It wasn’t too long ago that Facebook didn’t exist. We were all Myspacers (even if you won’t admit to it, you know you secretly had one). Then, even when Facebook did exist, there was a time (in the long, long ago) that we did not have a newsfeed. We did not know when our friends changed their pictures, how many your friends attended a party you weren’t invited to, and who broke up with who but has since entered into an ambiguous marriage with a member of the same sex. If we did happen to know these things it is either because a) we actually talked to them (and who has time for that in this day and age?) or b) we manually stalked them, typing in names and clicking on profiles and seeing who updated theirs most recently, et cetera. Good, old-fashioned finger work. Stalking took time back then and it should’ve stayed that way. Who wants that person you met on a Friday night at a lame party to know that you really didn’t mean those gin-inspired few sentences that may or may not have involved any of the following words: beautiful, hot, funny, adorable, sexy or fun to be around? Not I.
On top of that, the stalk-scope isn’t limited to close friends, anymore. Anyone who is a Facebook friend (yes, even your friend down the hall from freshman year’s cousin who came to visit that one weekend and totally tried to hook up with you while you played Apples to Apples) can stalk. That just isn’t right. Refer to the above paragraph, sentence 8 for a reason. If we’re going to stalk, people, we should stalk the right and just way.
This is why I’m saying we need to bring away message checking (because “checking “ sounds so much nicer than “stalking”) back to the forefront. Nothing says “I know your every move” more than misinterpreting those three lines of a song that you don’t know. Yes, things can be misread on Facebook. They are all the time. Who’s that girl that wrote on your ex-boyfriend’s wall? You don’t know? Well, make it up. She slept with him while you were still going out. Simple as that. And…commence the fuming.
That isn’t the point, though. With away message stalking, it is a more personal affair. You know these people, probably very well. You talk to them on a semi-regular basis, you may even see them around school. That girl from you sophomore geology class who you did a project with and though was cute? You haven’t talked to her since the end of that semester, but why not check up on her? Maybe she’ll have some free time (as indicated by the message, right between “classes all day =( “ and “who knowzzz what’s going on tonight, hit the celly”). Hey, it is worth a shot to check, maybe you’ll just happen to be at the same party that she will, and by “happen to be at” I mean you will go there purposely and act surprised when you see her there and hope she’s drunk enough to get with. It’s okay to admit, we all have dirty little secrets.
By re-engaging in away message stalking, we are proving we care to those close to us. Even if they say they don’t like it, that you need to stop, that they really don’t appreciate you knowing their every move, they don’t mean it. They love it. Really. So keep it up. Make things personal again between you and yours. I mean, if they really didn’t want people to know what they were doing, they wouldn’t put it in an away message. They’d put it on Myspace. Or Friendster.
Let's Not Crash and Burn 