I wonder how everyone on Facebook seems to have a perfect life. Each one seems to be having a gala time, lots of fun and frolic, travel, food, entertainment, shopping, attending concerts etc,etc. I hesitate to log into my account because somewhere acutely it makes me feel inadequate. When I see my friends posing with their spouses fondly in romantically, partying with families in functions or on travel I feel lacking the great happening in my own personal life. Some of my friends an
d acquaintance put pics of great recipes prepared by them in mornings and evening, from where do they get the energy and time to do so? And, the best part is at least ten to twenty comments keep pouring in for those pictures and recipes.
According to some recent studies conducted on fake profile on Facebook and other social media platforms, lying about oneself on Facebook is an observable fact. From beginning people have been tweaking their personal details every way from making their lives seem more interesting to out-and-out posting things that totally misrepresent the truth or creating other identities for a variety of reasons. This behaviour is prevalent and every day thousands of fake profiles are uploaded on Facebook. A Consumer Reports investigation in 2012 found that 25 percent of Facebook users lie about their profiles for different reasons, some which are very persuasive. People go to any extent while lying about their age, sex, location or birthdates in order to protect their identities. This process has been termed as catfishing. Sometimes a cacatfish’s sole purpose is to engage in a fantasy. Sometimes, however, the catfish’si intent is to defraud a victim, seek revenge or commit identity theft. The basic idea of catfishing is to get friendly with vulnerable young adults on Facebook.
A “catfish” is someone who pretends to be someone else online. This person completely assumes a fake identity and goes the extra mile to make their victim believe that they are exactly who they say they are. It tends to happen a lot in online dating sites.
Few of my students who are married for two–three years keep posting romantic pictures with their spouses and I feel good for them. But, shockingly a student who was ‘’happily married’’ as per her facebook status called me the other day to inform that she has filed papers of divorcee. By the time I sleeked clarification she started crying on the phone saying that it was just a white lie to show the world that she is happily married….
Another friend of mine on her wedding anniversary wished her husband “happy wedding anniversary to my janoo” she even put pictures of the presents she bought for him. But the same friend just few days prior to her post was complaining about her husband and even declared that she was planning to separate with him. Facebook and social media has made life topsy-turvy. It’s difficult to believe people; from partying, travelling, entertainment, learning, pursuing hobbies…you name the event, and most of it is fake,
There was a time when people dint like to share their personal life details with world, but these days people feel sad if their personal life details are not read on Fcebook and if they don’t get likes for their posts. I think Facebook is a conceited place where the best, the funniest, the most charming aspects of our lives are publicized; we don’t publicize the same boring, routine, shitty things of our life. So, the next time you get envied or jealous by a Facebook friend’s bragging about his or her splendid and eventful life, remember this fact that he/she is probably exaggerating it for social media brazenly to grab attention from others.
Facebook has become an obsession with most people; we want to know what others are doing in their lives. Facebook has made us nosier and it is platform for gossip about others and our Facebook friends are too happy to share their illusive, imaginative lives with us. Facebook has widened our friend circle far and wide; whereas realistically I am sure that most of us be knowing a handful of them whom we can call and share our details of life. Others are just for the name sake.
I see some of people around me very busy updating their statuses and constantly updating what’s happening and what’s not happening in their lives…. so Facebook has the power to make us feel so bad about our ‘dull’, not a very happening life and to get over our remorse, we are compelled to write about how wonderful our lives are. Can we blame Mr. Zuckerberg for this foolishness of ours? No, we only have ourselves to blame and it would be better if we take little time to realise that Facebook is definitely not a platform to blow our trumpet, to give vague unrealistic status and it does say that we must brazenly keep lying about ourselves. For me, Facebook is a short story book about false people, their lives in which each one tries to show how great his/her life is than others. It is hard to keep a balance of mind on Facebook if you compare your life to your friend’s.
Life is made up of little moments: some good, some not so good, some boring, some fabulous, we can’t run away from realities and we need to embrace them without feeling the need to write a status about it. What’s the use if we start writing status “in bad need of help,” “feeling low,” “feeling lonely” how many of the so called friends will rush to help? Our so called friendship with thousands on friends on Facebook is in fact a fantasy. The key message is to live your life, focus on your present reality, and ignore the extravaganza of social media. Trust me; you’ll be much happier!
