An Open Letter to Facebook

Dear Facebook,

In the beginning, I thought we were friends. I turned thirteen in 2009, when you were slowly but surely out-cooling MySpace. Honestly, I enjoyed the first year. I spent hours in front of the computer liking pages, reading posts, arranging Pieces of Flair to express my enthusiasm for various television shows, and taking all of your ridiculous quizzes.

Here's the thing-- now, I kinda hate you.

I don't know at least a third of the people on my friend's list. Another third of my friend's list consists of people that I do not like anymore. And of the third that are people that I both know and marginally tolerate, most of those people are related to me. I could easily unfriend all the people I find undesirable, or make a new profile, but here's the thing: I have neither the time, nor the patience to do this. I do not want to sit in front of my computer for hours unfriending people that I do not like, and I certainly don't want to deal with all the unpleasant (to say the least) feelings that would go along with the process. I don't want to make a new profile because, here's a shocker, I DO NOT ENJOY YOUR WEBSITE, so why on Earth would I decide to further support it by creating an entirely new profile that shows exactly the same information as my current one?

Think of it this way. This is sort of like when you go into a public restroom, and you go into a stall, and you see that someone hasn't flushed the toilet. Unless you really, really need to pee, you're just gonna leave and use a different stall. The reason is because there's so much crap already in the toilet that it'd be easier and less gross to go to a different stall. Or maybe hold it in and wait until you get home, because public restrooms are disgusting. I've gotten to the point, Facebook, where all the crap on my page seems like it belongs to a completely different person, and the path of least resistance right now is to just let it alone.

I don't like dealing with the so-called "political activists" on your website, either. I've discovered that most of them don't actually know what they're talking about, and the few that do are shot down for being Liberals. Of course, over time I realized that nothing good comes out of showing these ridiculous people that they actually know nothing about politics beyond their capacity to come up with not-so-witty and offensive slogans to plaster all over their walls. However, I look at these people like the awful school photo of me that my grandmother insists on keeping up in her living room: It might've been all right to start with, but there comes a point when you just don't want to look at that anymore.

I don't like the way you post memes eons after they stopped being cool. I'm really tired of seeing photos of various female celebrities being criticized for the way they dress. (Taylor Swift wore sweatpants today. Like wow. I wear sweatpants all the time. God forbid we have to start treating celebrities like humans.) And by the way, the Rotten E-card edits? They're not witty anymore. Now they're just bitter.

I don't like the constant Christian posts I'm barraged with on your website. As a Christian myself, I find the idea that God would send me to hell for not commenting on a picture of clouds with a Bible verse overlayed on it in Comic Sans ludicrous at best and offensive at worst. Theologically, liking and commenting on pictures of Jesus with a herd of sheep is about as likely to get me into heaven as reading the Harry Potter books is to make me a witch. Oh wait... that was probably a bad example for you guys.

I hate people my age on your website who feel it's necessary to post vague things in order to get attention. In the past two hours alone, I have seen at least six different girls post things along the lines of, "Well that was awkward lol"  and then failed to specify what, exactly, was awkward.

PLEASE OH PLEASE COULD YOU MAYBE POSSIBLY BE A BIT MORE VAGUE I THINK THERE ARE A COUPLE PEOPLE LIVING IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA THAT THIS DOESN'T APPLY TO.

And while we're on the subject, I would like to say how much I positively loath with every fiber of my being the girls who constantly share photos or type posts that read as follows:

DO YOU WANT AN AWARD OR SOMETHING?

I suppose I really could go on forever. Suffice it to say, Facebook, that if we were in a relationship, my status would go from "In a relationship" to "It's complicated". Hopefully in a few years I'll be able to kick you off my computer altogether.

Best Wishes,
Sarah xx