A close Facebook friend of mine recently told me that they were thinking of coming off Facebook as they were fed up of it. At the time we were chatting I didn’t think too much about it apart from being sad that I wouldn’t be able to keep in touch in the same way that we had before.
This was until a couple of days ago when I was scanning through my Facebook feed first thing in the morning so I can catch up on any overnight goings on from my friends in the Northern Hemisphere when I was confronted by the sickest thing I have ever seen.
It was a picture of what appeared to be a naked dead baby laying on the grass.
Yes you read that correctly.
It was accompanied by a story about the baby being abandoned and the usual crap that these horrendous images have – you know the drill.
‘Like if you think baby killing is wrong(!) Ignore if you don’t have a heart’ or something along those lines- I am paraphrasing.
The thing was I don’t know if that would have even come into my news feed at all had it not been for the fact that a number of my FB friends had commented on it.
Am I alone in thinking that posting pictures of dead babies is distasteful at the very least and absolutely appallingly disgusting at worst?
I just don’t understand the motivation behind posting an image so shocking and horrendous, and for what?
The sake of a few thousand ‘likes’ from people you don’t know? Am I missing something here?
I don’t understand people who then comment on these things either, even if it is just to say it is wrong and should be taken down (I don’t know if that is what was said as I didn’t stick around to read the tens of thousands of comments). But even if it was, isn’t that giving the poster of the vile thing just the oxygen they want? The more comments they get the more people will see? Is that how it works? And to what end?
Surely the best thing to do would be to ignore it all together and report it privately to FB instead of feeding the thread into a bigger and bigger monster.
I don’t know where these pictures have come from, I don’t know if they are genuine pictures of what they say that they portray but I do know that either way something like that should not be on a social networking site in my opinion.
After the shock of seeing such a horrendous image it got me to thinking about the whole Facebook phenomenon as a whole and how it can be abused so badly.
Does anyone remember the picture of a young girl called ‘Mallory’ who
‘didn’t think she was beautiful’ ‘like if you think she is’etc?
Turns out that the picture was not of a girl called ‘Mallory’ at all it was an image of a girl posted without the permission of the girls parents and the ‘story’ behind it was a complete load of hogwash. Yet people are still liking and commenting on these spammers that invade my newsfeed.
Besides being so shocked at some of the inappropriate sponsored things I see in my newsfeed all too often including links to porn sites with graphic pictures popping up unbidden. I am fed up of having to wade my way through this tidalwave of crap to catch up with what my friends on the other side of the world are up to.
Don’t get me wrong I like Facebook as a tool for keeping in touch with people that you perhaps wouldn’t necessarily have before and that’s why I use it.
The irony of the fact that this post will be read mostly by people who have seen it in my Facebook feed is not lost on me either. I know how good it can be, but am I alone in getting tired of all the rest of the rubbish that goes with it?
Perhaps due to the rise in the amount of sponsored pages and links that keep popping up in my feed, I am seeing less and less of the things, the people that actually matter to me, the things that I actually want to see. Being on the other side of the world I WANT to know whats happening with my friends back home, I WANT to hear about the little trivialities and minutiae in their lives as well as the big events that happen, so I don’t feel so far away. I DON’T want to know how to lose belly fat in 3 days. (I’m having a baby I’m pretty sure that will lose me some belly fat-I hope!).
There are many other things that I could mention while I am on my soapbox but this post is already in danger of turning into ‘war and peace’ as it is so I will just say one last teeny tiny thing.
If you don’t want to be FB friends with someone then just de-friend them instead of continuing to be friends and then blocking all access to you. What is the point, if you don’t want someone to see stuff about you – ask yourself are you really their friend?
Chances are they probably feel the same about you so suck it up and move on! *
Disclaimer* To all my FB friends I sincerely love each and every one of you and would walk over hot coals for you- please don’t de-friend me!! 
So tell me, am I alone in getting tired of it? Or am I taking it all too seriously and need to chill out? Does anyone else feel like this? Anything else to add to the list?
Hit me. (Not literally)
Linking up with Grace because it’s Friday and I’m a floggin.
Both images courtesy of Master isolated images at FreeDigitalPhotos.Net
