To suggest that habitual obsession with facebook is socially dysfunctional?

[JellyBilly]

Ok, so have name changed for this so as not to offend anyone I know!

As a secondary school teacher I see many adverse consequences that facebook and other social media can have on kids and their self esteem. However more recently, I am becoming more annoyed with some of my 'grown up' friends and colleagues and how they use it. For some of them, I would say they seem to be living quite a big part of their life through it.

I have one friend in my network that seems to update status at least every 40 minutes or so. Posts pictures of road signs, plates of food, checks in here there and everywhere, train stations, bars, restaurants, even walking the dog.

I'm not sure whether to be more concerned about their apparent need to share every moment of the day with the hundreds of people they are connected with, or the sheer amount of people that 'like' everything posted or manage to comment on it with such frequency.

Frustrations growing, I then went out for diner with a facebook friend I have not seen for a while on Saturday, only to find that having taken our photo at the table, checked us in at the restaurant on FB and posted the picture, she then proceeded to spend the rest of the night and most of Sunday morning constantly checking FB on her phone! Rude!

Is it unreasonable to say that I just don't care what my FB friends and family are doing or where they are at every minute of every day? That I refuse to get drawn into becoming obsessed over content from people who are invariably either trying to 'show off', be funny, are constantly seeking approval, or obsessing over what everyone else is posting?
For otherwise stable adults with real relationships in the real world I don't understand the obsession?

Surely one can't invest all that emotional energy in constantly checking and responding on what others are doing or telling the rest of the world what they are doing or where they are and constantly checking for responses or acknowledgement, without it having a detrimental impact on the people around them in real life?

Is there something wrong with these people or AIBU?

[SaucyJack]

I went to a family party last week. One person took a short video on their smartphone, posted it up online and then everyone else sat around watching a video of themselves at a party...... whilst still at the party.

Surreal.

[MummyWrongHQ]

Oh SaucyJack. I'm in awe of you. You couldn't have summed it up any better.

Something has gone wrong. Discuss...

[Thatisall]

meal on more than one occasion it has been via one of these hospital check ins that I have discovered that a close family member is in hospital!

Now that's detachment!

[hyenafunk]

Yanbu. It is incredibly destructive. It causes so many frictions and problems between people who otherwise had strong relationships, it even makes you question whether you like people anymore seeing the crap they post on there . It's also easy to become insecure and feel like people are avoiding you purposely etc.

I deleted my FB over two years ago now and have never regretted it. Friends were nagging me to go back for ages so I tried it out in the summer and it was awful. I only lasted a month before deleting it again. I just ended up detesting people I thought I liked and it made me feel very insecure and shitty.

I have Twitter and Instagram but I don't mind them because they're a lot less personal and you don't get this constant oversharing. I also think it's more successful for me because I don't really have anyone I know on there . I just enjoy having a giggle at Hugh Laurie tweeting about goats' intelligence tbh.

[intitgrand]

YAB a bit rich!!
take another shot of MN OP!!!

[biryani]

I've never used it, and don't really understand why other people do, particularly when there are other forms of communication that are as effective. If something is interesting enough to be communicated, then there are many ways of doing it.

I have a friend who uses it to keep tabs on her adult son. He has a job, a flat, a life of his own. Surely he can go about his business without his movements being scrutinized by his mother?

[passedgo]

Slangking that's a good anslysis of fb, I am probably one of those older people, but I am one step further down the line from you.

I have found that the people who are really truly interesting have stayed. The ones that are scared to post in case their boss sees are not the kind of people I want as friends anyway. I don't see the point of friends that don't share, and the ones that don't like sharing, leave.

I have found it interesting to find out what people are really like, we can all talk and show off, but over time on Facebook you find out who people really are, their politics, religion, families.

[TheFabulousIdiot]

I wanted to come back to say that I have considered deleting my facebook because of posts like the one from hyenafunk and that IS because, on occasion, I have used it in a destructive way (passive aggressive posting of pictures to express my pissed-offness at DH) and it's done me no favours. I have 'friends' on my facebook that I wish weren't on there but can't delete because of the politics involved. There's enough I DO like about Facebook to keep me on there.

However I think I use it more responsibly now, every post I make I think about who to limit the audience to. I don't think it's made me any more socially disfunctional than I already was and perhaps that is why the original post annoyed me a bit...

I just think that there's something a bit arse over tit about criticising facebook and the people on it if you are on it and using it yourself.

[babyfedleaning]

I find habitual checking of MN is becoming a bit of a problem...!

[ZooTimeIsSheAndYouTime]

I agree with much of what you say Jelly. I can see it's a good tool, a great way to share stuff, but for some many? it's morphed into something very strange.

[EBearhug]

It's a tool. There's no obligation to post every breath of your life, and you can hide or even block the posts of those who do. You can also control who sees your updates, so if you have them open so your mother can track your life when you're an adult, either you're happy with that, or you fix your settings. And if it's really private, then you want a different form of communication than FB anyway.

It is great for keeping in touch with people all round the world. Some people respond more to FB than email or real letters or whatever.

And I suspect the sort of person who spends every moment on FB would do the same with something else, were it not available.

[ZooTimeIsSheAndYouTime]

biriyani 'I have a friend who uses it to keep tabs on her adult son. He has a job, a flat, a life of his own. Surely he can go about his business without his movements being scrutinized by his mother?'
Yes! Things like that are odd to me too. It's like living someone elses life vicariously through a screen I don't use FB either. Nothing about it appeals to me, which seems to confound people. I have no interest in keeping up with someone I lost contact with 30 years ago at school. If the relationship was important I'd have kept it up. But people come and go in your life that's normal. Collecting every soul you ever knew into one virtual chat room about yourself makes my hair stand on end. What would an ex boyfriend from yonks ago have in common with my fil for example? You'd never put all those people together in rl, well I wouldn't (Sorry for lack of paragraphs my stupid Return key wont work)

[myalias]

Went on a hen night recently and our table all over 40's chatting and laughing having a good time. The table next to us, part of our hen party, mainly under 30's all looked miserable not speaking just sat there staring at their iphones

[ZooTimeIsSheAndYouTime]

Can I just ask though..if you hide or block someone on your FB do they know you have done so? If they then know you've rebuffed them, doesn't that potentially cause friction next time you bump into them?

[goldnsunsets]

very interestuing point op. there is certainly something compulsive about the way some people use fb - it seems like they are using it as a tool to create an image of their own life, which they can have control over and disseminate to others.

[goldnsunsets]

what about repeatedly checking mumsnet to see if someone has replied to your original post or name checked you in a debate - is that similar? is it about some kind of self-representation and reward system?

[BackOnlyBriefly]

Yanbu

I think the most telling criticism of facebook obsession that's been pointed out is that people miss the actual experience of the event or the company of friends because they spend the entire time posting about it.

[Mintyy]

I think you make a very good point op. I am older (51) and most of my facebook friends use it intelligently and can go days or weeks without looking at it, but I do wonder about the impact it will have on my children when they finally persuade me to let them have an account.

[TheFabulousIdiot]

"Can I just ask though..if you hide or block someone on your FB do they know you have done so? If they then know you've rebuffed them, doesn't that potentially cause friction next time you bump into them?"

I have put a whole load of people on a restricted list. This means they can only see what I post 'publicly' - that is you have various options of who to post to like 'friends' or 'public'. Public means anyone on your list can see it (And anyone who finds you too I think because FB is removing a setting which meant people couldn't search you by name).

The people who are 'restricted' are not counted as 'friends' ...

to answer the question, to be honest I don't give two fucks about what people think about my restrictions and I don't care if people restrict me because it's up to each user what they decide to share and who they share it with as much as it's up to each user to decide what they see or who they are friends with.

Honestly, if someone on my friends list questioned me in 'real' life about why they can't see stuff I would jut tell them because that's how I want it to be and what's the problem!

[SDTGisAnEvilWolefGenius]

Like many things, Facebook is a good tool, but a bad master. I have used it to reconnect with old school friends and university friends. It was used, only recently, to organise my nursing set's 30 year reunion. I get a lot of social interaction from it - it isn't my only social interaction, but I am often at home alone for the day - dh is at work, ds3 is at school, and the other two dses are away at University - and the dogs, lovely though they are, are not brilliant conversationalists, so I get social interaction from here and from FB - and for me, that is a good thing.

I remember sitting at home with a young baby, basically feeling all alone, with no company except the TV. Baby groups, and wandering round the shops only took up so much of the day, and the rest of it would stretch before me, empty and quiet and lonely - and I am sure that exacerbated my PND (as well as the PND making it harder for me to get out and socialise - a vicious circle).

I still have depression, and still struggle to get out of the house and find people to interact with - and it is still true that the things I do (knitting group, feltmaking group, choir, seeing friends) only take up so much of the day, and the rest could seem very empty, but FB and MN do fill that gap for me. I have made some wonderful friends just through MN and FB - some I have met in r/l, others I haven't - but I consider the friendships to be just as real.

[EBearhug]

if you hide or block someone on your FB do they know you have done so?

No, except if you are both on a conversation with s mutual friend, and you see comments like, "Oh, Person-who-blocked-me, that's so true!" and you wonder vaguely what the comment you can't see actually said. The person who has done this with me isn't someone I care about, and the main reason I know I'm blocked is that she publically announced she was blocking everyone she hadn't met in person. We have actually met in person, but no matter - she's got a lot of issues, not just this. It's just occasionally frustrating, like a griup conversation where you can't make out what someone at the far end of the table says. It must be just as annoying for her, as she can't see anything from me, either.

But it certainly has the potential to cause strife, and if someone close to me did it, it would upset me, and I'd be mailing them to see if they're okay and why they're withdrawing and if they're fine, wondering how I upset them or whatever, though I doubt I'd have the nerve to ask that outright for fear of seeming needy and paranoid...

[EBearhug]

what about repeatedly checking mumsnet to see if someone has replied to your original post or name checked you in a debate - is that similar?

I think it's definitely related, yes.

[DuckToWater]

I quite like people who are slightly socially disfunctional though. :)

[SizeMatters]

As an academic in the discipline of sociology, I have been involved in a number of studies seeking to understand the impact that social media can have on social and emotional well being.

There have been a number of academic studies on facebook in particular. The most recent by the University of Michigan in August this year.

All of these studies have concluded that the greater the frequency with which a individual engages with facebook, either checking or interacting, the more detrimental the impact on the persons emotional well being.

All studies concluded that the persistent and habitual use of facebook related to, and in turn exasperated, underlying issues of depression, narcissism and insecurity.

guardianlv.com/2013/08/facebook-causes-depression-new-study-says/

[JustAWaterForMePlease]

I definitely think I'm guilty of this. Not necessarily Facebook per se, but habitual phone-checking. And what many of you have said is right - it's checking. Not actually doing anything, just looking - it's passive. And, if I'm honest, hoping for some sort of contact, whether it's a notification or an email, in a self-gratifying way.

Having identified it's a problem, I suppose I need to do something about it. I think the suggestion up thread of no screen-time when in the company of real people is a good one. I'll implement that to begin with and see how I go!