Facebook is the End of Humanity
This was originally published by me on May 3, 2007.
Facebook is the End of Humanity.
There, I said it, now we have to live with it.
For those of you who know me, you know that I am a man of my word. I am not a good person, but I am honest and virtuous. Maybe, kinda and sorta don’t exist in my vocabulary, and that’s sorta one of my best features. Maybe it’s why I’m kinda the best at what I do? Entirely possible.
Sometimes it takes a real man to listen to someone’s pain. I get to do it on a daily basis, oftentimes not by my own admission. Today’s life-threatening terrorist force comes not from the Middle East, but from your very own computer screen. It’s called Facebook, and it’s going to ruin your life – if it hasn’t already.
The beginning of the end…
I’ll explain how Facebook works in the most honest terms you’ll come across:
-You sign up for an account. You put in some bullshit quotes and little blurbs about yourself, like you were making a singles ad. You are in a way, because you’re about to whore yourself out to the lowest bidder.
-You include pictures of yourself. You only pick the “best” ones. You also include every single picture you’ve ever appeared in, just to show strangers how outgoing you are. Girls will show off their body and clothes, and guys will show off their cars and the girls who just made a profile. They know you. They went to school with you. They own the right to be in the same picture as you, because they are popular.
-You include every aspect of your personal and professional life on the profile. Your schools, where you work, your relatives, address, phone number – anything you would be terrified of if someone got a hold of. Don’t be afraid though, this is the Internet! No bad people on the Internet to abuse the system, ever.
-You start looking up your friends. You know, those people who sometimes call your name if you’re in viewing range. Once you see their Facebook profile, you add their friends, because shit – you’re FRIENDS too.
-You look up the definition of the word ‘friend’ and realize you are so very fucking wrong
-You start to join the ‘clubs’ or groups of people with similar interests. No need to look hard though, there’s a group for everything. You can even make your own. You are now “An employee of Dunder-Mifflin!” but what about the other 37 groups with the same name? Dunder-Mifflin must have a lot of branches, then. +1 to originality.
-You friend writes on your “wall.” They say something meaningful like “OMG I haven’t seen you in ages! We gotta hang out soon!” Weird, eh? Last time I checked I hung out with my friends all the time. In fact, we were having so much fun hanging out that we forgot to not see each other in ages.
-This little light bulb goes off in your head about every person you’ve ever met. Is my ex-boyfriend on Facebook? How about that boy that sexually assaulted me? How about my abusive uncle? Wow, they’re all here! I can’t wait for them to know my every waking moment thanks to my friends writing on my wall about every breath I take.
-You start adding everyone, ever. You try to complete your entire high school by clicking every fucking piece of blue text imaginable. You feel so liberated when that bully that beat you up apologizes 9 years too late. It’s so easy to apologize over the Internet than it is to be a real person and do it in person with some heart and soul.
-You begin to electronically stalk your friends and people you hate. You can’t stop checking their profile on a daily basis. You start to feel nauseous when you’re waiting for their weekend pictures to be posted on Monday. You get butterflies when you start to see their innermost personal life displayed for all to see. You don’t notice you’re a victim too, since there’s no way to track who’s looking at yours.
-You can’t sleep at night until you check every profile ever. You start to get a slight buzz when you find out that your worst enemy hurt themselves while on vacation. You get chills down your spine when you hear the pity in their writing and you like it.
-You start to use Facebook wall writing as a substitute for MSN Messenger and email. You write very personal plans and thoughts to your ‘friends.’ Funny, if you wrote any of that stuff in an email and someone read it, you’d be mortified and feel violated. You equate wall writing to leaving “voicemail”. Since everyone else is addicted to Facebook, of course they’re going to see it in minutes.
-You don’t remember the last time you spoke to a friend on the phone. Why bother? Facebook is 24/7 free and no long distance. Voice? What’s that? You can hear their voice in their pictures of them holding their drinks. You can, can’t you…?
-You start using Facebook as a filtering service for your entire life. You start to judge people’s worth based on their profile. How many books they have read? What do they listen to? Is their life quote deep or just funny? Does it change every day? Oh my god, this person likes dogs too! Must be a great person…!
-You start to wonder who’s watching your profile. You make changes to your profile to appeal to everyone alive. You become a generic version of yourself. You’re afraid to express yourself because maybe…JUST maybe the love of your life will hate you because you don’t like dogs. You now love dogs. You love everything. Everything you hate is now “all right!” and everything you love is now “cool.” Spread yourself thin, because that’s the way to bring people closer to you.
-You notice that Cindy has 137 friends. You’re a few short of that number, so you start adding your cousin’s school friends. Seems logical, seeing as you’re both alive and on the same planet
-You run into someone you Facebook with in real life. They start to tell you about their life and events, but you already know everything. Who needs human contact and conversation anyway? Seems useless, you can barely listen to mp3s while talking at a bar. That Gwen Stefani’s not gonna listen to itself, you know. This person you barely know is now congratulating you on your new job. Seems totally appropriate, seeing as they don’t know what fucking colour your eyes are, or, you know, anything else.
-You read something on some website that says that if you spent as much time on Wikipedia as you did on Facebook, you’d be one of the most knowledgeable people alive and actually contribute to society
-Your attraction to the opposite sex quadruples. Guys that have no balls or personal skills are now chatting you up on Facebook. They’ve seen you drunk in pictures and now they want to be beside you. You love the attention and check your profile every chance you get. You have just found the ultimate dating service – the kind that violates every privacy act and human rights issue known to man.
-You don’t remember that last time you used MSN Messenger thanks to Facebook. You always login on invisible mode, so you don’t have to talk to anyone. You decided that MSN is just a great address book for people you hate. You read somewhere that you should delete people you don’t talk to, but then the list would be 4 people long! The horror! There’s no need to address your insecurities about your social life, really.
-You start to believe your own Facebook profile. You become more fake and more ‘fake outgoing.’ You change your little status message to alert everyone about your Cuba vacation and any every fucking minutia imaginable. The best part is that since anyone can read this, thieves know what you’re up to and break into your house without incident. The insurance company laughs at you and calls you an idiot. I am not far behind.
-You die, finally. No one notices because you weren’t there to post that as your status message. The end.
I hope you’re beginning to see the light. This is your life, and it’s ending one click at a time. Facebook brings out the worst in people. You put so much time and energy into something that makes you a worse person. Do you WANT this? I’m surprised you’ve made it this far into the article without changing tabs to check if someone wrote on your wall… I no longer have a Facebook account. Mine lasted all of 12 hours before I came to my fucking senses. People kept adding me, writing messages, asking me computer questions, flirting…go away. I don’t know you, and I don’t want to. You didn’t talk to me years ago, you have no right to talk to me now. I will not make an account. Your pretty little ‘school collection’ will never be complete without me. You will not be my buddy, and I will not ask your girlfriend about her new job. You won’t see me there, period. I am a popular dude on the Internet, but my private life is just that. You will not know things about me, and that’s how I like it. Privacy is the ultimate freedom that we are granted in life, and you fools are giving it away.
You know you’ve made it in life when the band takes a picture of you. What concert was I at? You’ll never know, asshole, because you are not my friend
I want to be able to meet someone new and learn about them as nature intended. Ever occur to you that Facebook has a more complete and dynamic personnel tracking system than the CIA does? Works really well if you’re a total loser and have no social skills. Yep, I went there. I can’t even recall the amount of times I’ve been told this story: Boyfriend breaks into girlfriend’s Facebook account (born in what city? Super! Thanks!) and realizes that lots of guys are flirting with her. She sends them playful messages because everyone is a whore online. They have a fight in real life (remember that?) and hilarity ensues. They change passwords, trust issues, betrayal, etc etc etc Othello dies. You can substitute any gender and any situation, but it happens all the time. Here’s an idea – grow the fuck up! Stop sneaking around and flirting with everyone with a heartbeat. Have some dignity, please. You are not a socialite all of a sudden. You are not busy. You work the same 8 hours a day as everyone else. The other 16 hours you’re allowed to be honest with yourself and not put on a poorly-acted play for everyone else you secretly hate and/or want to bang. Pick up the phone, call a friend, go do something and don’t take 112 pictures of it to put on Facebook. Seriously. I’m not old fashioned, I’m not a shut-in – I just want all of you to know what you’re doing, since most of you are too dense to figure it out on your own.
I can post this because my mommy doesn’t use Facebook either
I, as a human being, implore you to stop using Facebook. Delete your account. You’ll be surprised when no one even notices. It is one of the most evil devices ever created and it’s destroying your life. You are hopelessly addicted and it will be the end of your natural life. I guarantee if you can make it 2 weeks without it, your life will become better in every way. Please share this article with everyone and see if it raises any concern – you’ll be surprised. And ashamed…and you should be.
Facebook sucks.
Just because I wrote this doesn’t mean I can’t comment.
Great article. Now every time some clown asks the question “OMG! What’s wrong with you?? You don’t have a FACEBOOK account??”… i can just email them this link rather than wasting my time trying to explain it.
Regards, from a fellow cheap canadian beer drinker.
Oh dear, I’m now ashamed to have Facebook, and glad they’ve blocked it at work!
Another V2 upgrade, although in most areas, I’m far superior anyway.
This is awesome but I think you have no friends and thats why you hate it.
I think the point is that you have no friends. His are apparently invisible.
I read this forever ago. I think it was on digg or something. I even posted it on my facebook, hell, it’s still there.
Tommy v2, you are my hero.
Great article,dude.It is playfully sarcastic.This encompasses ALL social networking websites;another way for the powers that be to track you online.I’m glad i can resist the urge to join them.Paranioa can be your friend.
good.
YOu could never pace up….Facebook has now changed to Orkut.com which host around 2 billion people worldwide.
now if only you were friends with those 2 billion people….
clicking 388 times every 30 seconds it’ll only take you…the next 7 years without sleep…
This is really an excellent article. Mr Orwell would be proud!
I’m going through the process of finding a list of good articles with clear arguments against facebook.
You could also add a little more detail on the database that Facebook are generating. How secure is it? What info is collected? What is that info used for?
Ask yourself - why is it free to use a product that is worth $x billion?
A great piece of writing.
Try “deactivating” your account….
Anyone remember: 2001 A space odyssey
HAL: I know you and Frank were planning to disconnect me, and I’m afraid that’s something I cannot allow to happen.
Dave Bowman: Where the hell’d you get that idea, HAL?
HAL: Dave, although you took thorough precautions in the pod against my hearing you, I could see your lips move.
I’m so, so, so sorry for you
most of what you say is true, but… this kind of websites are to keep in touch with friends or family, share some pictures of personal moments…
if you are STUPID enough to add people you don’t know to your friends, that is YOU being STUPID.
you should try to get laid more often
This is FANTASTIC!!! My thoughts exactly! I’ve used some of your “reasonings” to deter people from using Facebook, and they think I’m an idiot. Ha. No way. I’m not the only one with common sense.
These are not good reasons to hate facebook.
Facebook is very usefull and addictive and i really like it.
But i can’t stop thinking about the evil programs it could be if someone (like government or whatever) wanted to list all the persons, religious, sexual orientation, personal data etc.
Big brother is watching you, using facebook lens, they don’t have to monitor you, you do that by yourself. Facebook became a self-monitoring tool.
Anyway, it’s a good way to keep contact and it does not replace reality, this article is bullshit.
it would be a better program if you could be sure that nobody can see your informations (excepted your friends). Take a look to the Wuala program.
You just said it’s “addictive.” Nothing addictive is good for you. I’m glad you live your life needing something you can’t control or stop. Good luck with that.
sex is addictive too.
Agreed. And there are a lot of people getting pregnant and diseased from that. It’s not quite the same thing for both genders since women decide the act of sex. For women sex can be an addiction, for men sex can’t happen often enough.
haha
Great article. Or IS it? Yep it is. Great article.
i don’t wanted to start a new thread, just show us that “Nothing addictive is good for you” is stupid. speaking back about Facebook, i don’t want to defend it, just said that “Facebook transform people into generic” is quiet stupid.
Once again, did you took a look to Wuala project, really interesting.
Dude i knew something was wrong with that shit and you have make it complete clear right now, that fuckin profile will not survive this day
I made this picture a while ago to bitch about something facebook-related. Care to use it instead of that shitty crossed-through logo?
http://img393.imageshack.us/my.php?image=facebookpaperqz8.jpg
I agree that facebook is turning a bit into myspace, but as one of the few people who actually got one before it was open to students in high school, I actually experienced facebook as a networking tool and it worked quite well for me. Some of my good friends that I know now are actually from facebook (but it’s true that we talk in REAL LIFE, not on facebook)…Anyway, I think the problem with facebook shouldn’t be so much with facebook itself but with the people who are using it.
Bastante Pelotudo!
Brilliant¡
My thoughts exactly on the matter.
A few weeks ago I posted something similar on my blog, Im glad some people think the same as me. *relief*
great article
these have been my thoughts (and arguments to people TELLING me “you’ve GOT TO get on facebook”) for about a year. what ever happened to going out with friends, people having house parties etc.? Now everyone just pretends to socialise with friends, and stalks everyone else. Its scary. and i always think about people looking you and your friends up when you apply for jobs!! all they need is your name.
well done tommy v2, you’ve reaffirmed my beliefs. haha
HAHA I love your article man. Very humourist approach, although it is unfortunate to say that everything you have mentioned is based on reality. A girl asked me the other day (after telling her I deleted facebook): “how do you live without it?”…I told her that it was simple, just like we lived before it existed…
This is brilliant. Over the past few months, I’ve had sleepless nights about facebook. I get up for work at 6am and check facebook…I didn’t understand why I was having all this agita but then I googled “facebook is evil” and I saw your post. It sums it up so well. Basically I realized, I was in a popularity contest, and competing with people to come up with the most creative status update. Then after I wrote an update, I’d keep checking it to see if anyone else thought it was cool and wrote on my wall….it was endless…then there was the adding friends/ex boyfriends who I didn’t want on there….once I deactivated, I felt like I had a rebirth :-)))). I actually activated it again today but deleted all my postings, pictures etc and kept it to keep in touch with 3 or 4 friends that live in another country who I don’t speak to that often….that seems more genuine. I made my profile super private so only those friends can see me and I’m not looking to add anyone else or show off to anyone else. I don’t feel the need to do any status updates with them anymore–it’ll just be nice to log on every once in a while and see pics of their families.
Thanks!!!!
Haha this article is amazing. True in every way.
I have a problem though! My girlfriend (facebook addict) created a profile for me against my will and adds pictures, comments etc! what should i do?
to Rik….delete it!
i am the papi chulo I will show you the end of your kind just come to me your your mater
I COMPLETELY agree with facebook being evil and addictive. I the way people go on and on obviously not telling the truth about their lives is stupid and pathetic. Deactivate, you will feel better. You don’t even realize how bad it is until it’s gone and you can think clearly again. Remember this, there is a reason you didn’t stay in contact with 90% of your “facebook friends”!
Good job man… Good job..
I totally agree, I have read every bit of this page and it is all absolutely true, I do have a facebook account, from when it first started, i never log on anymore, so I say i don’t, and when people ask me “are you on facebook” I say no and start telling them why I don’t like it and they think i’m some sort of wierd outcast because I don’t use facebook
One of my friends was talking about facebook and somehow got talking about a group they had joined which was against the UK government issuing everyone with ID cards, saying on this group that the government will have too much information about them - I just laughed and said but you put every minute of your life on facebook so EVERYONE has personal details about you, never mind the government you are crazy!
I am really against facebook I am just so happy now that there are others out there that agree, IT MUST BE STOPPED SHUT DOWN FACEBOOK NOW
Check out this youtube vid, the facebook anthem, brilliant!
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=3ZzP_69ZTFk
lol, I also googled “facebook is evil” and got a hit on this site-no one should have that much info about you, period. and I tend to overshare anyway..just deactivated my account. Although, I have to say that it was useful on a certain level; I’m an actor,it is a good networking tool, but..fuck that. no one needs to know the VERY MINUTE I book something. lots of jealous motherfuckers out there will use your “open book” of a life against you..keep everything on the low.