Confessions of a Facebook fugitive

I use Facebook the way most people approach expired milk: frightened, with great suspicion, and only when absolutely necessary and with my nose wrinkled in disgust. I mostly post videos from NLJ’s YouTube channel, then I’m out AS FAST AS I CAN BE. Linger too long and I enter the vortex: the endless parade of selfies, food photos, and breathtakingly pointless updates that make me wonder if humanity’s collective creativity peaked with the “Like” button.

It starts innocently enough. 

Step 1: The basic selfieBasic Selfie. You know the one. Someone — let’s call her Karen, because of course her name has to be Karen — tilts her head at a 47-degree angle, purses her lips into a kissy face but looks more like mid-sneeze, and captions it “Feeling blessed.” Blessed? You’re in your car at a stoplight. The only thing you’re blessing is the algorithm for ruining my morning coffee. I scroll past, mildly annoyed, like stepping on a Lego. Tolerable. Barely. But still painful.

Facebook doesn’t let you escape. 

Step 2 arrives like an unwanted second helping: the food selfie. Karen posts a close-up of her avocado toast, styled by a toddler with a phone. “Brunch goals with my besties! #Yum #Healthyish.” Ma’am, it’s mashed green stuff on bread. I’ve seen better presentations at a convenience store hot box. The filter makes it glow like it was touched by Instagram gods, which it probably was, while my breakfast was raw oatmeal with molasses. Not exactly picturesque, so, of course, I don’t bother, and I’m a photographer!

Step 3:, The beast grows. Now it’s the “Look What I Bought” phase. Karen’s new sandals get a full photo shoot — multiple angles, toes painted kumquat orange, or some other color that no guy in his right mind has any notion about. Of course it’s captioned: “Retail therapy after a long week! Who else loves a good deal?” I stare at my own feet. I got socks with holes from the Bush era. The only deal I got today was finding two matching socks. I also remembered I’d already paid the utility bill — after discovering the receipt while changing into my newly washed pants. “Oh yeah! I already did that!” Good times.

Step 4:, I call this one The Escalation, or the Vacation Humblebrag. “Missing this beach already! Nothing like salt air and good company.” Karen’s toes in those sandals are buried in sand that costs more per grain than my mortgage. My idea of a vacation is parallel parking on the first try. Seventeen hashtags, a location tag, and a story highlight taunting those of us who vacationed via Google Earth.

Step 5:, This is where the monster mutates: pet content crossover. The sandals vanish, replaced by Brat Cat staring judgmentally at …... whatever! Probably the avocado toast. “Fluffy says no to carbs! Who’s a good influencer? #CatMom #Furbaby.” Pets are the internet’s best part, but when your cat has better lighting and more followers than most humans, something’s wrong.

Step 6:, the final boss of banality: Karen combines it all — a selfie with the cat, eating toast, wearing sandals, on the beach, plus a motivational meme about “living your best life.” The caption is a novel: “Grateful for this journey, the highs and lows, friends who become family, and the avocado that nourishes my soul. Tag someone who needs this energy! #Blessed #NoFilter #LivingMyTruth.” It started as a shrug at Step 1. Now it has ballooned into a full internal scream. It’s performance art for the terminally ordinary. What comes out of my mouth is not translatable in any language.

We all have moments worth sharing, I guess. A genuine milestone, an un-staged sunset, a joke that lands. But the deluge of curated mediocrity turns the platform into a digital trash can. I don’t need to see your dinner, even if it’s on fire. I don’t need proof you went outside. And your cat is cute, but not that cute.

I log off most days feeling like I survived a flash mob of over sharing. My feed is quieter now after unfollowing the reality-show lifers. The silence is golden, but I still mostly avoid Facebook.

Which brings me to the real hypocrisy. After drafting this column — venting about the selfies, toast, sandals, cats, beach, and soul-nourishing avocado, I realized something hilarious. I just spent 800 words meticulously documenting my annoyance with people who post useless pictures of their everyday lives. ...

…... and now I kind of want to post this on Facebook.

With a selfie. Of me eating avocado toast. Wearing sandals. With my cat photo bombing. Caption: “Writing goals achieved! Who else hates this platform? Tag a fellow fugitive! #Hypocrite #Meta #LivingMyTruth”

See you in the comments. Or, better yet, don’t. I’ll be the one who already logged off.

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