“They are Facebook-verified in a relationship right now!”
“Really?!”
It was a moment of conversation I happened to overhear on my way to class. I’m assuming there was humor to the context, which I’m not privy to. But the fragment of conversation provides an insight into the role Facebook has in our social lives.
Facebook was originally a college networking Web site, founded by three Harvard roommates a few years ago. It has since expanded its network base – controversially – to non-college communities. The system is relatively user-friendly, and as many have pointed out, can somehow be quite addictive. I actually find its addictive power a little reassuring, as it suggests the most interesting thing to people is still other people.
I really don’t mean to bash Facebook for 28 column inches. I think Facebook isn’t entirely a bad thing. I believe people coming together, even superficially, can be positive; the other day someone mentioned to me their pleasant surprise at being “friended” (ah, how the Internet made “friend” a verb) on Facebook by a once-close confidant they haven’t talked to in years. The problem occurs when this agent of social interaction supplants “real-life” relationships.
Social tools – like Facebook and MySpace and those shady eight or nine low-traffic ones used by the emos and porn addicts – increase the quantity of interaction. You can talk to thousands of people, at any distance, at any time. Yet with increased quantity of interaction, the quality is decreased: You often have little attachment (or really, should have little attachment) to people you don’t physically interact with, and it’s harder to learn about others from their Facebook profiles. The net result, if you’re not careful, can be thousands of relationships that do little to enrich your life. At best, they keep you occupied, and humanity can become like television.
This analysis still isn’t entirely accurate. Although Internet networking could, in theory, overrun real-life interaction and replace it, they can more often help make actual friendships. If you think about it, and you’re in my demographic, chances are at least one of your close friendships was initially developed through one of these superficial interfaces.
Interestingly, the best thing about Facebook might be the degree to which it limited users’ ability to customize their profiles. Unlike its older compatriot MySpace, Facebook still does not allow users to change the color or typeface specifications of their personal profile, and they have a limited ability to screw around with its layout. While many people see this as encumbering, it does have the effect of keeping your Facebook profile from “becoming you,” and personalizing itself to the degree it replaces your “real-life” individuality. Facebook instead can serve as a simple directory (a “facebook,” perhaps) that only references your individual character rather than supplant it. In the last year, with the addition of “Applications” and the expansion of Facebook’s networks, this has become less so, but is still significantly more restraining than News Corporation’s MySpace.
Facebook and MySpace do present an interesting civil liberty problem, that of self-surveillance. If you proposed, hypothetically, for the Eugene police to pay students to go to a party and photograph underage drinking, the use of illicit substances, and the knowing violation of whatever other laws, we’d be outraged. The concept would be considered an incredible violation of privacy by authorities, and I bet people would call immediately, and reasonably, for restrictions. But what’s interesting is that if you allow people to do this for free, and even make money off of a program where people can post their pictures for police review, the outrage, I think, is less significant. Agency is a factor: When you’re documenting illegal behavior “for” the police, it’s certainly different than sharing pictures with your friends.
It’s still risky. There have been reports of employers using MySpace and Facebook pictures in reviewing potential employees, and though I pity the hot-shot business exec who Calvinistically turns down the next Bill Gates because they rolled a spliff in college, it demonstrates the intrusion these sites could pose. While people are posting pictures of themselves for “the whole world” to see, I don’t really think they support a Big Brother government.
The distribution of pictures implies a trust, which implies a privilege, which shields the privacy of those photographed. This must be considered both by nonchalant picture-posters and overzealous authorities looking to use them. I think people should take responsibility for their actions, but we shouldn’t allow these pictures to become an expanded government presence in personal lives. Many authoritarians might say “if you don’t want it photographed, don’t do it,” but that’s not really the world we want to live in, is it?
Facebook does have a place in our world. It’s not all bad. It keeps us in touch with those we don’t see often. It allows us to coordinate events more easily, and it can even help develop real friendships. Let’s just not let it substitute for a real social life.
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