Photo+Journalism
If only life was as simple as Facebook.
The fine line between friendship: a simple confirmation. And sometimes the entirely unnecessary addition of details–where did we meet? Did we hook up? Was it hot? Who cares? Why would I want to announce it to my other 100000 friends (yes, I’m so popular).
The ugly line between friendship and accepting its dissolution: the mere click of an ‘X’ and a “Yes”.
Today, I deleted a friend. Were we ever friends, or was this a person who I added in the desperate stages of my freshman year, when everyone I met was a “friend”? Probably the latter–in any case, I don’t remember. Kelly H. (for the very plausible possibility that one of our 15 mutual friends might read this, I will omit her last name). I don’t remember the circumstances of when we met. I don’t even recall the last time I saw her face-to-face. Or talked to her. Was she in my orientation group? Did we talk meaningfully about anything? Probably not. I hope that I would remember if I did.
Choosing this friend to delete was difficult; another actual friend of mine (or is he?) recommended that I try this. And write about it. Being the obedient sheep that I am, I gave it a try. I hovered over the name “Chris C.” for a while, but decided against it; I had seen him recently, and perhaps there is a chance at our friendship–though it would probably not be any further developed over this whole Facebook nonsense. And in all plausibility, we may never speak again. Who knows. I’m not actually going to try.
I skimmed down the list. Hey, I actually do speak to a good number of these people on a regular basis. Every once in a while, a name of an old classmate–but wait, I still want to see what they’re up to. No, I can’t delete them–they have the greatest drunken photos of themselves on their Mini-Feed every Monday. Ah, that’s one of the 5 people I actually talk to on a regular basis, can’t delete them for sure.
So I came upon Kelly. I probably wouldn’t recognize her if I saw her on campus. She hides her pictures, so I can only see those faux-art photos she puts as her profile pictures, half of which were taken with the Mac Photobooth application.
A dozen other thoughts raced through my head: would she be hurt if I deleted her? Would she care? Would I ever see her again? Would we recognize each other? Would it be awkward or would we not care enough to make eye contact? Would she have deleted me first if the thought had occurred to her first? Perhaps I had survived her own methodical sifting-of-friends, and how I had given her the ax. Chop chop.
I’m making too big of a deal out of this. But then comes the pathetic realization that if I was to sift out each person who I don’t talk to frequently, who has slipped from the rank of “friend” to “acquaintance” to “distant contact” or “someone I check up on out of a sick curiosity”, I would probably end up with maybe…50 friends. Maybe even fewer than that. I won’t, for the sake of my own ego. I like to think I’m well-liked, and popular. With over 600 friends (maybe 1 less now) at UCLA. Oh special me. Love me.
Feel special, everyone who is reading this. You’re probably still on my friend list.
Also, don’t be offended. I’m not (that much of) an egotist. This is all in satire.
Sometimes it’s good to clean out those lists.
Deleting people your AIM lsit is even harder. It’s like “I don’t even really talk to this person anymore but I don’t want to delete them neither…”
Glad you carried out this experiment.
However, look into academic literature on “weak ties” in social networks. There is an argument that, despite the weakness of a tie, it’s still valuable to maintain it, even nominally, even if you don’t talk on a “regular basis.”
They did a study of social behavior during the Hurricane Andrew disaster in Florida, and researchers discovered that while communication with “strong ties” increased somewhat (you called your mom to say you’re ok), the big difference in coping with disaster was the activation of these so-called “weak ties.” Even more so than simple strangers helping strangers, these “low frequency”, “just on facebook” friends become very useful.
Your reticent neighbor gets chatty when the neighborhood is destroyed, because extreme circumstances mean that the strong ties may not be enough. People that you haven’t talked to in years check in on you, and offer moral and practical support.
I’m pretty sure these observations bore out during the September 11th attacks too.
So yes, it’s good to maintain quality control over your definition of “friend.” But to prune all of your weak ties would be a loss (not that I think you want to). Loss, disaster, extreme circumstances simply shift your network need. Facebook tries to nag users to define these ties, but I can’t be bothered to add the information. I think in the long run, our computers and robots will be able to infer who’s actually a Friend and who’s just a weak tie.