Why I'm Leaving Facebook

The title of this blog post can be somewhat misleading. First of all, I'm not necessarily going to abruptly delete my Facebook account. Leaving Facebook might be more of a gradual process over an undefined period of time, like a crab slowly molting its old shell. On the other hand, in some ways I've already left Facebook, even though my account is still active as of this writing. To begin with, some context is necessary, especially since this isn't the first time I've had a problem with Facebook and its privacy policy.  

When Facebook first started taking off, I liked MySpace much better. After all, I could customize my MySpace page while everybody's Facebook page was the same old white and blue. Booooring! So I resisted jumping on the Facebook bandwagon as long as I could. Eventually Facebook grew on me, like a rapidly spreading rash that's highly uncomfortable but gives you a strange satisfaction when you scratch it. I started spending more and more time on it, posting, liking and commenting on others' posts, and keeping in touch with old (and new) friends. I even attended a high school reunion BBQ organized almost exclusively through Facebook. Good times! Unfortunately, it didn't stay that way.

Fast forward to the 2016 presidential election and the subsequent Trump presidency. During this time, I "lost" a number of Facebook friends over the tribalism and division that emerged in this political environment including, ironically enough, the friend who had hosted the high school reunion BBQ a few years earlier. I attempted to counteract the toxic politics by creating a private Facebook group called Meet at the Center, where members with different political views could debate the issues respectfully. The group soon sputtered though, as I noticed that most of the members preferred to continue posting on their own pages rather than on the group page. I realized that they probably preferred to bask in the warmth of their own respective echo chambers rather than submit their views to scrutiny and challenges.

And so it's come to this. I'm taking some of the more recent not-so-surprising news about Facebook mishandling users' data as my cue. It's not the first time, or even the second or third time, so we're way beyond the question of who the shame belongs to. My privacy is my responsibility, and allowing Facebook to violate it continuously is totally on me.

I've already scaled back my Facebook use to almost nothing for weeks now. That makes any official decision to leave Facebook more of a formality than anything else. My biggest concern through all this is the reason I joined Facebook in the first place: keeping in touch with people I care about. To that end, I'll keep my Messenger account active for the time being so that my Facebook friends who wish to stay in contact can message me and get my phone number if they don't already have it. That way, we can have a real friendship outside of Facebook and maybe even meet up face to face every once in a while, which is always nice.