Is Facebook upsetting the natural balance of the universe?
So the other day, my husband Dave said, “Facebook is disturbing the natural order of the universe.”
I looked at him curiously, “How so?” I asked.
“Well because it’s causing all these social realms to collide… I left all these high school friends back in High School… It isn’t normal to be reconnecting with so many people.”
“Actually,” I said, “if you think about it… that is more the natural social order than the one we currently live in.”
“How so?” he asked
“Well before the global economic marketplace started dispersing people around the planet… it was more likely that you would have stayed in touch with those people you grew up with. It’s more unnatural to have like 20 different social circles. Not only that, but it could be beneficial to be reconnected to your past… it helps you create and form your own narrative.”
Dave rolled his eyes. He hates it when I use jargon, “But these people don’t know who I am now… how can that be helpful? They only know what I used to be.”
“But that’s an important piece of who you are now.”
“Yeah but… I’m not the same person now.”
“But your not the same person ‘now’ than you were a year ago. Perhaps you have friends in your social circle now who still remember you as the person you were a year ago rather than know you as the person you are now.”
“I suppose…” he hates it when I make a valid point.
this is a great one! I’m not on Facebook – I only have so much time – but I had this experience with classmates.com about a year ago. I didn’t WANT to be in touch with people from high school. I deliberately left that somewhat provincial school and reinvented myself in college. Used to be called “coming into one’s own” or “blooming” or some damn thing.
but your discussion with Dave can be seen as an interesting take on the buddhist idea of the self. I have read a great Zen writer discuss how there is no “solid” self. He notes that a woman answers the door. Her husband sees a wife. She turns to talk to her child; he sees a mother. the phone rings; she picks it up and she is a daughter. She is all of these, but not only any of them.
so “who” is she? All and none. Who is Dave? the boy his high school friends new, the guy his friends know now, and someone else to a random person on the street. Also, the narrative we construct of who we are is notoriously unreliable. It is a constuct, but one that constantly changes – a very fluid construct. And that construct is seen differently by every viewer.
In the end, I agree that Facebook provides another fascinating way to explore the construct of self in modern society. How we construct our “selves” seems to be changin at a lightning pace. What will we learn about what a “self” really is?