Below, Sophia Mason has written an Inkdesk piece in which she both pans and praises Facebook. How I empathize with Sophia!
As regular readers know, Facebook and I have had a tumultuous relationship. She and I have split a few times after ugly public shouting matches, she pushed me down the stairs once, I have accused her of infidelity, her algorithm had originally sized me up as a loser and drug abuser simply because I was an actor, and so forth.
But we’ve settled into something rather permanent of late. Facebook and I are not exactly “married”, nor “single”, we are “in a relationship” and “it’s complicated”.
So I do indeed empathize with Ms. Mason over her tendency to love / hate this thing called Facebook.
But how much is Facebook as a mode of communication to blame for Facebook’s shortcomings? As the internet blogger Dr. Thursday pointed out to me once, “Objecting to the internet is like objecting to a road or a highway. The internet is simply a pathway to a variety of destinations.” This is true, but certain kinds of roads encourage certain kinds of traffic and it’s easier to take some roads to particular destinations than it is to take others.
For example, when men had to take a physical road to find a pornographic book store or a strip club, they had to risk the dangers of going into a seedy neighborhood and risk the shame of being seen doing so. But if someone can instead take a virtual highway across cables linking computers to one another, so that pornography can be viewed in the safety and privacy of one’s own home, then naturally the use of pornography will mushroom and men will indulge their lust far more so than had such technology not been around.
Likewise, in the early days of printed books, reading and writing were more careful and more deliberate. With the advent of the dissemination and popularization of the printing press, you begin to see such things as magazines, newspapers and pamphlets, which by their nature allow for more immediacy in communication, which leads both to the use of printing for political agitation and for capitalizing on sensationalism.
And thus we see that new developments in technology lead to the cultivation of new kinds of behaviors. Even in the development of literature, we see that when the technology available to Drama was the stage only, scripts tended to be less intimate and sensational than they became when written for the new technology of film. Likewise, when the new (or “novel”) technology enabled “novels” to appear, we find the beginnings of a kind of fiction that is detailed, complex, and intensely psychological. And yet the novels that first appeared in serial form in periodicals, such as the novels of Dickens, have a different structure and feel than novels written to be read from start to finish all at once.
So technology, itself a development of culture, does indeed impact the further development of culture. Roadways are not neutral. Different kinds of paths are conducive to different kinds of traffic and different kinds of purpose. You can’t safely ride your bike on the freeway, for instance; nor can a rutted gravel road in the country allow for the development of a fancy new suburb in that area.
Likewise the technology of Facebook makes certain kinds of behaviors easier than others. The emphasis on pictures and the brief space allowed for “status updates” encourage a trivializing of relationships. But the ability of users to post links to articles and blogs that interest them means that if you have a variety of friends who read good things, you will be treated to a variety of posts linking to some very good stuff. And while “threads” of discussion can be compelling, the nature of comboxes seems to draw out a kind of defensive argumentation that makes it hard to develop points formally and carefully.
All in all, however, the benefits of Facebook for me have outweighed the drawbacks. It still remains the best technology out there for photo sharing and for keeping up with friends who otherwise I would not keep up with.
Still, I don’t completely trust the gal. She’s a bit of a tramp. So, yes we’re back together, but “it’s complicated”.
Re Facebook thus far, I’m reminded of Ben Franklin’s remark at the launching of the Montgolfier brothers’ balloon:
“Monsieur, franchement, à quoi peut bien servir de s’envoler dans les airs ?” (Sir, frankly, what’s the use of flying in the air ?)
Franklin replied:
“Monsieur, à quoi peut bien servir l’enfant qui vient de naître ?” (Sir, what’s the use of a newborn baby ?)
It’s more than “complicated” for me in the sense your describe above (although I concur with your points), as Facebook is now attempting to breach a line of privacy I do not wish for them to cross.
A couple of days ago, when I tried to log on, I was asked to provide a mobile number as a ‘security precaution’. FB would then apparently text me a code which I would then provide back to them in order to gain access to my account. I tried to request an alternative method to meet their request, with no success. After googling the problem, I found that I am among a growing number of Facebook users experiencing this issue. I was not made aware of this possible requirement when I joined, so to me this is a breach of contract, or at the very least, civility, on their part. As I refuse to give them my mobile number, I – and many others – remain locked out of our accounts. For now, I am following the issue at this site: http://www.examiner.com/political-buzz-in-san-diego/omg-how-can-i-live-without-fb
Sophia – I would be interested as to how you would respond to this situation – if it hasn’t happened already!
Spare a thought for the UK teenager who was notified that she had been sacked from her part-time job in a café, via a message from her Manager on Facebook.
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I’m loath to seduce you back into the combox when you are forswearing it–but I can’t resist. I’m evil that way. As I saw quoted somewhere, I could never be a saint but I might be a martyr if they killed me quickly.
On the one hand you are saying what Marshall McLuhan–a good Thomist, btw–said pre-Internet, the medium is the message. Meaning the media influences the message so much that it is embedded within the message.
What is less known or understood about McLuhan is that he also had an interesting take on history and our typical understanding of historical causation. Meaning–it wasn’t so much that the printed medium arrived and we changed, as we changed, and thus the medium arrived.
The Internet has power and I think you are right that the immediacy of it increases its power–however, in the example of porn you might as well go back to the camera, and before that the painted image, and before that, the cave drawing as a medium to blame for porn.
Relating this to your recent disavowal of comboxs and messaging, it’s no good to go all Puritan on it. That’s taking the “social” out of social media and it sort of loses it’s point and becomes even more auto-erotic than it is with them.
Blaming the Internet–or gaming–as “dangerous” is transferrence of responsibility. There was nothing evil about the tree or the apple or the knowledge. There were Adam and Eve and there was the snake, and it was their relation to the snake that brought about the fall from paradise.
(Though Adam tries to get away with blaming Eve a little bit—doesn’t he say she’s a tramp? Maybe I’m revising that a little.)
So Facebook isn’t trampy—Facebook didn’t bring out anything that wasn’t already in you. Comboxes are bringing back the tradition of debate. I think that is glorious. Schools don’t teach it or rhetoric anymore. The problem is these are untrained arguments—and you have to be patient with that, but it is better than no debate at all. For my part I try to raise the bar on debate, even if it is so hard to do. Sometimes I get frustrated, sometimes I get emotional hangovers.
But you’ll notice that debate had all but gone out of style until the Internet. It’s being done poorly but at least it’s being done! It’s a great chance to teach rhetoric and respect for each other.
It IS a time suck—but that’s a battle for a lot of people. Especially people that don’t work for themselves, as I have the good fortune of being able to do. And I fall into it.
but before that I was just as likely to get lost in writing in my journal, reading, and letter writing. I was an obsessive letter writer and diarist before the internet, at a time when folks didn’t write letters all that much. Email has given me far more correspondents.
Check out my blog for more–I call this the technorenaissance–what is happening the re-emergence of letter writing, of debate, of old knowledge being revivied.
And on the carefulness of print media over internet media–an Elizabethan once complained that the printing press was going to be the downfall of society and higher writing because: ‘Every gross brained scholar is suffered to come into print’ LOL. That’s pretty much what they are saying now.
Personally, I think, like capitalists, there are too few writers.
Not to lure you into reading more gross brained scholars (which is preciesly what I am actually!)
But here are some of the notes on my Technorenaissance project.
http://piercework.typepad.com/just_jen/technorenaissance/
Readers, Jen is referring to the fact that I am swearing off comboxing when I turn 50 in two days. At least on Facebook!
Jen, I am not blaming technology for the sinfulness of man. I am saying that certain kinds of technology bring about certain kinds of sins (and virtues) in man. Technology is not neutral. That is my point, and Facebook, an example of a certain kind of technology, is far from neutral.
Now since people are getting picky, let me quickly say that the thing “technology” itself, being a thing and not a person, is indeed neutral; but it’s more complex to state the more accurate case: people behave differently in different environments, and so it is conventionally said that different environmnets “draw out” different kinds of behaviors, whereas technically speaking people tend to “put in” behaviors (good and bad) that are conducive in a given environment, and avoid “putting in” behaviors that are not conducive. But if it’s a sunny day and you go for a bike ride, you don’t say, “My inner impulse to excercise was excited by the weather,” you say, “the day drew me out!”
The point is rainy days keep us inside, sunny days draw us outside. That’s a metaphoric way of saying we respond to different environments differently. And technology is a prime factor in any environment.
Likewise, let me explain to the nitpickers and the humorless that my calling Facebook a skank and so forth is tongue-in-cheek. I make those jokes because it personalizes something that’s not at all personal. But just because technology is impersonal doesn’t mean its effects are neutral.
And I am not blaming porn on the internet, nor on photographs or cave paintings. Lust is part of our fallen nature. But certain technologies are more suited to the indulgence of certain behaviors than others. The internet is far more conducive to the dissemination of pornography than cave paintings are. That’s just obvious. The internet does not create a disordered desire in man any more than any art or technology does, but it does make the indulgence of certain kinds of desires and behaviors easier than others.
I feel like I’m explaining a joke, but that’s what seems to happen in comboxes.
You are explaining a joke, which you didn’t have to do. I got it–I joked right back about Adam and that tramp Eve.
So—to summarize what could be a longer response but I’ll save you—why post anything on a blog or Facebook if you aren’t going to use comboxes or invite debate and collaboration? Do you want people to challenge and discuss and invite other viewpoints or do you want people just to click “like”?
The fact that you didn’t address what I wrote about debate sort of makes the point for me–you seem to find debate irritating and pointless. Even poorly done debate to me, is far better than writing unchallenged and to the open air.
I’d say if you find comboxes irritating then you should save your writing for St. Austin Review and Gilbert.
What’s social about social media if you don’t interact?
(I apologize if you don’t want to discuss it and just wanted to express an opinion. The medium suggests otherwise to me but I’ll respect it. )
PS I come from a world where the whole point to expressing ideas is to examine them and challenge them and share ideas. I realize it may seem nitpicking or odd to someone outside of it.
But I ask you–does Chesterton nitpick Shaw? In letters or debates?
It’s rather fun to nitpick each other don’t you think?
Jennifer, the fact that I ignored what you said about debate does not mean I did not agree with it. In fact I do agree with that part of what you said. I was only commenting on the thing on which we appeared to diverge – the (metaphorically speaking) bias of technology, it’s non-neutrality.
And there’s a difference between my personally not participating in combox debates and my not allowing or encouraging them on posts like this one. The combox issue is part of the Facebook technology, but is less of a problem on a site like this. This is why I said I’m backing out of Facebook private messages and comboxing. I haven’t committed to combox avoidance on other sites.
For comboxes differe from site to site. For instance, the lowest form of combox debate in the universe is on youtube. The highest perhaps is here on the Ink Desk. When it’s not spam for stock tips.
And to answer your last question. No, nitpicking has nothing to do with a good debate, nor with Shaw or Chesterton. And before you nitpick at that, I concede solid definition of terms is crucial to debate, but nitpicking is not, and it’s obvious to anyone the difference between the two when they hear it.
Meanwhile, thank you for all of your combox comments – they are usually quite good and always engaging.
Aw you’re no fun! One person’s nitpick is another one’s gold mine.
Don’t mind me. I have a lot a teacher to work out and I always zero in on an argument and ask for clarity. Distinctio!
(Hopefully, when my kids are in school full time, there will be a job for me again and I won’t nit pick in comboxes so much.)
But you see–clarifying is important. now I understand that you think there is something specific about facebook debates that is a degree lower than on a site like this one.
My experience is that since Facebook are friends you choose it tends to be higher–even at The Atlantic the debate is all over the place. But I can see what you are saying. And I glad that you aren’t eschewing all comboxes.
Thank you for indulging me. I hope that you will check out the link I posted on the Technorenaissance and my notes therein. It’s a fun topic.
On the header task bar there is a link to an introduction to my concept of the Technorenaissance and along what lines I’m researching and collecting notes.
PX!
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