pampered chef stuff)
- https://www.instagram.com/eaaarts/ (Art my kids have made- mostly just perler bead projects from a year ago, but will be updating again)
- I currently do not have an Usborne IG account- I’m trying to figure out what to do with that specifically.
I do also have a few YouTube channels- but as plans for those are in the future I’m not going to bother linking them here.
Nikkie
PS- anyone who is wanting an update on my weightloss goals; I’m writing another shorter essay about that which should go up this weekend.
Decidedly Nikkie 