Thank you, Mark Zuckerberg!

I facebook too much. Signing in every hour, hoping for a shiny, red '1 new notification' (or inbox message if I'm lucky)-arghh, I'm going to HAVE to sign in right now!!-is facebooking too much. Feeling like an idiot when you haven't got any new notifications or inbox messages or friend requests or event invitations (application requests don't count in my book), and then logging out in disappointment, vowing to never visit the darned website again (WTH, it's been four whole hours and she STILL hasn't replied to my wallpost but she's had time to like all his pictures) is facebooking too much. Thinking about your next status update while you're supposed to be cramming for your C-language test is definitely facebooking too much. I hate it. But I can't stop. Sometimes I wonder if this is what being a smoking addict would be like. Going to bed promising to never ever EVER do it again, and in the morning you're still strong, but as the hours pass, and you come home cranky from work or school or wherever, you feel your pledge withering away. You just need cheering up, you tell yourself, you only want to stop feeling lonely, you reason. And there you go breaking another promise to yourself and undermining your trust in yourself as a person. Really, it’s very mentally unhealthy.

Facebook is destroying our social lives!! It gives us the impression that we're always connected to our old friends. Because if you want to know what's happening in their life, all you've gotta do is click on their profile, read through their wall, flick through the latest pictures they've been tagged in, and you feel like you've done all the catching up you need. My A level class hasn't had a reunion in two years (okay, so I guess that's partly because we didn't like each other very much), but STILL. Personally, I think it’s also because seeing my classmates fill my newsfeed with gratuitous details about their lives is more than enough. They're all there together, albeit virtually, and IF I ever wanted to talk to them, I'd know where to find them (seeing as the Facebook fad doesn't seem to be losing its popularity anytime soon). We're beginning to take people and the social experience for granted. There was a time, a few summers back, when I was always, always online (yes, more than I am now), and I had begun to crave one on one HUMAN CONTACT. You know where you actually sit next to a person, and talk to them face to face and can reach out and touch them if you wanted to?

And the most annoying (or interesting) thing of all is how Facebook has become a social competition, of sorts. Every status you put up, every page you like, and every photo you tag of yourself reflects how cool/popular you are. Facebook’s given the human race a platform to do what we do best, and that is showing off. Apparently, it wasn’t enough to have cliques in high school; the usual hot cheerleading squads and basketball guys head-dunking the less privileged nerds in the school toilets. No. We must also have the same scenes re-enacted on social networking sites. You don’t have 30 people liking your status, or writing on your wall? Wow, you must have no friends.

You haven’t updated your profile picture in six months? Dude, GET A LIFE.

One of my friends tried to assuage my fears of becoming a Facebook addict by asking me if I’d be facebooking every hour or so if I had better things to do. To that I replied with a firm NO, and then immediately felt horrible since I had basically admitted that I HAVE nothing better to do than Facebook. But it got me thinking. Maybe that’s why some people use social networking sites excessively. Maybe it’s because we aren’t involved in fulfilling, constructive activities. Maybe when I choose facebook over my textbook, I’m reasserting the cruel fact that I don’t love engineering all that much, and should really consider changing my discipline. Or maybe I’m blowing this way out of proportion.  

I’m sure I sound like a very confused person to you all. I’m not really one to talk; what, with me devoutly signing into Facebook every single day without fail.

But I am TRYING not to. I am trying to spend my time in fulfilling, constructive activities, like blogging, for instance. If I hate Facebook, it’s because I can’t stop Facebooking. Forgive me.