Bahahahahaha! Facebook is somehow 'socially engaged'? It's the polar opposite. Being alone, staring at a screen looking at pictures of what other people have done and skimming the borderline racist/clueless politispam of distant relatives barely known acquaintances . . . that's not social, or engaged.
:P
Perhaps your social circle isn't enmeshed with Facebook, but you can't generalize that.
Yes I can. In fact, if you re-read my post, I did just that.
In my social circle, facebook is used for planning parties and gettogethers,
Planning parties/gettogethers isn't social. Actually
going to the parties is. The method of notification of the party can be anything, letter, engraved invitation, email, etc. None of these delivery methods are themselves social.
chatting throughout the day, messaging acquaintances, sharing and discussing things people have done (which *is* social engagement).
This is social engagement in the same way that masturbation is sex. The quality of random posting, messaging, and humble bragging about how awesome you are isn't real social engagement. It's meaningless time wasting. If you honestly think that doing this makes you socially engaged with a person or group, I feel kind of sad for you.
Facebook enables many-to-many discussion of things in a way that simple conversation isn't equipped for.
I have never seen Facebook used as a respectful, well thought out place for deep introspection and stimulating conversation. Were you to describe Facebook that way to most people though, I suspect that they would have to work hard to suppress a giggle at such a silly notion. It's possible that Facebook has the potential to be what you're claiming it is . . . but unfortunately it's populated by people.
People are generally dicks online. When you take away the inflection in someone's voice, reduce the quality of his or her writing (as is typical of online communication, 4 reel lolz!!!11), remove any sort of face to face nonverbal indicators, and reduce any real life repercussions for acting infantile this is an inevitable consequence.
It's not a replacement for socializing
Agreed!
- it's an extension of it.
Eh . . . I guess? I mean, writing letters is an extension of socializing too, but most wouldn't say that a person alone in a dark room scribbling some stuff on a pad of paper was being particularly social.
It's a qualitatively different kind of communication that didn't exist pre-internet.
No it's not. You could always write notes to your friends. Sheeeit, I used to spend an awful lot of time passing notes back and forth in my grade 9 science classes. The internet just allows you to pass the notes further (with more advertising) to people you know even less. Fundamentally it's exactly the same kind of communication that always existed.
Obviously simply looking at other people's pictures isn't being socially engaged. It's the conversation that stems from those pictures being posted in a public social environment, where everyone can see and comment and engage with each other, and from which future in-person conversations flow - that's the social engagement I'm talking about.
Yeah. That's what I'm calling bullshit on. Because the quality of conversation on those posted pictures usually goes something like this:
*Pic of drunk dude posted, holding a beer, with palm trees in the background*
- nice man!!!!!11111
- r1ght on, YOLO
- dayum, is that mexuco
- take sum of those immigrants jobs 4 1ce
- nah man, it's morokko
- iznt moroko in mexico????
- YOLO!!1111 Lern geografy
- Jay, this is your grandmother. How do you turn on the printer?
- Spring brake 4eva!
^ Not social engagement. Pretty typical of Facebook.