Measuring life through “Likes” on Facebook!

Whilst one may sing paeans to the Internet and its contribution to knowledge and a global world, I am yet to be convinced about Facebook! The first jolt about this social media website was the discovery that it was manipulating its users by testing their emotions. Surprisingly, Facebook got off lightly! After the initial hue and cry, not many of its users protested or signed out. I might have been among the few, silent FB users who did so, but then I have always had a problem with this site and its style of operation. 

For instance, why would one’s faith in oneself have to be reinforced by the number of 'Likes' that one receives for a post?  And it is not as if it is only teenagers who are hankering after those 'Likes'. Adults of all hues also seem to crave for them, with some even spending sleepless nights ruminating over why a certain friend did not add a 'Like' to one’s very brilliant post!

Of course, the greatest casualty is one’s sense of privacy, as you are not sure who is clicking your photograph and putting it up, for the world to see! This social media site seems to have resulted in people losing their sense of proportion, or courtesy towards one another. I find myself asking people again and again, if they would be using my pictures taken at private gatherings, on FB.

This social media outlet seems to have turned us into something akin to mannequins up on display, needing to showcase our lives to the world at large. No sorrow is complete unless it is shared with the world. I still cannot get over the 'Likes' that follow after posts dealing with the loss of a dear one. For Heaven’s sake, leave a message, if you are indeed sorry about the person’s bereavement. There is something numbing about grief but Facebook seems to have numbed one’s senses, with the compulsion to use that “Like,” in any which way.

One’s love is not love unless the world knows how deeply I care for my spouse, daughter, mother, dog or cat, as all the sentiments are out there for public consumption. Attendance at an aunt’s landmark birthday or a friend’s housewarming is valueless in itself. One has to wait for the applause from the ubiquitous “Like” after the uploading of pictures, to make one realise one’s great achievement in what would have just been one’s duty in another era.

There appears to be something pathological about this dependence and obsession with FB. If one is going to spend a good part of one’s day popping in and out of one’s timeline, the fallout is bound to be felt in one’s real-life relationships. Look around you in a restaurant, in an airport, in a train and all you see are people punching away on their mobiles. Or, alternatively, they are holding up their cameras and clicking everything in sight!

Not enough of a study has been done to study the impact of FB on marriages or personal relationships. One knows of the mental devastation caused by a relationship ended via a FB post. There are instances, too, when the green-eyed monster has surfaced when the wife has “liked” a male friend’s status picture or the husband has commented on his friend’s wife’s sexy pose! 

So, is this digital interconnectedness of the social media a good thing or has it completely distorted the way that people have begun to think and view life? Given a choice, I would be very happy to “unlike” Facebook so that people would go back to liking each other, in real life!

The author is a Bangalore based writer