Three lifeless bodies lay there on my floor before me. They almost deserved a white chalk outline, but a part of me envied their status. A part of me wanted to lay there right beside them without a single worry. My cell phone was overheated and began to slow down again and I knew then that it was time to turn it off, take out the battery, and let it sit for a few hours. And so it lay there, with the battery and back cover beside it - dead. How lucky they were to just be off and not simply on standby or sleep mode. But we humans, can't ever be off in life. Because even when we sleep, the wheels in our minds never stop rolling. Sometimes we even wake up from a thought that came to us in a dream. We wake up because we were sleeping so lightly due to anticipation for or from something. Distracted from sadness, fear, happiness, excitement, nerves. It never ends. And I blame a large part to technology - especially with the invention of these smart phones. It only adds to the nervous anticipation as we now carry access to our e-mails and Facebook accounts in our pockets. And we sit there, checking and rechecking (even though there ARE notification lights and tones to let us know) our accounts to see if we received anything. And now, for the first time, it has really gotten to me. Sickened me to a point where I am debating disconnection - from most of the useless accounts.
I know I will sound like a psychotic girl from a romantic comedy describing how she is going to decide on whether a guy is right or not when I say that I am even working on the list of pros and cons about this deactivation process; but I am. After watching The Social Network a bigger jolt hit me than the one that had before about Facebook and its purpose and uses. And since then I've been going through the mental debate of deactivation. But after an even more recent event (long personal story) I have put action to this thought.
It began last year, when I left town for almost half a year. Staying in an area that didn't have strong internet access for five months taught me a few things. I was able to recover from the withdrawal I faced of not accessing Gmail and Facebook twenty-seven times a day. Then I learned that I could go days without even desiring to check my e-mails. Then I learned something even more meaningful. It all became easier because I was never receiving anything in the first place. And that is when it hit me. After the invention of so many technological gadgets and networks, humanity has evolved to a very scary and shallow mentality in which we measure our worth based on internet-made connections. And I will sadly but honestly claim that at one point I reached this level until that trip, where I learned how to rip myself from these connections as easily as Velcro. Slowly it became easier and more relaxing.
But taking the final step of deactivation was hard; hence the need for time and a list. From experience I know how painful the withdrawal of merely deleting someone from Facebook can feel; but how would it feel to delete myself? Every connection I've built? Then again, WHAT are these connections? Over 550 friends ... friends? Facebook must modify that term to acquaintances. It may make the process simpler and the actual Facebook environment more realistic.
And let's take a moment to review this environment that Facebook has created. The perfect metaphor for it would definitely be a clothesline and humanity can no longer resist. Everyone has the desperate need to air every piece of laundry they have - dirty, extremely dirty, possibly clean. Why? The metamorphosis we have undergone is beyond ridiculous and eerie. No one can take a photo without the thought in the back of the mind of, "Oh I hope it's good enough to be my new profile picture." We spend petty moments CONTEMPLATING a status message. Wording and rewording until we get it right - just right to hook every passerby to WANT to comment, "Like" or something. We cannot survive three days if a red flag does not appear in our notification space. We start to wonder, "Why am I not attracting anyone anymore?" "Why am I forgotten?" So you post. Update the status. Change the profile photo. Scroll down that agitating home page to find something to leave your fingerprints on in hopes of leading them back to you.
The breadcrumbs of desperation were once in my hands until I analyzed all of this. Did I need to seduce friendships and solicit attention from the worthy ones? Is that what I've succumbed to? The original reason and purpose for the activation of my Facebook account goes all the way back to my junior year in undergrad. One girl - one good friend - explained her eagerness to want to keep in touch and how Facebook would be the best. Back then I had an anti-social network attitude. After seeing the MySpace scandals and reputations, I steered clear of it all. But I explored Facebook (back before you were no longer allowed to skim through people and tour it) and found that it could be a possibility. One month later I was signed up.
There I was. Like a kid given $50 at a cheap candy store I went crazy. Uploaded photos. Kept the status fresh on every hour. Searching for "People I May Know" on a daily religious basis to extend that friend list. I floored it until the first wake up call let me slam the brakes on the insanity. A true story about a hacker and virus that happened to someone I knew; and the discovery that EVERY FILE (pix/dox) uploaded to the internet, EVEN IF DELETED, will remain in the world wide web data base eternally. It let me realize how much of a Facebook junkie I became and slowly I began deleting albums, deleting historic posts and comments, and trying to take a step back. "What was the purpose of Facebook for me?" I asked myself.
For the longest time I had no purpose for it; that was until my first official poetry book was published. The excitement ran through me as I held that book in my hand and found it available on top websites like Amazon and Barnes & Nobles and once again the Facebook bug bit me - but it was a smidge more sensible. I created the 91 at 19 group, uploaded photos of every poetry event created/attended and blasted the site everywhere I could. My intent was to advertise like crazy to boost sales and for a while I thought it was working. Until I realized that two years later, only three sales stemmed from the Facebook advertising. So was my excuse of "it's for my poetry" viable all this time? Tonight it didn't seem to be. Not when I looked back and found that Facebook brought me more drama than happiness - both on and offline!
But that devilish fear remained. The one that threatened me of how much connection I would eternally lose if I hit the deactivate button. No more ability to create and invite "friends" to events. Better yet, no more ability to RECEIVE invites (because for some odd reason we've all forgotten the usage of e-mails or REGULAR MAIL). No more ability to advertise blog, book, basic info. And the one most deceiving and tempting - no more ability to connect with all those people who tell you they miss you, want to see you, etc. but forget you if you lose internet access.
It was a scary thought as I recalled some of the rare but wonderful and memorable connections I've made on Facebook, but it was a painful enough reminder of how many weren't. I looked back at those lifeless bodies on my floor and laughed as I thought of the ridiculous irony that would be after I post this on my Facebook profile and somewhat anticipate people's feedback. But I guess that's one pro, that when I post and re-post and again re-post things as a reminder (because sometimes it takes people that long to notice), on my profile, people become somewhat aware about: My blog, my book, or an upcoming event related to the book. But then again, how many were benefiting from this info and was it worth keeping a Facebook account open?
The back and forth thoughts were making the already existing migraine worse. The idea that soon enough I would go into sleep mode myself, and the fact that I wasn't going to make the "To deactivate or not to deactivate" decision at the moment, were a relief. But as the night went on, I felt that deactivation was right; and that there had to be another way to advertise people's work. All I could remember now were quotes from the film The Social Network and they were angering. The deception. The scandals. The way we humans are so easily seduced and deceived without a care. We don't realize how quickly we slip into a mindset. And every time I think of this I remember my first and (hopefully) last trip to the Apple Store.
The way mankind evolved into some other species terrified me greatly as I waited in line to fix the Mac I regretted purchasing a year ago. The staff appeared to be born with an iPad glued to their left hands and an iPod in the right. Their trance like focus on the technology before them and the way their eyes widened as they scrolled down whatever page they were reviewing. And that's just the beginning. As I watched the consumers (perfect term here, as they consume the hypnosis of the producers), I felt the inhumanity. Each person hugging their Apple item like it were their child. Almost in tears at the potential idea of losing their iPhone 4. Carefully caressing the iPad. And I realized every one in line, including myself, had items that were fairly recent. And I wanted to slap myself for falling into the Apple mentality with a lapse in judgment as I bought this laptop. Apple was so clearly fooling us into buying their merchandise when it was flawed purposely so we could return and pay for repairs and parts. It made sense as I remembered that the CD port in my laptop broke two weeks after I purchased it. As I heard the man in tears standing before me, holding his brand new but defaulted iPod 4 like a dead pigeon in his hands. As I saw the mother and daughter carrying in the brand new box of their Apple touch computer and wondering what went wrong upon arrival. It was pathetic how inhumane we have let technology make us.
It's beyond true and I will leave you with two points of proof - in my opinion anyway:
Although technology MAY save us SOME things, like time (e.g. washing machine, typing vs. writing, etc.) it allows us to lose MANY things. Take note of how you do in a course when you type up the lecture notes during class versus writing them down by hand. It was always easier to go into an exam without massive studying when I wrote down the notes by hand; whereas the classes I typed in I found I had a harder time studying.
Lastly, I will never forget something a friend told me she learned from a speaker who discussed technological disadvantages. He wanted to prove how the dependency people have on technology actually retards them (and I mean that term in the proper sense, as in holds us back and ruins us). He took out a PDA/smart phone and a paper monthly planner. To check his appointments for June on the PDA/smart phone he had to (1) input the password to unlock it, click on menu, scroll to find tools, then scroll to find calendar, scroll to the month of June (if it wasn't June), and lastly click on each day to see what appointments were scheduled.
To check his appointments in the paper monthly planner, he opened to the month of June and saw all appointments listed clearly across one page. It was so simple but it got to me. I cannot believe how inhumane we have let ourselves become as we enslaved our functioning minds and hearts to the most shallow and tangible of things in this world. Just look at how much we freak out if someone doesn't respond to our texts/calls instantly! Yes, benefits can be born, but I cannot tell if they outweigh the problems they bring. Only the completed list I create will let me know!
