The popularity of social networking sites like Facebook,
Twitter, Instagram, >insert the latest fad here< has changed the way we
interact with one another. There is an
expectation of instant and constant access to everyone we have ever met,
interacted with, had that one chance encounter with, and even those that we
consider closest to us. There is that
veil of anonymity and safety from behind the keyboard or touchscreen
device. The perception is that we can
say and share more than we would in person.
Why is that the expectation now?
People who really know me know that I am an extremely
private person. If you are one of my
inner circle, I share most everything with you but otherwise I keep my inner
thoughts, dreams, feelings, and decisions close to the vest. There are many opinions as to why that is;
whatever your opinion on that, it is my personality. I rarely make a decision that isn’t well
thought out, researched, and debated.
The fact that it is not made public until it happens doesn’t mean that
it was impulsive or rash. It simply
means that it was not for public consumption until that moment. It should not be taken personally; I have no
malicious or nefarious intent. It has
been said that timing is everything.
There are a lot of things that go on behind the curtain, so to speak,
that not everyone is aware of. Perhaps
there was a holiday and/or a vacation and it was deemed inappropriate to share
until after. Maybe there is a job
involved that requires specific timing.
There could be a million different reasons that have nothing to do with hurting
someone else; in my case, it’s usually quite the opposite.
Internet privacy is something I believe everyone should take
more seriously. I have seen a post where
a friend of a friend of a friend shared their cell phone number on their
wall. Because a friend of mine liked it,
I saw the post and thus had the cell phone number of a complete stranger. I don’t know for sure but I would posit that
the original poster didn’t intend for me to have their number. Obviously I just ignored it however someone with
a malicious intent could have used it (and anything else on the profile). Employers have started to require that
prospective (and sometimes current) employees accept a friend request so they
can review their social media profile.
Everything you post is there for posterity, just ask the college
football players who got in trouble for a stupid picture taken in high school!
Our family chose not to use social media to share pictures
of our kid. Everyone should make their
own choice about that however we all should respect whatever choice is
made. We don’t believe a bunch of
strangers (friends of friends of friends of…) have any business seeing our kid;
again our choice and yours may be different.
We really didn’t want those pictures to be used by the less moral side
of the population. This is not a
reflection on anyone we know personally just that we don’t know everyone down
the chain of social media; especially since people have public profiles for
their businesses that are tied to their personal profiles. It can be a wonderful marketing tool, just
don’t need our kid exposed to the world along the way.
The children’s game of “telephone” where one kid tells
another kid a story and it gets passed on and on until the last kid hears the story. The story the final kid hears is nothing like
the original story. Every kid that
passes it along does so with their own understanding, emotion, bias, and narrative. My point?
Well, if you haven’t heard something from me or my husband directly, it
likely isn’t the true story. We all add
our own twist to things we have heard. That
is human nature; we always project our own perception on everything we hear and
say. The original message might be “new
and exciting opportunities” but the message heard down the line might be “different
although there were likely other opportunities”. If you want to know why something happened in
our lives, please ask me or my husband.
In the meantime, we would appreciate it if less people played “telephone”
with our choices! It will save a lot of
heartache and misunderstanding in the future. 😁