Facebook Narcissism

Yesterday, I was talking to K. and telling him how I had been trying and failing to reach someone on Facebook. K. said "The important thing to remember is that most people on Facebook don't have very much else going on in their lives, and that's why they are there. This friend of yours must have a real life going on." I didn't say anything, but then I thought of all my theater friends, whose lives are chock-full of activities from dawn to midnight, and who still manage to cram in a full life on Facebook as well. I thought K. was clearly wrong.

Myself, I'm more of a Facebook lurker. I have enough trouble keeping up with this site without getting too involved with Facebook as well. Like Betty White says, "it sounds like a huge waste of time."

It can be, of course. It doesn't have to be. It depends what you make of it.

Yet, theater people tend to rate a bit higher on the narcissism scale than your average Joe, so who's to say Facebook isn't a part of that syndrome as well?

I tend to think of Facebook as a apartment-building-like warrens, and blogs as solitary ranches. Take your preference. They each have their charms.

This site has one feature that Facebook has trouble incorporating. On Facebook, one can say "Look at me." On this site, I can say "LOOK AT ME!" It pleases the theatrical impulse better, but only if I can manage to attract readers. That's the thing that slays about Facebook: your friends are your readers. Your audience is already there, and you can choose your audience too. So maybe "Look at me" resonates better in a full hall than "LOOK AT ME!" in a nearly-empty hall.

It's important to remember that the theatrical impulse is different than the narcissistic impulse. "Look at me" is different than "Love me, as I love myself."

And now there is another kerfuffle regarding Facebook and narcissism on the Web:

As if to validate the suspicions of your above-it-all friends who claim they can't be bothered with the superficial world of social media, news out of Canada's York University declares that the crappier the self-worth, the likelier a person is to be Facebooking. In a study of 100 18-25-year-olds entitled "Self-Presentation 2.0: Narcissism and Self-Esteem on Facebook," undergrad psychology student Soraya Mehdizadeh found that "individuals higher in narcissism and lower in self-esteem were related to greater online activity," especially the "self-promoting" variety that "appear to attempt to persuade others about one’s own positive qualities." Is your profile picture a little too good? Are your interests a little too clever? Guess your parents didn't love you enough.

For a small study by an undergraduate student, Mehdizadeh's findings made big headlines around the world – because who doesn't revel in a story about how terrible the kids today are, with their Internet and all? Or as the UK Telegraph summed it up with a smug, told-you-so explanation, Facebook is "a haven for narcissistic people because they can establish a large number of hollow 'friendships' without having to establish a real relationship." And you thought everybody was just there for the Farmville.

...Study author Mehdizadeh, who tellingly boasted to the Star newspaper this week that "To be honest, I don't use Facebook much," certainly seems to have stacked the deck against those who do. In her paper, she editorializes the medium as "a gateway for hundreds of shallow relationships and emotionally detached communication."

...People "self-promote" on Facebook? Isn't that a big part of Facebook's raison d'etre? And while critics have been squirming over the private life as public spectacle nature of online communication since the early nineties, it's only part of the story. ... Because connection, as most of us know, is not a one-way adventure. And in a world of trolls and plentiful ugly behavior on and offline, presenting one's best self hardly seems much of a moral failing. Sounds more like a reasonable aspiration.