aka, a new way to be single without being single.
What’s the usual, number one deterrent to a man? The wedding ring. Now, correct me if I’m wrong but I do believe that if a guy sees that a woman is married, he’ll back off, women…not so much, but some women can be man-stealing bitches…
I personally believe that today, even the wedding ring is not foolproof anymore. A couple of years ago, I was in FL and I watched as a guy took off his wedding ring, put it in his pocket, then came up to my friend and I and offered to buy us a drink. My response? Dude, I can see your tan line…and I just watched you pull douchebag move number one.
So what about for those of us who are not married or even engaged? Facebook is now its own virtual wedding ring. We put our relationship status on there and its for the whole world to know.
Last night, a friend of mine told me that “everyone uses Facebook to check out if someone is single” and that “if its not FBO, then its not real.” This really got me thinking because I have my own thoughts on posting relationship business on Facebook. I was “In a Relationship” for several years and it never said that. I was “Single” and it never said that either.
My reasons for officializing business on Facebook:
- Being proud of the person you’re with.
- Wanting to let people subtly/not-so-subtly know that you’re no longer available because you’re happy to not be available anymore.
My reasons have nothing to do with “well, I’m claiming my territory” or whatever but then my friend went on to say that this is another thing about Facebook — you are staking your claim.
So Facebook as the modern indicator of commitment? Not to mention that there’s added pressure to behave a certain way when you’ve made it for the world to know that you’re somebody’s somebody. Take, for example, exhibit A, the married man from above. Let’s say he had not taken off his wedding band and offered to buy me a drink. Reprehensible but at the least, its me who makes the decision to involve myself with a married man. I mean its so obvious to catch the married man cheating on his wife scenario: married man with wedding band and woman with no ring on, clearly not his wife. All eyes on them can tell “this guy is kind of a shit” right?
Now let’s say its an unmarried guy so there’s no ring. That makes it harder to tell. But now there’s “FBO” (haha) and you can easily see if the cute guy that hit on you last night is kind of a shit (or the cute girl too). Does anyone have thoughts on this?
I have mixed feelings. On one hand, I agree with the wedding ring analogy. I also think making it FBO also makes it everyone’s business. I don’t want the whole world to know whether or not I end a relationship. I also have seen girls in relationships realize they have been dumped because one morning they woke up and their boyfriend had taken down the relationship status. I think I’ll be keeping my relationship status to myself, and if anyone wants to know, they can ask me.
You know, I’ve had it go either way, where I was in a relationship, but didn’t announce it on Facebook, or I did. One time I had a boyfriend that said I should request it say I was in a relationship with him, but then his lame ass didn’t accept it for a month. Wtf? I knew one girl who was dating a guy that put up “In a relationship,” but not with whom, and it turns out he had like 3 girlfriends at once. I’ve also had a boyfriend before who put in a relationship with ME on his Facebook, yet he would hit on other girls via Facebook messages!!! I want to blame Facebook for being a bit poisonous and offering more temptation and complications, but really, I was probably just dating idiots in my past.
Like Gayle, I also have mixed feelings on Facebook Official. It can be multifaceted in it’s uses and applications. Personally, I don’t have a relationship status on it. It can help to keep the pressure off when I am starting to date someone before anything is official, as well as quell unnecessary attention whenever my status changes. On the other hand, since I am not advertising when I’m single, it could have the possibility of giving perspective ladies the impression that I am not single. I do have some close female friends who post things on my wall which, to someone who does not know me very well, could be misinterpreted. When I am in a relationship I still would prefer to keep my status hidden, unless she really insists that I change it. Now that being said, I think a better alternative is changing the profile picture to one that has both you and girl/boyfriend in it.
Ok I want to touch on a few things:
1) This whole post came from a conversation with a friend where he gave me a perspective that I was not too familiar with, namely that “announcing your relationship on Facebook” officializes and publicizes your commitment to someone else. His perspective was that “my relationship, although it could be ‘real’ was not made public for one reason or another” — whatever those reasons may be could vary between people. So in a way, what I felt he was saying (and correct me if I’m wrong and you read this) is that “you’re not taking my being in a relationship seriously because its not on Facebook”, right?
2) Another perspective that was brought to light to me today was from a different friend. Let’s say you were someone who had a fan base of some sort or you were using your online social networks to promote something (a business, a product, etc)…if say, you were cute girl/guy, would being “publicly” single make you more marketable? On the other hand, if that is the case, should your significant other feel any discomfort about that?
3) The more I think about it, I am starting to seriously view Facebook as the new “I Love You” — or whatever guideline people use for themselves to make a relationship “official”. Did you ever hear someone say that “It’s not cheating until…
…you’re using titles.
…you’ve said I love you.”
And so on…
Also, thanks for the emails, from those who wish to keep their thoughts private!