I Quit Facebook: A beginning of a new way to approach modern life
I've been thinking hard about it for a while, but especially in light of recent events, and I've determined that the only ethically consistent thing to do for me is to delete my Facebook account.
I have been unhappy with the way Facebook makes me feel for ages but never had the strength to stay away for very long. That feeling has gotten worse over the last few years as advertising has taken over Facebook and now we have confirmation that it is mining our data for use in all sorts of god-knows-what deals and operations.
I'm all for technology. I'm all for a greater connection of global consciousness. But while certain things, like Wikipedia, make me feel smarter and more informed, Facebook often makes me feel dumber, like it's the biggest television sitcom ever invented. It's made me lazy. I rarely finish reading articles. I browse headlines. I seek out drama. I get a guilty pleasure out of seeing people argue over extremist points of view. Facebook is bad candy, and I need to go on a permanent diet.
I intend to go back to reading blogs and articles and actually researching items that i'm interested in learning more about, rather than relying on how many "likes" an article got to tell me how good it is. I want to get back to using my brain to engage with the world, while at the same time putting a damper on the constant flow of information that leads me to stress out from information overload.
I left Facebook on March 21st. It was a deletion of my account, not a deactivation. The time I’ve gotten back into my life since has been incredible. In a week or two, I’ll write up a post about it.
