Why we unfriended Facebook
Earlier this week, socialite Amanda Brunker revealed she was the latest among the growing ranks of people who’ve turned their back on the social network. Amid a stock market meltdown and a growing backlash against Facebook’s methods, we talk to others abo
GIVEN the week that Facebook has had — seeing $120bn wiped off its stock market valuation — it probably didn’t notice one particular user ditching her account: but here, people did.
When socialite and newspaper columnist Amanda Brunker announced ‘I have just deactivated by Facebook account and I’m delighted with myself’, it seemed to epitomise a definite shift in the public’s attitude to the social media giant.
She’s not alone. Earlier this year, a number of stars, among them Kanye West, Adele and Justin Bieber, reportedly cut their ties with Facebook amid privacy concerns. It all started when the world’s largest social network upset users by mishandling data, which ended up in the hands of Cambridge Analytica — a political consultancy that worked on US President Donald Trump’s 2016 election campaign.
Actor Will Ferrell was among those to respond by ditching his account: ‘I know I’m not alone when I say that I was very disturbed to hear about Cambridge Analytica’s misuse of millions of Facebook users’ information in order to undermine our democracy and infringe on our citizens’ privacy,’ Ferrell wrote.
Then came the killer blow for many users: a Dispatches documentary on Channel 4 obtained undercover footage that showed Facebook moderators being told to leave horrific content online. The videos Facebook continued to publish included a grown man savagely beating a toddler; two schoolgirls fighting, with one ending up being battered senseless; and a man eating live baby rats for fun.
Angry users called for people to #DeleteFacebook, a hashtag which went viral. Here, we talk to some of the people who have walked away from Facebook in recent years about why they did it — and how it impacted their lives.
DUBLIN-BASED writer/ musician Dara Higgins likens giving up Facebook to ‘giving up the smokes, only less traumatic’. He says:
‘IT’S about breaking the habit. Five minutes to spare, a cup of tea, just don’t refresh that page. Read a book, check out the news, watch some videos on YouTube. After a while it stops being an automatic thought.
The downside is that people tell me about great gigs they went to that
‘My time online is now more enjoyable’
I’ve missed because no one told me they were on. It seems many independent organisations think a Facebook page is advertisement enough. In a digital sense, I’m living in a yurt up a cold hill somewhere so beyond the Pale, it doesn’t have a name.
It’s not isolating no longer being on FB, because it isn’t real people. Sure, I’m not in contact with Timmy from pre-school any more, but you know what, that’s grand. We weren’t that close.’
WEXFORD-BASED office manager Sinead O’Gorman, 43, originally found Facebook to be a great way to rekindle old friendships but soon found it started to cross lines that made her uncomfortable. She says:
‘I FINISHED college in the mid1990s, before email was common or mobile phones became ubiquitous, so Facebook was a great way to reestablish friendships and relationships. It helped reduce my isolation after the birth of my last two children. Initially I used to post photos of my children but stopped as other methods emerged.
Years ago I became uncomfortable with some friend requests — both those I had accepted and later regretted, and requests I received prompted by Facebook or people themselves. I was also uncomfortable with the way others laid their lives bare and sometimes could see vulnerability there.
I was aware that data relating to our social media use was being sold and making a lot of money for social media corporations.
It bothered me but I kind of felt defeated and thought, “what could I do about it?’ But once the Cambridge Analytica story broke, I had had enough.
I made an announcement and sent messages to a few people who used FB messenger to stay in touch. I swapped phone numbers with anyone who got back in touch.’
DUBLIN blogger Sinead Cuddihy (shiny blogging nonsense. blogspot. com) similarly fell out of love with Facebook over time. She gave up for a month before fully deactivating her account. She says:
‘I HAD deleted some “friends” — people I wouldn’t know if I passed them on the street but had been “best friends” with over the course of a hen weekend in 2011. I had others hidden from my timeline.
I wasn’t really posting anything any more and I was spending too much time scrolling and not getting anything from it.
I initially deleted the app from my phone and logged in via a web browser twice — once to look at photos of a friend’s wedding, another to check details of a funeral.
Since then, I’ve never looked back. The time I spend online, on social media, now is more enjoyable. I’d encourage anyone to do it, try it, see how you go.
You’ll keep in touch with the people you want to keep in touch with, there are other ways to share photos, and you might even actually meet up and be able to ask what they’ve been doing rather than knowing from Facebook.’
JEMMA DAVIS, 37, a social care worker from Wicklow, was instantly enamoured with the novelty factor of Facebook when she joined the site back in 2007 — but it it ended up leaving her worried about her mental health. She says:
‘LET’S be honest, it was a chance to see what everyone was up to. I remember my first status was when I was on holidays in California and I was bragging like nobody’s business. I thought it was fun, a bit of craic and a great way to communicate, and show off.
On the one hand I loved the keeping in touch/nosey factor but on the other hand it feeds into your late night crazy. I began to struggle personally with anxiety, paranoia and self-esteem, and this only fed into it. The comparisons about my life to others was eating me up.
This sounds dramatic but I honestly felt that it added to how I
was feeling. After I left, people were shocked that I did it, asking why. I told them I was no longer comparing myself to others, and I wasn’t concerned what people who I don’t see/socialise with we’re up to.
I just got on with my own life and didn’t show the world my dinner, my holiday plans, the outfit I wore to a wedding.
It’s very freeing, not uploading a picture/comment at every point in your life.
I no longer wasted hours scrolling through feeds.
I can honestly say, it’s the best thing I’ve ever done. My life is better because I’m not updating, checking in or worrying why my photo wasn’t liked. I communicate through text/phone calls with friends.
I’ve asked my family not to put photos of the baby online. Some were not particularly happy with this, saying that I wasn’t on it so what difference did it make.
If I’m having a bad day now, I don’t have a platform to compare myself and make it worse. It sounds very serious but I personally think Facebook is toxic. The way we live today means our mental health is fragile and we need to look after ourselves. Any platform that makes us feel bad about ourselves needs to go.
Let’s be honest, nothing very exciting happens on it anyway.’
DARREN O’REILLY, 27, a marketing manager from Dublin, believes Facebook has contributed to the rise of ‘influencer’ culture. He says:
‘GIVEN that a lot of my old school friends moved to different countries post-recession, it was a good place to share some of our lives with each other. It was like the modern day version of catching up without actually having a conversation with anyone.
For businesses, Facebook was an accessible, budget friendly marketing tool that I took full advantage of in the early years and was able to preach to the masses around the globe on how to use the platform to drive real results.
But I was getting fed up with some of the ridiculous, contrived
‘They don’t make it easy to delete it’
and attention-seeking posts by some. This I believe was the beginning of this “influencer” culture we now have in Ireland. I also believe this fabricated existence online has fuelled increasing issues with mental health. ‘Facebook doesn’t make it easy to delete an account with many users only deactivating their profiles. I deleted any posts I made, defriended everyone in my contacts list, I went through all my activity and removed any location check-ins and page likes. I then saved any images I wanted to retain on to my laptop before deleting all the photo albums on my page. I effectively reversed or undone everything I had ever done on Facebook before finally exiting stage right.’
ROSLYN DEE, an Associate Editor with the Irish Daily Mail, says deleting her account gave her a feeling of ‘utter liberation’. She says:
‘I’D been talking about doing it for months as I was becoming increasingly concerned about a number of aspects, including the ethos and the feeling I was being used — and knew I was being used, yet put up with it anyway.
I used to click in at maybe 8.30pm, thinking I’d just take a quick look, and before I’d know it, it would be 10pm. And what would I have achieved? What enjoyment would I have had? I thought of all the time I had wasted sharing in people’s vanity projects and being bombarded with advertising as if I didn’t have a mind of my own.
And so I decided that I no longer wanted to be a party to that. To any of it. I’m no longer prepared to help feed Zuckerberg’s monster.’