Facebook, Myspace, and Texting or the Scourge of Youth

Ah, technology. Never have people felt so near and yet so far away, thanks to the advent of the internet and cell phones and their wide availability and relative cheapness to the average consumer. However, there's something wrong with this whole scenario of connection and social networking that bothers me. I'm going to try and put my finger on it.

Maybe starting with a scenario would be good:

1. Text Angst = Waste of Mental Energy

So, I met a guy one St. Patrick's day and we hit it off. What a thrill, right? We exchanged numbers and enjoyed a couple days wandering around the city. After this real life, in-person relationship had expired, the more fruitful texting relationship started. Texting is designed for short attention spans, a quick glance in a meeting or between boarding a bus or subway car. The texts were often one-liners, witty quips and back and forths. A Saturday out on the town would prompt me to text him an innocent, "What are you up to tonight?" While I would do this, fighting off the warnings of my girlfriends to "play it cool" he would take his fine time responding. A text received at 2am saying, "Drankin." would prompt my friends to shake their heads. "Anytime after 2am is a pure booty call." What? Bars close at 4am in this here town, maybe it was just an invite?

More confusing then these unwritten rules of texting, was the cool and delayed responses I would receive from my correspondent. Texts are perhaps the laziest form of communication and if someone who you are supposedly "hanging out with" (the ambiguity of relationship terminology these days is the subject of another post entirely) can't muster a one or two word response, what hope is there for communication? Lastly, the angst these pauses would throw me into were unwarranted for the supposedly rational human being I take myself for. "Why oh why has he not texted me?" I would fret, it's been over a day. I would time the relative intervals of text exchanges. If he wrote 3 hours ago, is it necessary for me to respond, or at this point should I just ignore him until tomorrow.

Texting is illogical, apathetic, and doesn't amount to communication but rather a waste of mental energy. When you could be enjoying yourself out having drinks with friends, instead you flip open that obnoxious cell phone at every possible moment to check for an inevitably ineloquent response in three or four words, badly misspelled and reliably noncommittal.


2. Facebook Stalking = Waste of Time & Get in Line

Ah, when you have yet to exchange a number or even a glance, in the flesh, with your crush, Facebook is a convenient outlet for your romantic restlessness. A quick advanced search with name and location, if you should be so lucky to have these pieces of information, can whittle down the thousand plus search results into your crush him/herself. Then, if you are lucky enough (luck is very big in technology's supposedly staid support of modern stalking) their profile will be public. But if not, it's not the biggest embarrassment to friend them in order to view their profile. After all, people accept friend requests from strangers every day. It's de rigeur in this world where the number of friends you have online amounts to your relative worth as a person.

Once gaining access to their profile, you can learn their age, sex, and location, which you are probably well aware. More appealing is their relationship status, their many albums of drunken evenings and artsy shots taken with their overpriced MacBooks, lastly, you have access to the many inside jokes posted on their "wall" including messages from mom (because now Facebook is open to everyone) and cryptic messages from girls they met at parties ("Remember Me?"). Yuck, you think to yourself, I will never be that desperate person reaching out on Facebook to someone who most likely does NOT remember me. Instead, when you look at the clock, you will realize you've spent the last three hours obsessively paging through his Facebook albums and reassuring yourself that he has a lot more going for himself than the ability to do kegstands for 10 minutes.

Facebook, I will posit, is a classier joint than MySpace. And when it was closed to only college students, whatever you say of the elitism of this, it had a certain security attached to it. But now, Facebook has turned into a great outlet for the stalking lurker, who will sift through pages of inconsequential photos of their significant distraction rather than calling (since most FB profiles list all vital details, down to a person's address) or, shocking of all, interacting with them in real life.

3. MySpace = Ultimate Miscommunication

Last of all there is MySpace, which has to be the most populist platform for social networking, which is a grand euphemism for social disconnection and networking. Myspace is great when you want to listen to that song you've had in your head from days from the as of yet unsigned band you saw in a darkly lit room last night. However, MySpace is consistently one of the bigger blows to successful relationship building on any level due to its atrocious aesthetic and ability to view people's innermost and crudest thoughts.

Case in point, a one night stand prompts one girl to search out her guy on MySpace only to discover that under "Heroes" he's listed "Melanie, the love of my life" and is listed as "married". Is it better to figure out these crucial facts in the darkness of your home office or in person, I will leave that to the reader to decide.

Facebook stalking and MySpace stalking are borne of the same impulse, but MySpace somehow manages to unleash the less appealing sides of a person's nature. Not only will you find out all their sexual exploits and who they admire, you'll also learn that they have been unemployed for five years and one of their top friends is "Oriental Massage".

So, the above are a few examples of how social networking tools are actually tools for distancing and isolating people, in fact social alienating tools. There are many examples, and I encourage others to submit or comment on their own experiences in stunted communication via the supposed sophistication of today's communication tools.

A few more I can think of. The inherent delay and "talking over" each other that occurs in chat conversations.

me: I saw that the other night and though it was....
him: But I order pizza instead.
me: excellent. I mean so important.
him: Then I thought of you and...
me: I also love pizza.
him: I miss you. Do you miss me.

Agh, that doesn't even begin to encapsulate the level of mediocrity and profundity that takes place in a chat. Also the lack of inflection, the ins and outs of wifi connection. Sometimes it's just easier to send a letter because that's a one-sided conversation and the person is forced to "listen". That is if they can read.