Elizabeth Bernstein: How Facebook Ruins Friendships

Posted by Kendall Harmon

All this online social networking was supposed to make us closer. And in some ways it has. Thanks to the Internet, many of us have gotten back in touch with friends from high school and college, shared old and new photos, and become better acquainted with some people we might never have grown close to offline.

Last year, when a friend of mine was hit by a car and went into a coma, his friends and family were able to easily and instantly share news of his medical progress—and send well wishes and support—thanks to a Web page his mom created for him.

But there's a danger here, too. If we're not careful, our online interactions can hurt our real-life relationships.

Like many people, I'm experiencing Facebook Fatigue. I'm tired of loved ones—you know who you are—who claim they are too busy to pick up the phone, or even write a decent email, yet spend hours on social-media sites, uploading photos of their children or parties, forwarding inane quizzes, posting quirky, sometimes nonsensical one-liners or tweeting their latest whereabouts. ("Anyone know a good restaurant in Berlin?")

Read it all.

Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Blogging & the Internet • * Theology • Pastoral Theology

5 Comments
Posted August 28, 2009 at 12:17 pm [Printer Friendly] [Print w/ comments]



1. Chris wrote:

could we not substitute Twitter, Myspace, texting, email, telephone,  TV, for Facebook?  And you could write a very similar article….

August 28, 12:33 pm | [comment link]
2. Kubla wrote:

I love that there’s a nice handy link to post her column to various social networking sites, including Facebook.  Gotta go now and tweet that I just commented on a post at T19…

August 28, 1:02 pm | [comment link]
3. FenelonSpoke wrote:

I suppose I should feel bad that I’m not on the cutting edge of high tech communication, but I don’t twitter or tweet and I have never even looked at facebook or myspace and have no desire to. I don’t even have a cell phone, although I am seing an increasing need for one of those. People who need to contact me seem to have no problem, nor do I have a problem contacting them.

I don’t really understand the need to tell people what you had for breakfast. Some of this stuff seems not only boring but quite narcisscistic.

August 28, 5:16 pm | [comment link]
4. State of Limbo wrote:

During my time of unemployment, I regularly connected with friends on Facebook.  Now that I am again employed (Praise God!), I do not have the time to keep up with everyone.  My “Requests” are overflowing and would take hours, which I do not have, to catch up. 

I have noticed that I am not the only member of my “Friends” group that are not on nearly as much.  I think it was fun for some of us for a while, but it became more of a chore to continue interaction. 

We all have lives that dictate we be attentive to our jobs, spouses and households.  Besides, I’d much rather spend the precious free time I have reading God’s Word.

August 29, 11:59 am | [comment link]
5. John A. wrote:

FenelonSpoke, If you have any interest in sharing the Gospel with teenagers you need to at least try Facebook.  Like any tool it can be abused or used in silly ways but it can also be useful for staying in touch.

One of my kids texts on his phone while he IMs on Facebook.  He exchanges about 10,000 texts a month.  It is not instead of other kinds of communication it is in addition to.

August 29, 5:29 pm | [comment link]
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