Jaybird gets honors for the comment of the day:
Anyway, don’t expect *TOO* much of me on Facebook. I’ve promisciously friended people. Not in the “please help me and get a free cow” sense of the word, but I’ve friended:
High School Friends
Current Friends
Work Friends
and
RelativesSome of these people are evangelical christians. Some of them are evangelical atheists. Some of them are flaming lefties. Some of them are unreconstructed reactionaries. This means that I can’t say so much as “Happy Easter! Eat the ears of your chocolate bunnies first!” without starting a fight.
The first comment would be “Easter isn’t about chocolate or bunnies, Jay. Christ is Risen! CHRIST IS RISEN INDEED!”
And the second comment would be “HOPE YOU ENJOY YOUR MITHRAIC FERTILITY SYMBOLISM!”
And, god knows, the third comment would be “I haven’t had any chocolate since I found out I was diabetic! I am hurt that you weren’t more sensitive in your status today.”So I generally just talk about movies or videogames or trivial crap about the state of my day.
According to some quiz I took, about half of my friends (that filled out the profile entry) lean in one direction and about a third lean in the other direction with the final sixth being libertarians or other. I don’t know the Christian/Athiest/Other distribution, but I’ve got some loud members of each of the first two. Nearly everybody hates the BCS except one… and, of course, me.
I’m finding Facebook upsets me nearly as much as real life.
Comment by Sheila Tone — December 19, 2010 @ 11:48 pm
My wife and I are yellow dog Democrats. My mother is a fervent member of the religious right. My wife got so irritated with my mother’s comments to her posts that she unfriended my entire side of the family. That was bad enough, but she compounded the error (against my advice) by sending everyone an email saying that she unfriending everyone for unexplained reasons. This caused a great deal of hurt feelings, so she refriended them. I hate Facebook.
Comment by Kevin — December 20, 2010 @ 10:36 am
Sheila, at least with Facebook, I can ignore the ugly comments that Friends don’t realize apply to me. Much more awkward in person when people make comments not realizing that not everyone with them disagrees. On the other hand, I think people seem to take more care in watching what they say in person.
Facebook really needs a “Boo!” button.
Comment by trumwill — December 20, 2010 @ 12:38 pm
Kevin, I know that there are ways to filter out which messages to go to whom. I’ve been pondering this for comments that I don’t want my family to read. It can certainly make things complicated. I seem to be one of the relatively few people that feels sympathy when I read stories about people getting burned (career-wise) by messages they put on Facebook.
Comment by trumwill — December 20, 2010 @ 12:40 pm
I would never put political posts on a social network site; why offend family and friends?
Curiously, it has been my experience that it is almst always the more left-wing people who feel free to put up political posts, expecting that everyone in their network shares their views.
Comment by Maria — December 20, 2010 @ 3:00 pm
It’s my experience that, among the educated and intelligent, conservatives are generally more aware that their views are really unpopular in some circles. They’ve gone to college (few of which to conservative colleges and even then the faculty doesn’t match the student body) and consumed entertainment media reinforcing the point.
Comment by trumwill — December 20, 2010 @ 3:41 pm
Kevin: My wife got so irritated with my mother’s comments to her posts that she unfriended my entire side of the family. That was bad enough, but she compounded the error (against my advice) by sending everyone an email saying that she unfriending everyone for unexplained reasons.
Was she a retard when you married her, or was there a horrible accident afterwards that made her that way?
Maria: Curiously, it has been my experience that it is almst always the more left-wing people who feel free to put up political posts, expecting that everyone in their network shares their views.
I don’t find that to be curious at all; I think that is par for the course.
Comment by Mike Hunt — December 20, 2010 @ 4:40 pm
Mike, beyond the line. Spouses and family members need to be off-limits. Beyond which, we all make mistakes.
Comment by trumwill — December 20, 2010 @ 5:02 pm
Spouses and family members need to be off-limits.
Fair enough. Name-calling may have been inappropriate. In my defense though, he brought her up.
The general point is that Facebook is more trouble that it is worth, IMHO. Dear people from my past, if I am not keeping in touch with you, there is a reason. It is almost as if people go to to work, then come home and do data entry and webmastering as a second job for no pay.
Comment by Mike Hunt — December 20, 2010 @ 6:23 pm
Mike,
I’d be offended by your comment, but I make it a point not to take seriously anything said by someone whose alias is a phonetic version of a crude slang term for a woman’s genitalia. I long for the day when I can post under an oh-so-clever moniker like “Hugh Jacock.”
Comment by Kevin — December 20, 2010 @ 8:06 pm
Kevin: I long for the day when I can post under an oh-so-clever moniker like “Hugh Jacock.”
I have to admit, I laughed at moniker. I would have spelled the last name Jakok, though.
Other monikers I like are Jim Shoo, Ben Dover, and Heywood Jablome.
Comment by Mike Hunt — December 20, 2010 @ 10:55 pm
I’m still not on Facebook. Part of the reason is because it seems like an internet version of a high school reunion.
What do I say to my high school associates when they ask what I do for a living? “Yeah, I work in a factory that used to have 600 people in it but is now down to 170 people. I’m essentially waiting to get laid off.”
And then there are the pics. Use a 20 year-old photo of myself and get busted for it, or use a recent one and hear people says, “Jesus, you look like hell”?
It just seems like too much stress.
Comment by Kirk — December 20, 2010 @ 11:38 pm
My facebook picture is actually almost twelve years old. Given that it’s me in junior high, I don’t think anyone thinks that I am trying to fool anyone.
Comment by trumwill — December 21, 2010 @ 1:17 am
In comment 11, I meant I laughed at that moniker.
Comment by Mike Hunt — December 21, 2010 @ 5:27 am
Mike,
Glad you’ve got a sense of humor. I’ve got one too. In response to your original question, my wife still hasn’t fully grasped the complexities of dealing with my family on issues relating to religion and politics. Just before we got married, she had a conversation with my brother’s wife, who told her she was going to hell because she was a Catholic. This completely freaked her out. My oh-so-helpful response was to say, “Don’t you know better than to discuss religion with my family?” The same is true of politics. I wish she would ignore my mother’s comments to her Facebook posts, but she just can’t seem to let it go.
Comment by Kevin — December 21, 2010 @ 8:18 am
I had to defriend my cousin-in-law’s soon-to-be ex-wife. A family email went out urging us to do so, so what could I do.
Wait, Will, you were in junior high only 12 years ago?!
Comment by Sheila Tone — December 22, 2010 @ 12:47 am
In Willspeak, 12=20.
Comment by trumwill — December 22, 2010 @ 1:10 am
@Maria: I’ve noticed the same thing, lefties have an aggressive confidence in expressing and even pushing their views, while righties tend to be far more polite/measured
Comment by Escapist — December 23, 2010 @ 9:10 pm