William Deresiewicz just published a long essay in the Chronicle of Higher Education that’s worth spending some time with: “Faux Friendship,” in which he traces how the concept of friendship has changed since classical times — it used to be an intense and serious matter; these days, not so much — and worries that social networking in general, and Facebook in particular, is accelerating a trend he perceives in our culture towards shallower friendships. More “friends” on Facebook, less engagement with friends in life. Or so the argument would seem to run.
[Click for more, we want your feedback!]Plus email has ensured that nobody ever writes a letter longer than a thousand words. “The 10-page missive has gone the way of the buggy whip, soon to be followed, it seems, by the three-hour conversation. Each evolved as a space for telling stories, an act that cannot usefully be accomplished in much less. Posting information is like pornography, a slick, impersonal exhibition. Exchanging stories is like making love: probing, questing, questioning, caressing. It is mutual. It is intimate. It takes patience, devotion, sensitivity, subtlety, skill—and it teaches them all, too.”
I agree with all this, except the notion that Facebook is somehow making us incapable of connecting “for real.” Long emails, long conversations, and hanging out with friends continue to be a part of my own life, after all.
What do you think? Has Facebook completely destroyed your capacity for intimacy? Or has Google made you too stupid by now to reach the end of this post?
Ironically enough, I learned about this essay because a previous contributor and friend of the Rumpus — somebody I probably wouldn’t have gotten to know without the mediation of Facebook, I might add — posted the link on her Facebook wall.
3 responses
Just the other day I wrote, on a dating/social networking site no less, a 3000+ word message as my end of an ongoing conversation about a book. It was well received. In fact, the most successful communications I’ve had on said site have almost always (while starting with the usual bullshit) ended up as exchanges of thousands of words even before jumping to email.
So, I’m not the normal guy – I write, I read like I breath, and I don’t know when to shut up and those are all qualities I like in others – but still. I see Facebook being used that way as well, and much of my FB circle are not “wordy” people.
People’s notion of friends, and what a friend is, may be lacking, but its not due to social networking tech. People, particularly when young, often make poor choices of “friend”. At worst, Faceborg, and Twitter make it easier for such “friendships” to sustain. These aren’t the friendships in which meaningful stories would be told anyway. And, eventually people usually learn what real friendship is, and isn’t – Those who can’t, still wouldn’t even without social networking.
Deresiewicz may have some good points, but his fears are somewhat extreme and smack of the stereotypical generational fears, “in my day” and “those darn kids”-ism.
This is an excerpt from a blog post I made several weeks (months?) ago…
It’s dawned on me repeatedly that, as much fun as social online areas can be, it can also become the mechanism for “friendship”—I can speak for a majority of the people I used to hang out with, see or talk to on a regular basis…it doesn’t happen anymore. The efforts not even there (and that’s on both sides of the fence). When you can read about their night out, their latest angst, their relationship status, and who knows what else is 5 seconds flat, why take the time to pick up the phone and actually talk to them? Heck, I realized that because of all that when I did talk to those people, we rarely had much to say to each other. Honestly, is that any way to nurture a friendship or relationship with someone else? Not for me it isn’t.
Because of this, I eliminated a majority of my FB friends who live near me and use it instead to communicate with people (friends and family) who live outside of my 1 hour willing to commute in a day area. Sadly, I’ve reached out to those friends I was feeling a disconnect with, but their view on this isn’t the same and they seem to prefer the impersonality of online communication in sound bites as opposed to a real life conversation over coffee or a beer. To each their own…
I’ve had a FB account for a few years. I was able to sign up when it was limited to college folks because I am an administrator. I think social networking websites can serve different functions depending on one’s generation and background. Sometimes I meet students at college events and discover the next time I visit my computer that they have friended me. Typically, I will accept their friend requests unless there is some conflict of interest. Very few of my FB friends fit into this category. I have several family members (siblings, cousins, aunts and uncles) and colleagues I have met at work or through professional networking. This year I have reconnected with some folks I had not seen or communicated with for 10-15 years through FB. This has been gratifying. For me, using social network websites has enhanced the relationships that I had before we were FB friends. However, I have not developed meaningful bonds with anyone who I did not previously have some relationship before we were FB friends unless we have had the chance to get to know each other in person. There is a lot of useful and entertaining information on the internet that I like to share with my FB friends. I enjoy having a convenient vehicle to do so.
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