YOUR SAY: Facebook? No thanks, I prefer real human interaction

Karl Marx, the real one, not that controversial former University of Nairobi students’ leader who passed away a few years ago, once said that religion is the opium of the masses.

I will paraphrase. The so-called social media sites, ala Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp and the motley of other online platforms, are the opium of the masses today. Just so we’re clear, I will state upfront that this piece is not supposed to endear me to the swelling numbers of social media followers.

The truth of the matter is, I have had enough of this whole social media fad. The world could still spin and go round without Facebook, Twitter and WhatsApp - come to think of it, the world did spin and go round before the advent of social media.

At the risk of being branded backward, I dare say that I have no love for Facebook. In fact, I think Facebook and WhatsApp, social media’s newest kid on the block, are overrated and overused.

As unlikely as it might sound, I get this feeling that at this very moment, a geek is locked up somewhere engrossed in the encoding process of a new software that will soon make the likes of Facebook and WhatsApp painfully ancient. Then, and thankfully so, all this talk of Facebook will cease to be. Call me old-fashioned if you want, but I prefer human contact in all my social interactions.

I would rather chat over a cup of coffee with a friend, or share a firm handshake or hug, rather than engage in the superficial socialising that takes place on Facebook and other sites. 

I find it ironical that we have an insatiable craving for virtual interaction with strangers, spending hours chatting with people we have never met, yet we have no time to spare for the living, breathing people around us. Look around you, and see the aloofness that surrounds you.

IT IS MADDENING

Don’t you see that social media’s biggest achievement has been turning us into a society of antisocial beings?

Living in cyberspace is just not my cup of tea. Okay, maybe Facebook is not such a bad idea, but what really raises my eyebrows is what the users have turned it into; a myriad of triviality – oh, the manner of absurdities that most users post and comment on! It is maddening.

So what if you had eggs and bacon for breakfast? Must you post a picture for people to see?

That’s without mentioning Facebook’s infamy as a spurring ring where users, at least this side of our world, trade vile comments that are nothing more than ethnic racial chauvinism.

The main stream media is also now facing serious threat from what is being bandied around as ‘citizen journalism’. Hearsay, rumours and half-truths are the stock of trade for these interlopers masquerading as journalists.

As you would expect, much of what passes for ‘news’ on social media is often shallow on accuracy, balance and objectivity, the very essence of the profession. But the citizen journalists are not alone. Their close associates go by the name, bloggers. I prefer to call them ‘cloggers’, many clogging the minds of their hordes of followers with their sometimes myopic views.

I particularly find it amusing to watch my fellow Kenyans in public transport neck bent at an unhealthy angle, fingers crooked over a smartphone or tablet chatting away those long hours in Nairobi traffic with virtual friends and acquaintances in far flung places with unpronounceable names such as Timbuktu and Ouagadougou.

All my misgivings notwithstanding, I realise that it is not in my place to attempt to convert a movement that commands a greater global following than the Roman Catholic Church, but I just had to get it off my chest.