By Carlee Lammers
Round Table editor-in-chief
One out of every 13 people on Earth has a Facebook account, according to a report from CNN. Even worse, three out of four Americans have active Facebook accounts and one out of 26 of them signs-in on a daily basis. Are we moving toward becoming a nation addicted to Facebook?
Facebook can be used for a wide variety of purposes ranging from promoting your business to keeping in touch with friends you met at camp that live thousands of miles away.
Facebook allows you to post, read or “like” virtually anything at all in a matter of just a click.
If you were to log onto Facebook and type into the search bar “addicted to Facebook,” hundreds of pages come up with thousands of people who “like” the page, including the page “my mom is addicted to Facebook.”
The same CNN report found that 48 percent of young Americans use Facebook as a means of finding out about news.
Technology today has made it even more convenient to compulsively check those wall posts and status updates. With features such as Facebook mobile, users can get text messages sent to their cell phone every time they receive a notification. With smartphone technology, users are now capable of accessing the Internet wherever they go. Surely, “there’s an app for that.”
For many high school students, myself included, Facebook is mainly used to procrastinate and put off completing homework. I’d much rather look at pictures and other updates on Facebook than finish my AP Environmental reading for the night, or apply for scholarships. When I choose to spend my night on Facebook, nothing gets done. My scholarships aren’t any closer to being completed, I haven’t studied for my exams and I know I have a very late night ahead of me.
I think anyone who suffers from a Facebook compulsion to any degree will agree that there is a certain thrill when you receive a notification or harvest your crops on Farmville in just enough time before they wilt. Before you know it, a “quick check” on Facebook becomes an hour or two, and you completely lose track of time.
Some applications on Facebook, such as the game Farmville where users can create their own virtual farm, reward players the more they sign in. If you play Farmville three days in a row, and then invite five friends to join the madness, your farm will be rewarded. Can’t wait three hours for your strawberry plants to finish growing so you can earn more money? All you have to do is take out your credit card and you can spend your real money on imaginary money for your imaginary farm. Clearly, there must be a problem if you are spending your own hard-earned money to feed your Facebook compulsions.
My question is: does all of this really matter? Do all 968 of your “friends” truly need to know what you are doing at that exact moment or what you had for dinner? Do these “friends” need to see the picture of your new haircut minutes after you got it done? Can’t you go outside and plant your own garden instead of planting an electronic one?
In Fall City, Wash., there is a rehabilitation facility called reSTART Internet Addiction Recovery Program. The reSTART program provides both in- and outpatient recovery programs for youth and adults who suffer from Internet, texting and video game addictions. On the reSTART website, an Internet addiction is actually compared to a substance addiction.
The CNN report shows a video of 19-year-old college drop-out, Ben Alexander, who traded his time furthering his education to play the video game “World of War Craft” up to 17 hours a day. Alexander is now part of a detoxification program provided by the reSTART center that focuses on regaining the excitement of other activities rather than video games.
While I recognize that this is an actual addiction from which many people suffer, I can’t help but blame those addicted for making it incredibly easy to feed their own compulsions. We are the only ones responsible for the amount of time we spend online, and we need to have the willpower to stay offline when we know it will just cause more problems.
Spend time with your real friends instead of browsing over the pages of your Facebook friends. If you like something your friends say, tell them in person; don’t click a button to let them know. Imagine how much time we would all have to be productive if we really did just a “quick check” of our Facebook accounts.
Websites such as Facebook are meant to be fun and used in moderation; they are not meant to overrun your life and take priority over real interactions and experiences.
