A Facebook Letter

I just lost another Facebook friend. He left quite abruptly, we were still in the middle of a conversation, he said “bye” and even before I had a chance to reply he was gone. His Facebook account closed. “I am taking the easy way out” he wrote just after I wrote to him that complaining is the easy way. He had started the conversation by writing “I'm growing tired of Facebook, it's all about self publicity and vanity, not much of it makes any difference politically, it just salves a bit of the chattering class' consciences.” I challenged him to try to make a difference but he wrote “I'm too tired and dissillusioned with it all, to even bother trying to make a difference. We are deluded to think we make a difference, all this sharing of political press releases, none of it matters. We are all grist to the mill.” And there he went. I couldn’t even get my last words to him: “Sometimes taking the easy way out is the best thing to do, is necessary: I think that before we can make a difference we have to feel ok with ourselves. Sometimes that means taking the easy way out. But I truely think we can make a difference wherever we are, here as well, on Facebook. Take care, wherever you are.”

So I am saying them to you now.

And his words make me wonder why I put this here. He made me think. And I like that about Facebook. I am not rarely afraid I post something for my own benefit mainly, to make myself look good in the eyes of others, but we all do that and sometimes the border between wanting attention and giving attention is a thin one. The best way to figure that out is to keep trying. To keep posting. To keep writing. Thinking. To take yourself and others seriously but not all the time. To keep talking, laughing, discussing, but also to be silent from time to time. To find good friends. On Facebook as in real life.

So here’s to friends. And to life. And to Facebook.

Take care.