Cutting back on Social Media

[Sharon]

Have you considered cutting back on how much you use social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, etc?

I delete the mobile app a while back and somehow managed to download it again and I can tell my screentime usage has increased dramatically these last few weeks. I'm considering removing it from my mobile device again.

 

[Kylie]

Facebook was annoying me and I finally just deleted it and never looked back.

 

[MrDawn]

I had to get rid of Facebook for a lot of reasons. My mother, grandmother, and brother cause problems over it. I don't like people getting in my business. I didn't care to see people's posts about their religious and political views as well as airing their drama about their failed relationships and everyone getting involved and slamming this person or that person who wronged them. There's a lot of misinformation being posted. I got tired of it and felt the whole platform was invasive.

 

[Kylie]

I had to get rid of Facebook for a lot of reasons. My mother, grandmother, and brother cause problems over it. I don't like people getting in my business. I didn't care to see people's posts about their religious and political views as well as airing their drama about their failed relationships and everyone getting involved and slamming this person or that person who wronged them. There's a lot of misinformation being posted. I got tired of it and felt the whole platform was invasive.

May I ask what made you decide to even join Facebook?

 

[Ashlynn S]

I have FaceBook but I have all of the alerts turned off and I probably log in once a week or so and have a quick look around.

I don't have a Twitter or Instagram account at all.

 

[MrDawn]

May I ask what made you decide to even join Facebook?

Myspace was going down and I heard all of these great things about Facebook from my ex wife and her friends so I wanted to try it out. I thought it was another youth platform.

 

[Kylie]

I thought it was another youth platform.

I did too but it didn't take long to realize how wrong I was. I found it to be very toxic and couldn't stand the drama.

 

[Grungie]

I primarily just shitpost on Facebook, and use messenger.

I didn’t have many problems on Facebook until Trump became president. I didn’t care what their political opinions were, but it got really annoying when the Trump haters were posting ALL DAY EVERY DAY about him. Dude, we get it, you don’t like the guy. You don’t have to update us on a near hourly basis.

 

[Lämmchen]

I primarily just shitpost on Facebook, and use messenger.

I didn’t have many problems on Facebook until Trump became president. I didn’t care what their political opinions were, but it got really annoying when the Trump haters were posting ALL DAY EVERY DAY about him. Dude, we get it, you don’t like the guy. You don’t have to update us on a near hourly basis.

I could have written that myself from what happened on my Facebook feed! Even today you get people blaming Trump for things that have nothing to do with him. It's just ridiculous.

 

[Grungie]

I could have written that myself from what happened on my Facebook feed! Even today you get people blaming Trump for things that have nothing to do with him. It's just ridiculous.

The sad part, is that I wish I was exaggerating on the near hourly part. It’s like, don’t you guys have jobs…. Or a life?

 

[MrDawn]

I did too but it didn't take long to realize how wrong I was. I found it to be very toxic and couldn't stand the drama.

Dealing with my family on Facebook was mostly my experience which was nothing but negative bs. My experience on Myspace was 100 times better.

• One is if you add someone no one in your family likes. I saw complaints about that.
• If I was friends with one my brother's ex girlfriend or someone he didn't like, I saw complaints from the rest of the family. The hypocrisy behind all of that which really aggravated me is that they stayed friends with my ex girlfriends or people I didn't care for. Anytime I call my mom out on her hypocrisy she deflects with "what does this have to do with me?"
• My mom, who is described as a Karen, enjoys telling me I need to stay off of social media...but it's okay for her to harass people about their pages. During my marriage, my mother in law made a comment how my mother needs to stay off of social media.
• My families constant nagging to control everything my ex wife did on her Facebook page.
• My ex wife blocking my grandmother which ended in me getting the 3rd degree over their feud by my grandmother over some asinine remark she made at my ex.
• People I added from work would post political bs about how much they hated Obama as President.
• Seeing the daily relationship drama from the people I worked with who were my age. People allowed Facebook to define their relationship. Girls would constantly post a new boyfriend one day only the following day to remove it and give the bad news on how the guy fled from commitment after a one night stand. Girls making posts how a guy I was friends with cheated on them. Relatives my age that I had never met posting detailed photos of them making out with their brand new girlfriends that they just got with.
• Listening to one of my relatives put her son on a pedestal and how she idolized him.
• Having to block my friends toxic mutual friends who were trolls.

After my divorce when I started dating again. I was asked if I had a Facebook of Instagram 99% of the time. I did make a dummy account with no personal information or profile picture to get a look. Because the girls I talked to would cheat on their boyfriend and lie and tell me that they just broke up. While it was a possibility, if I didn't feel good about it. It wasn't going to happen. OR they would say that they were divorced when they were separated and neither one of them had filed yet. And if I did start seeing them, they'd post every selfie of us on their Facebook and put updates. I never looked to see what they posted after the break up. I'm sure they moved on quick lol.

 

[Fait]

It’s ridiculous that people ask that these days, Social media has ruined the world, But I can’t talk us Gen Y’s were the start of the internet.

 

[Ashlynn S]

It’s ridiculous that people ask that these days, Social media has ruined the world, But I can’t talk us Gen Y’s were the start of the internet.

The internet is a wonderful thing, democratizes publishing, give access to education, and should in theory guarantee a freedom of information that is hard to censor (yes I know the last bit doesn't always hold true)

Social media should be a good thing too, but it's become a beast that does far more harm than good in so many ways.

 

[Fait]

The internet is a wonderful thing, democratizes publishing, give access to education, and should in theory guarantee a freedom of information that is hard to censor (yes I know the last bit doesn't always hold true)

Social media should be a good thing too, but it's become a beast that does far more harm than good in so many ways.

I agree!
Gen Alpha’s don’t even know what a forum is, it’s scary that everyone is so focused on TikTok that they forget how the internet started.

 

[Laifot]

I still have facebook but i deleted all my family members but my brother. I don't like relatives asking me questions about my stuff, why did i post this or that, it's so damn annoying. Also i blocked people from tagging me in photos or posts.

Maybe i'll delete it later but it helps me to connect with the female organization, so it's useful to me.

 

[Sharon]

I have FaceBook but I have all of the alerts turned off and I probably log in once a week or so and have a quick look around.

I don't have a Twitter or Instagram account at all.

Yes turning off the alerts definitely helped me. I went ahead and deleted the app from my phone just to remove temptation.

 

[Ashlynn S]

Yes turning off the alerts definitely helped me. I went ahead and deleted the app from my phone just to remove temptation.

A little bit off of the topic, but I hate it when any online services want me to have their own app and limit the features I can use just in my web browser, facebook, instagram, linkedin, etc. it drives me nuts and is part of the reason I very rarely visit any of them.

 

[Sharon]

A little bit off of the topic, but I hate it when any online services want me to have their own app and limit the features I can use just in my web browser, facebook, instagram, linkedin, etc. it drives me nuts and is part of the reason I very rarely visit any of them.

I think it's somewhat still on topic I can totally relate and Facebook definitely does that. I have to go through a security prompt in order to access it via the browser which is one additional step to do but eh, it discourages my usage so that's actually a good thing since I'm trying to cut back. I now only access it when I'm on my laptop.

 

[ZandraJoi]

I had closed my Facebook account years ago. I tried Mewe but I'm really Team Forum.
Forums are just more friendlier in my opinion. While Social Media is great for keeping in touch with family & friends, they are very much biased & are big on censorship.

 

[Ashlynn S]

It's interesting that so many people here have closed social media accounts, I keep my Facebook account mostly because it makes it much easier to sign up for and log in to other things.