So, on January 1st of this year, I finally deleted Facebook. (Full disclosure, the other one is "deactivated" to keep the Messenger channel open for someone I’ve been trying to contact, but it is as good as deleted otherwise.) I was going to wait a month to see how I felt, but this seems like a good time as any.
I feel pretty good, overall. Especially with headlines like "Facebook Embraces Donald Trump" and "Mark Zuckerberg and Meta Are Finding New Ways to Kiss Trump’s Ass."
I no longer have a nagging feeling about checking feeds or messages– because they aren’t there. I’m less likely to doomscroll (or have quality doomscrolling with GroundNews). I’ve been pushed into actually using the other social media sites I’m already on, and found myself engaging a little more than passively sharing or quickly emoji reacting.
Also? FB made me lazy about keeping in touch. Why ask, if I could just check their page right quick? Or, I’d friend someone, and that’d be the end of our interaction and we’d see each other, probably, and assume we’ll always be there. But now if I want to know how someone is doing, I need to reach out!
The withdrawal symptoms have yet to set in, but I’m still expecting them. Despite my bitching I did stay on the platform. I suspect the one-foot-already-out-the-door mood I curated is helping with that. But grrl. Those dopamine hits are real.
I also feel a bit bittersweet.
I did make and bump my flounce-y post, but it gained little interaction. I sent messages to people I’d love to keep in touch with, and most were unanswered. Overall, I can count on one hand the number of people who asked where I was going. That didn’t feel great… it made me feel like I think far more about other people than the other way around. On the other hand… People had ample time to keep in touch with me– I’ve been threatening to leave Facebook for years. Most just never asked. Others were acquaintances or friends-of-friends, and I doubt I’d be terribly missed to them. And some people just… grew away from me.
Facebook made me forget about that fact of life. That prevented me from spamming my entire friend list of about 150 people. If it was meant to be something, I wouldn’t be wondering if I should throw my Links-in-Bio at them.
I should mention that there are some things I do miss: the rare trifecta of awesomeness support group, the OGs of a defunct group, and shitposting (needling) fellow hashers. But that isn’t enough to undelete. Those were the only groups I was real invested in beyond the "scroll to be amused" ones (Which reminds me, where’s Simpsons BortPosting? I’m sure I can find another hose of that particular content somewhere else).
To quote a coworker I used to work with, in all her wisdom:
It is what it is. Mrs. Cynth
During a party, I was using my eReader (yes, I’m that bitch). As predicted, a few people came up to ask me what I was reading, what I liked to read, and what they were currently into when they’re not being bookish at potlucks. I even traded StoryGraph links with someone! So that felt extra special, because it wasn’t obligatory, superficial Facebook.
Memes aside, I’ll be okay in the end.
