Within recent memory,
my then wife got mad at me for something I said. What was I thinking? In truth,
I wasn’t thinking. However, what was an infraction in my eyes was a felony in
hers. I talked to her, clarified my intention, and apologized profusely. I was
still in the doghouse, but slowly I felt I was being forgiven. After a while, I
thought the incident was behind us, but that was a premature assessment. In
fact, it was wishful thinking.
One day, I found out I
was no longer my wife’s friend on FB. Ladies
and gentlemen, I had been quietly and unceremoniously unfriended by none other
than my wife.
I was livid and felt
jilted, rejected. How could she do something egregious like that? I teetered
between being angry and being disappointed.
No, this was not an
infraction on her part, I rationalized, but a declaration of war.
Apparently, I found
out, she had made her decision before we buried the hatchet. She was, of
course, understandably irate when she decided to boot me from her friends list.
I talked to her about
the matter, but she smiled and went about her business. One day, I jokingly
brought up the issue with her and her female friends and told a story about an
unidentified husband who was once unfriended by his own wife. Her friends were
not amused: Some had to suppress a chuckle, others simply winced at me. Much to
my chagrin, all her friends blamed the man. “What did he do,” they all asked,
“for him to be unfriended?” To them, this
poor husband must have done something “bad” and “reprehensible.”
True to her nature, my
wife showed magnanimity and offered to “befriend” me again. By then, I had come
to the conclusion that it was not a bad idea for us not to be friends on FB.
Although I only had less than 2 percent of female friends on FB, my wife had a penchant
for gently prodding and quizzing me about them. Not
being the jealous type, she was merely curious about these women.
A bold man
“I love my wife to
death,” proclaimed a New York therapist, Ian Kanter, “But I do not need to be
her Facebook friend.”
Kanter thought it was
better for his marriage not to be friends with his wife on social media. “I
didn’t want all the extra information,” he told Public Radio International. “If
anything, I wanted less information—I wanted more mystery and more
unpredictability.” Any element of mystery is good for the relationship.
In this day and age of
digital explosion, married couples have little time for each other. A 2014 Pew Research
Center survey found that 25 percent of those polled who are in a long-term
relationship complained that their loved ones were “distracted by their mobile
phone while they were together.” About 8 percent consistently quarreled over
time spent on the Internet.
“Put your devices
down,” roared Kanter.
Facebook as a medium
can cause rifts in a relationship. Too much use, according to studies, can have
adverse effects on a relationship. A recent study published in the Journal of
Cyperpsychology, Behavior and Social Networking found a correlation between relationship
stability and FB usage. Those who check this medium more than once an hour
“experience Facebook-related conflict with their romantic partners.” The
problem, according to the study, is that FB use might lead to misunderstanding
and jealousy often created by connections with ex-lovers and possible emotional
and physical cheating.
A new legal phrase
“Facebook divorce” refers to the increasing marital dissolutions that have
happened due to information uncovered through the medium. These include, but
are not limited to, flirty messages with old flames and exchanging photos which
in turn become evidence in court. One British study found that 66 percent of
divorce lawyers had cited FB “as the primary source of evidence in a divorce
case.”
One American clergy,
Reverend Cedric Miller, in New Jersey was so mad at FB that he asked members of
his congregation to close their accounts because the social network is “a
portal of infidelity.” The cleric was concerned because 20 couples in his congregation
had been led astray by the use of FB. The medium alleged the cleric, facilitated
spouses to re-connect with ex-lovers, which in turn led to bitterness and undue
strain in their marriage.
“Readily available
communication on Facebook,” says John Grohol—the CEO and founder of Psych Central—“leads people to pursue
temptation or engage in risky behavior.” He added, in an interview with The
Huffington Post, “Facebook makes it easy to engage in less inhabited
communication—which can lead to taking risks we wouldn’t ordinarily take in our
everyday life.”
A word of caution
A few guidelines will
help you protect yourself when using Facebook:
1.
Be careful of what you post for your friends. Not every friend on FB, it
is said, is a true friend. The word ‘friend” has unfortunately lost its meaning
in today’s social media. Your ‘friends’ may post damaging information about you
and there is little you can do about it.
2.
In case you have forgotten, whatever you post—and its contents— belongs
to FB.
3.
Your postings can be used against you in a court of law. I have seen a
California prosecutor present, as evidence, 45,000 pages of FB
postings allegedly used by gang members.
4.
Employers have been mining FB for information to weed out job applicants
or keep tabs on their employees. One woman called in sick one day and took her
children to the zoo. Her husband inadvertently posted pictures of the family
standing in front of the elephant house to her FB account. To say the woman was
miffed is an understatement.
5.
Facebook can be helpful in connecting with family and friends. It is also
a source of valuable information. It is, however, how you use it that can
adversely affect your relationship. You do not want to keep checking your FB
account more than you check on your life partner. As one wise person once said, “Couples that
fail to make one another the centerpiece of their life are straddling the red
zone.”
(Courtesy: Sahan Journal, August 22, 2016).
