The other day I started looking at people’s posts on Facebook and it got me thinking: a lot of people make posts about exactly where they are and what they are doing. All of the time. And I just have to wonder: For whom exactly are they posting?
Their followers?
People who you don’t really talk to very much anymore?
While I was thinking about this I started to realize that Facebook is dangerous on so many levels.
Let me explain why.
The other day a guy called me for a coaching class. He was angry. He was upset. He was confused.
He had met this woman and he really liked her. He thought she was fabulous.
She blew him off one day, because she said she that she wasn’t feeling well.
She said she’d get back together with him another day. But, while she was supposed to be feeling sick, he spent the day playing around on Facebook.
And he saw what she was posting.
She was at the lake. She was drinking at a bar with friends. She had gone to brunch and taken pictures of her food: her eggs, salmon, and other things.
Instead of calling her, he called me.
And he said, “It’s amazing. She blew me off, yet she broadcast all over Facebook what she was out doing.”
I told him to save his money. I wasn’t going to charge him for this.
This is what people do. You see… Facebook is a trap. If you are going to blow somebody off, you don’t leave a trail like a snail.
People can literally follow you on social media. Everyday I get e-mails in my in-box telling me that somebody has caught their girlfriend or boyfriend cheating just from looking at pictures that they’ve posted on Facebook. Often, this is because people post pictures of what they’re really up to after they’ve claimed to be spending a quiet weekend at home.
We are constantly broadcasting our exact locations to the world. Why? Are we trying to create our own reality shows? Are we trying to entertain our followers? These people are bored and sitting at home, watching us because they have nothing better to do.
Why do we do this? Are we trying to be cool? Why, as a community, do we post every move we make on Facebook?
I don’t understand. I think that the number one reason is because people are impulsive.
You see, when I am out and about I rarely post on Facebook because I’m so distracted doing whatever it is that I’m doing. If I’m at the beach, I’m enjoying the beach. If I’m at a lake, I’m enjoying that. If I’m eating brunch with friends, I’m focused on that. I’m not posting all over Facebook all the time, constantly disconnecting from the present moment.
Don’t even get me started on parents.
You, parents who post pictures of your kids in front of their school at their activities.
You’re posting pictures of kids. You’re leaving a trail. All it takes is one person to comment on your photo to set off a chain reaction that makes it hard to know who can even look at the picture.
It only takes one crazy person in your Facebook ‘family’ for this to become and issue; an issue that you might not even know about. And, I guarantee that you don’t know every single person who is friends with you on Facebook.
Not only that, even people who you do know in real life aren’t people who are really your friends. The Facebook family tree is so far reaching that it would be impossible for you to know about their real emotional character.
You have no idea what they’re about.
Just because you were friendly with them in high school, doesn’t mean that they haven’t turned into a crazy stalker now.
Every day, I hear stories about stalkers on Facebook. It’s non-stop. Every single day, people will constantly post updates telling people where they are. It’s bound to cause issues.
I heard from a woman that I know the other day. She had a stalker: 45 messages from one guy.
When she asked me what to do, I told her to de-friend him.
Then, I told her to delete every piece of personal information about her and her family that she could possibly find. You never know what this person is thinking or going to do.
We live in a world where people are lonely, lonelier than ever because they feel more connected than ever. They’re socially challenged people who will spend most of their time on social media.
They portray things on social media, and hang out on social media because they can’t go out and socialize in person. It creates a ticking time bomb and makes it so that one, little thing might trigger this person. They might follow your kid to school one day and do something that you’ll always regret.
Sound harsh? There’s no getting around it.
There are crazy people in this world. The next time you want to be validated by posting your life on Facebook, think to yourself: Do I know all those people?
Next time you want to put up a cute picture of your kid sitting in front of her school, so that anybody who looks can know her location from 8am to 3pm every single day, think to yourself: do you know all those people on Facebook?
Oh yeah, we live in a dangerous time. Nothing’s anonymous. Welcome to the dangerous world of Facebook.
