It’s not “official” until it’s Facebook official

Melissa Giugno – Staff Writer –

Social networks have become a major part of our lives; almost everyone we know is on at least one site; whether it’s Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, or more, it seems that everyone around us has one and is addicted.

In this age, media surrounds us, to the point where it’s impossible to even measure how much, but it is easy to see the results. With all these social networks at our fingertips, information about our peers is always available and that definitely has a huge impact on our relationships.

People are losing their jobs, scholarships, and friendships for things that are posted on these sites; and whatever is posted is on the internet is there forever despite the users best efforts to delete the post or block other users from seeing with privacy settings.

What is particularly interesting to me, is how many relationships can be ruined by these social networks, and sometimes it’s easy to blame a social network for relationship problems. Crazy as it may seem, the hard truth may be that a relationship is between two people and getting 375 Facebook friends involved can make it messy.

Because social networks have become a second environment to us, filled with constant interaction, it’s addictive to post and share every part of our lives. Making a simple status on what you’re feeling may seem like a good way to vent, but it may also be inviting people into those problems.

Everyone can see, talk about, comment, and gossip about you’re problems with any situation; and even though I’d like to think our society has the decency enough to leave something as delicate as a relationship alone, we definitely do not .

While many will have a general lack of interest in your personal life or relationship, others will find the information interesting.

Other than the overwhelming amounts of information we allow to be public on our social networking sites, it’s also about what we don’t include that can make us feel if what we are doing is validated.

The term “Facebook official” gets thrown around as joke; commonly, it’s as if a relationship is confirmed because the couple decided to allow it to be public on their Facebook walls. Even though we joke, how important is it to have your relationship listed on Facebook? Many will hide their relationship status entirely just avoid the added stress of everyone snooping, like mentioned earlier. Others will be offended if the other will not allow it to be listed.

Something as insignificant as a little line on my Facebook telling the world who I am dating is crazy to worry about, right? Wrong. Because many people have different preferences, and something as huge as Facebook, where everyone and their mother is connected, some may wonder, who are they hiding this from?

I am not saying at all that every person who doesn’t list their relationship has a hidden agenda, I am just noticing this phenomena with couples.

So is the information highway ruining your relationship? Maybe it’s time to put things in perspective: keep you and your partner’s business between the two of you and tell the personal details with who is important in your life. Sometimes, the world doesn’t need to know what’s going on.

As for your relationship being Facebook official or not, maybe it’s not as important as it may seem. If it’s trust you’re worried about just talk about it with the other person and see if they are worth it. And if it’s something you absolutely can’t stand or absolutely need to have in a relationship, that’s fine and perfectly understandable, just make sure the other person knows your boundaries.