I recently offended an ex of mine on my blog. I felt badly that his feelings were hurt. It wasn’t my intention. I was simply speaking my truth. Ultimately, his response was to delete me from Facebook. It was a surprise when I went to his page and found that it said the dreaded words “Add Friend.” It was somewhat of a surprise but I understood that he was hurt. Fair enough.
The thing about everyone being on Facebook these days is that when a relationship ends in real life, it also tends to end on the Internet. And when that relationship is terminated on the Internet not only do you see the death of it, but so do your friends and family potentially.
I have deleted people from Facebook before when they’ve hurt my feelings in a deep way. Sometimes seeing them on my feed was a constantly reminder of what it was that they did to hurt me. I totally get it. I’m a sensitive person and so is my ex apparently :).
Sometimes I wish Facebook didn’t exist. It was easier in the days before it’s existence. We just dumped ex-girlfriends and boyfriends and pretended that they didn’t exist anymore. I mean, sure you could still run into that person on the street. But you were safe from them.
Now, you can “run into that ex” online. You can see a visual reminder of their new relationship. You are continually aware of what this individual is doing without you in their lives. So many people choose to delete these people online so they don’t have “see” these new life events.
It’s not just ex-lovers. Sometimes a friendship ends for a variety of reasons. Rather than stay connected to this person on the internet, the hurt friend chooses to delete this individual from their life.
The other trend I’ve noticed with regard to Facebook deletion is miscommunication. Often times one party will offend or hurt the other party. Human beings have different styles of communication since we’re unique. So here’s what happens:
Person A: Hey you hurt my feelings when you wrote binky boop blank pow!
Person B: I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings. I just felt like Beep beep bop hello!
Person A: You don’t understand or hear me.
Person B: You don’t understand or hear ME!
Person A: **Deletes person B.
Social media has made relationships way more complicated than they already are, because it helps to decrease in person interaction. When there’s a conflict, it’s best to work it out in person. Resolving things over Facebook chat, email, Twitter or Pinterest is…wait you totally can’t resolve anything over Pinterest…but anyway, the point is work it out in person. If you can’t do that because you’re not in the same state or country, then at least fix that shit on Skype.
So if y’all want to go delete me on Facebook after this, no hard feelings. When I see you in person I’ll just lick your face.
First I want to say that this is very well written and an important topic to discuss. There are so many different reasons why people choose to delete people off of facebook. For me personally, I often go through my list of friends and eliminate people I no longer speak with. I also eliminate people who post really annoying things on their feed. If I have a conflict, I would prefer to sort it out with the person in real life but circumstances don’t always allow that. More importantly, I think it’s crucial for us to be more “selective” about who we choose to be friends with online. Everyone is so quick to say: “Hey, find me on facebook” and then we find out we have nothing in common with that person, they post really stupid disturbing stuff on their page, or they suck in some other general way. Last time I checked, you had the option of choosing “friends” on facebook. I can count on ten fingers how many friends I actually have!
Very great article Sarah. I am torn about Facebook etiquette. On the one hand, Jenn is right. On the other hand, it’s very hurtful when someone you thought was a friend up and deletes you out of seemingly nowhere without a single reason as to why. This recently happened to me, and although the person was annoying and rude, I had kept them on my Facebook because we were friends in real life and I didn’t think someone I had occasional hang outs with should be deleted over many differences in opinions.