Adam Earnheardt
  • Blog
  • Welcome
  • About
  • Contact
  • Speaking
  • CV
  • Blog
  • Welcome
  • About
  • Contact
  • Speaking
  • CV

Treating ‘Friends’ Like Real Friends on Facebook

10/10/2018

0 Comments

 
Picture
“Hi... I actually got another friend request from you which I ignored so you may want to check your account.”

That’s a message millions received from Facebook friends over the past few days.

If you followed the instructions and forward the message to your friends, you’re probably feeling a bit ashamed right now.

“Stop! Ignore it! Delete it! Don’t forward it to all of your friends,” someone posted on Facebook, lamenting those duped by the hoax.

If you did forward the message, you shouldn’t feel shame. You care about your friends, for which you should be commended, not chastised.

We all have Facebook friends who aren’t necessarily “friends” in the traditional sense of the definition.

We also know that our traditional definition for friend doesn’t apply to Facebook. We try so hard not to conflate the noun with the verb in conversations: “I don’t mean Joe is my friend in real life. He just friended me on Facebook.”

Even Merriam-Webster knows the difference.

Dictionary editors expanded the definition of friend with alternatives such as friended and friending, in part to capture the meaning of the transitive verb.

I’m not sure Mark Zuckerberg knew what he was doing when he landed on that term – friend – as the signifier for adding people to our Facebook networks. By all accounts, Zuckerberg had few real friends at the time he created Facebook, so it’s likely he didn’t contemplate the implications for choosing that term.

Or did he?

When Facebook exploded in popularity, it was not only because of the number of new people who joined, but because of the number of new personal networks it cultivated for us. Zuckerberg was, in fact, growing Facebook by redefining the word “friend” in terms of networks, not individuals.

Imagine snowballs rolling down a hill, smashing into each other to create larger snowballs – not an avalanche, but fast like one, with seemingly unending momentum.

Those snowballs are our networks. They smash into one another. They mingle. They create connections we might otherwise never experience.

This is true of people who aren’t really our friends, at least not in the true sense of the definition. We’ve simply added them as friends because, truth be told, it feels good to get a friend request.

It’s a fleeting euphoric feeling, a dopamine hit. Maybe not for everyone, but for enough people that friend requests are approved with minimal scrutiny of those on the other end of the requests.

It’s what made this latest Facebook hoax so problematic. We default to the traditional definition of friend.

We care about our friends. We want to protect them from danger.

If you were one of the millions who forwarded the hoax to everyone in your network, don’t feel bad.

Feel good knowing that you care enough about your friends to protect them, even if they’re just Facebook friends.



0 Comments

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.


Leave a Reply.

    Author

    Dr. Adam C. Earnheardt is professor of communication studies the department of communication at Youngstown State University in Youngstown, OH, USA where he also directs the graduate program in professional communication.  He researches and writes about communication and relationships, parenting and sports. He writes a weekly column for The Vindicator and Tribune-Chronicle newspapers on social media and society.

    Categories

    All
    Social Media

    Archives

    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014

    RSS Feed

Proudly powered by Weebly