NPR - Facebook

SugarChick10

Man, some people take Facebook WAY too seriously. 

A friend commented "What a gorgeous dress on Jane Fonda." The first response was "I can't stand that communist b!tch." My friend stated she's not a fan of Jane Fonda's but she still likes the dress. Someone else chimed in "Hanoi Jane boooo." I said "since the point of your comment was the dress, I agree, gorgeous dress." Which put the person who said "Hanoi Jane booo" completely off the rails. He replied she's a traitorous skank in a gorgeous dress, he knows my father would be ashamed of me for complimenting the dress (my dad's a Vietnam Vet), eff Jane Fonda, and no one must say anything good about her, THEN follows up with another comment about how he once saw a picture of Hitler wearing a snappy Austrian suit (I guess he was trying to say that complimenting the dress is like complimenting Hitler..?) Which resulted in his wife chiding him to "play nice" in another comment.

Alrighty. 

BrideBuddies

I have a friend like that.  He goes apeshiit any time I mention that I went to Walmart.   Dude.. Walmart is 3 minutes from my house vs. 20 minutes to any other department/grocery store.  Not to mention it added several hundred jobs that did not exist before.  And since there were no other stores in this area, it did not put any mom-and-pop stores out of business.  If I want to save money on my groceries, it's my perogotive to shop where I see fit.

 

 

vanverth

I think that the problem with FB is that it is easy to respond without thinking because you do not have the visual cues from the other person's body language that you have stepped on the crazy train/bitchy train. 

stever

Yeah, FB brings out the crazies.

LauraLynneC

My FB "crazy" story:

My bff was fighting with her mom so I posted a status just for her.  It read:  "Friends are God's apology for Family"

I thought it was funny.  And appropriate in the situation.  I'd been spending hours on the phone with her talking about the things she was going through with her family.

Meanwhile, my family went apesh*tcrazy over my status.  They took it as a slam against them.  30+ family members boycotted my wedding because of it.  I unfriended all family from my facebook (and STILL have a strict "no family" policy).  My uncle went so far to send me a letter in the mail saying that since I unfriended him on facebook, we must not be friends anymore and he wouldn't be attending my wedding. 

True story. 

vanverth

LauraLynneC:

Meanwhile, my family went apesh*tcrazy over my status.  They took it as a slam against them.  30+ family members boycotted my wedding because of it.  I unfriended all family from my facebook (and STILL have a strict "no family" policy).  My uncle went so far to send me a letter in the mail saying that since I unfriended him on facebook, we must not be friends anymore and he wouldn't be attending my wedding. 

True story. 

They sound a bit nutty.  Perhaps you could have two FB pages, one for family and one for the sane people in your life.  Use the family page to post pictures of LO and funny stories and leave all the other information on your "real" FB page. 

robynlesley

I think the internet in general brings out craziness in people. My brother gets into "fights" (debates, whatever) with people on FB -- on his friends' posts because he's so far right wing (I'm moderately conservative but not like him) that he has to hammer points to anyone who disagrees. Even if I agree with him, I don't agree with HOW he does it.

JenniferTCU

See?!?!?!? This is why I don't do Facebook.

mwd

I look at facebook as any comment you make there could come back to haunt you.  So I try to be careful, and keep it positive.  It's the customer service training in me. 

SugarChick10

It was crazy. I almost feel like he was looking for an argument. My friend felt that he was ranting like a nut, not as an angry person. She & his wife were able to diffuse him pretty quickly.

I keep my FB light. I post things that I think are funny and pics of the LO for my family. I have family & friends who chose to use FB to voice very strong opinions, which fine that's their choice, and those are the people whose updates I have hidden. I kind of want to block this guy, he was THAT crazy.