What do you think of when I mention Facebook? Fake news or fake friends, or both?

As regards fake friends, we have thousands of them. They are really virtual friends and they give us an unreal sense of being all together on one platform, sharing but not caring!

It is also a platform for trolls who have mental health problems and they insult, berate, criticize and spread hate. It is like having to share a room with patients who have been sent home from a psychiatric hospital.

That is the main reason the whole thing is really an illusion.

Yes, I know that Facebook can reunite lost friends from the past and it can serve as a way of letting your friends know that they are in your thoughts when things go haywire. It is so easy to write :

“You are in my thoughts”

Then, add a suitable GIF and with a click of the mouse, it’s done! You have expressed your solidarity with somebody who is going through illness, mourning or a divorce.

So easy. Too easy!

That is the great appeal. It is all a sham really, and the meaning of true friendship has gone up in the cloud and there it stays.

What is real friendship?

Friends are there for you in every sense of the word. They can come and sit with you, keep you company, help out with some jobs and above all listen.

Nothing to click for. No need to swipe or scan.

There is real eye contact, you can slap him on the back, hold hands and cry and laugh together. Facebook will never be able to let you do that.

Inviting friends for a meal is no longer fun

It used to be so wonderful where you could sit round a table, eat some good food, talk about silly things, serious things and tell stupid jokes.

Now, when you do it, all the joy is gone. Guests will interrupt you when their phone burps or makes some other rude noise. They have to pick it up.

You feel like stabbing them to death with your fork but you are the one who will be accused of diminished responsibility, not them!

Also, when you are talking to a friend or partner, you are likely to hear:

“Just a moment”

Scanning, texting, swiping and even showing you a stupid GIF. Emojis rule their emotions. Their devices have mesmerized them. Their nervous ticks are when they react to a vibration, ping or even if the phone rings.

Watch them scrambling in their bag to get it out.

They are like drug addicts getting their next fix.

I sometimes dream of a laser which I could wave as soon as they enter my flat. This laser is so powerful that it deactivates all smartphone batteries.

I know one friend leaves the room when her partner tells her to wait a moment. It is either the phone or her. As Princess Diana said

“Well, there were three of us in this marriage, so it was a bit crowded.”

We have become social robots

Can’t we see where this is going? We cannot have a real conversation or even an argument any longer. We now rely on memes and emojis and we are now on status updates 24/7. Looks like we will soon forget basic vocabulary.

Words.. what are they?

Our privacy has been raped

Facebook has faced several charges about private data being sold to unscrupulous political parties who desperately want our likes and shares to feed their electoral campaign gorillas. Those monsters are so hungry that they can gobble up millions of users’ data in no time at all.

These have been called “mistakes” by Mark Zuckerberg!

We have become pawns and slaves

Every time we are clicking and messaging, we are feeding the monstrous machine in its gluttonous efforts to get its hands on our data. We are just pawns in the global chess game.

Time to get real

Why can’t we switch off our phones when we meet our friends and family? How many parents switch off their phones when they get home as they greet their kids? Not many!

I love the story of those kids who organized a demo against their parents in Hamburg last year. Their slogan says it all :

“Play with ME, not with your cell phones”

Do me a favor! The next time you are invited to a friends’ house, switch off your phone, do not leave it on the table (try a discreet pocket) and above all

Enjoy a real conversation face-to-face with real people!

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