Print this story |
E-mail story |
This story has 10 comments Add your own |
iPod friendly | Bookmark this
What is this?
Do you have face friends or Facebook friends?
Published Friday, September 4, 2009
I grew up in a small West Alabama town. It wasn’t exactly Mayberry, but it was pretty close.
In the early 80s, the Internet was still just a bunch of blips on some college main frame computer.
There were no cell phones. My family had just rid itself of the party line. Our community had just been hooked up to cable.
There was little crime and few headaches, it seemed.
Sounds ideal? Well for a 12-year-old going through puberty, Carrollton was not so much idyllic as it was boring.
Not much happened. We had no movie theater. The town had no fast food restaurant. We didn’t even have a town drunk like Otis in Mayberry. Our county was dry.
And in a town of less than 1,000 people, you could count the number of friends you had on one hand, maybe two.
Maybe that is why everyone knew so much about each other. The only real form of entertainment most of the time was talking.
In the post office, in the grocery store, on front porches and back porches people could be spotted detailing their daily lives through chatting. People connected.
For a pre-teen all that talking was pretty stifling. All that connecting was limiting. Forget Mayberry. There was a much bigger playground in which to explore and have fun out there in the real world.
Flash forward 30 years. The Internet has long escaped the university laboratory. Cell phones are no longer a luxury.
The ability to connect with almost anyone in the world in mere seconds is no longer a vision of the World’s Fair — it is a reality.
So if we have all of these wonderful devices with which to connect, than why does it seem we are less connected as a society today than we were 30 years ago?
I joined Facebook with a little prodding from a co-worker a few years ago. At first, I didn’t think much of it. Occasionally I would check my homepage to find out who requested that I become their Facebook friend. By doing so I gave them access to see the photos and messages that I posted about myself.
Slowly it became this obsession to peek in on the lives of my friends unannounced. After all, I gave them access to do the same. Forget knocking, just come right on in and see what I have posted for you to read.
To date I have 168 friends. I love it — check on them most days.
But there are times when I have this nagging sense that something is missing. To tell you the truth, I know little more about my Facebook friends today than when I connected with them online.
Yes, it is thrilling to suddenly find a long-lost high school friend or a former co-worker.
And yes, I do share pictures of my new son with those friends who need a cute baby fix.
But I rarely contact any of them face to face. The whole process seems detached — like reading notes posted on your front door that begin with the words, “Sorry I missed you …”
With the Internet and cell phones, it seems as if the world is going at such a fast pace that true face-to-face contact has been replaced with e-mails, visual voicemail and Twitter messages.
When we are together, most of my friends stay buried in their Blackberries, iPhones and laptops. Life is a constant stream of text message beeps it seems.
It makes we wonder if the boring Mayberry days of sitting on the porch and talking with your friends is not so boring after all.
That’s the true face-to-face contact that seems to be missing.
Ben Hillyer is the Web editor of The Natchez Democrat. He can be reached at 601-445-3540 or by e-mail at ben.hillyer@natchezdemocrat.com.
Comments
Posted by gemccull (Gary McCullars) on September 4, 2009 at 2:24 a.m. (Suggest removal)
Well, Ben, that was the good old days! :>)
Posted by beammeupscotty (anonymous) on September 4, 2009 at 7:20 a.m. (Suggest removal)
This must be the new defination of friend,someone you have never met,know nothing about and could be lieing about everything. Be careful out there Ben, these are not really friends. On another note my Granddad always said the less people know about you and what you have the better off you will be.
Posted by southernbelle (anonymous) on September 4, 2009 at 8:49 a.m. (Suggest removal)
Your Granddad was right. Low profile. None of us really do that on these comments. Myself included.
Posted by 2008 (anonymous) on September 4, 2009 at 9:48 a.m. (Suggest removal)
You don't need to be low profile if you are anonymous.
My friends have my phone number and email address if they want to contact me, don't most people?
Posted by beammeupscotty (anonymous) on September 4, 2009 at 10:08 a.m. (Suggest removal)
I think with facebook you use your real name and some give out information about their families. Besides just how anonymous are we really.
Posted by freedom42 (anonymous) on September 4, 2009 at 2:09 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Any posting on the internet could be dangerous. Remember the family who found the Christmas photo of themselves being used on an ad in Europe, or the baby who was supposedly up for adoption on Craigs List? I have given out more info of myself and family than I should have on this site, to my dismay, but I would never post photos anywhere on line. Just sent a jump-drive with photos to my daughter with pictures I took of her baby last week and and she told me that they got the envelope but someone had ripped into it and stolen the drive. That makes me very nervous, because her address was on it. I hope it was accidental.
Posted by iluvntz2 (anonymous) on September 4, 2009 at 10:21 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Great article. Wouldn't it be nice to sit and visit with friends where no one texts or talks on the cell phone?
Posted by Crabbe (anonymous) on September 5, 2009 at 8:03 a.m. (Suggest removal)
I am interested in knowing why people need instant communication all day every day and all night every night.
Before cell phones there was a bit of effort to get a message, but it probably had some importance. I even see Priests hugging their phones as if they were their only lifeline.
Posted by Kaintuck (anonymous) on September 5, 2009 at 9:57 p.m. (Suggest removal)
It is warm here in Mississippi, but nothing like it was prior to the advent of air conditioning in the 1950s. However, the pre-air conditioned country had more neighbors out on porches talking with each other in the evening and the community was stronger as a result of that natural socializing. Television and air conditioning have had a tremendous negative impact on socialization in this country. Drive down any road after sundown and check-out the number of folks staring blankly, mesmerized by the blue light of their television at night. It is spooky - like invasion of the body snatchers - the way folks sit there frozen. Surely, that is not what we were meant for....
Posted by thelorax (anonymous) on September 20, 2009 at 7:16 a.m. (Suggest removal)
iluvntz2; Would be great to be able to sit and chat with friends.Those of us who were military brats and have grown up wondering what happened to all their friends from all over the USA are THRILLED to have facebook. I have even found my best friend when I was seven years old and living on Elmendorf AFB. My family moved 6 times during my childhood years. ALL over the United States, including Alaska and Bermuda? Would I trade those times that I had with my Mom and Dad? Not for a bazillion bucks.
Facebook is a great way to re-connect with old friends and sometimes make new ones.
Just like anything else on the internet you have to be careful, just wise up and read all the warningl
Post a comment (Terms of Use Policy)
(Requires free registration.)