Social Media, Self-Control, And Taking Responsibility
On the local news here in Chicago I just saw a story about how Facebook is “ruining this teen’s life.” The teenager featured in the story is apparently spending hours and hours on the site and her and her parents have had to resort to draconian measures to break this “terrible addiction.”
This type of news story INFURIATES me. My simple response to this sort of story is: if you taught your children some self-control, and or urged them to develop a variety of hobbies with which to spend their time, this wouldn’t happen.
The angle taken in all these stories is that the website, in this case Facebook, is the oppressor and the teenager is the victim. Facebook (or Twitter, MySpace, or whatever) needs to stop being blamed for this sort of problem. One of the main reasons I get so worked up about this is that these stories present a skewed perspective of these sites. You never hear about the positives that can be had from these sites, you only hear about the negatives, the “bad apples” if you will.
My biggest issue with this is that the stories always paint the child as the victim, and never suggest that, God forbid, maybe the child ought to take some responsibility for how they are spending their time. It is the child’s own fault that they’re spending six hours in front of Facebook, not the fault of the website.
The angle that many of these stories take paint Facebook as an evil service that is corrupting its users. Now for those of us who understand how Facebook works, and even are healthy Facebook users, we’re (most of us at least) able to see straight through this sort of story. The vulnerable ones though, are those who are not on Facebook and don’t know much, if anything, about what the service actually entails. Lets be honest too, this is usually an older demographic of the population which, lo and behold, is also the demographic that is much more likely to be watching the local evening news on television. So in a way, the networks are catering to their audience, but what they’re catering is the perpetuation of a cycle characterized by misinformation and biased perspectives.
So what are the positives of these sites that I seem to be implying? Well, let me offer two examples, one broad and one more specific.
First of all, Facebook. The amount of people that I’m able to keep in contact with via Facebook is exponentially greater than the number with which I would be able to without the service. And this is especially true with my constant moves all over the world over the past several years. For example, you stay closer with, and more informed about, the casual friends you develop in an intimate environment, such as college or a job, after you have moved on from that campus or workplace. You’re not only able to just keep in contact with and share things with your closest friends, but you’re able to cast your net wider. You’re also able to find common interests or pursuits with people who you might not have ever imagined you’d share something with. Facebook allows you to have a wider social network, it might not be extremely deep, but it will definitely be wider. It’s up to you to develop and nurture those deeper relationships on your own.
And second, Twitter. The question “What are you doing?” simply doesn’t do Twitter justice. It is one way to use the service, but it’s one of an almost infinite number of ways. A little less than a year ago, I had just purchased a piece of software called Coda at full price, only to see a week later that the company was offering a 50% discount on all their products. I was a bit annoyed, but wrote it off just to bad timing. I also happened to, almost in passing, write something about it on Twitter. Not that long after, I got a message on Twitter from someone at the software company, Panic Software (who make GREAT stuff, btw), saying that they could price match for another week or so. I emailed them about it and got the 50% discount. All just because of a seemingly innocent tweet.
In the end, the message I’m trying to convey is one of exercising self-control and taking taking responsibility for your time and how you spend it. A tall order, I know, but one that we can all work on.