1) Delete your facebook account. It takes a month (because they don't let you delete immediately) but you won't miss it.
2) Leave twitter.
I believe social media is a net negative for society so I did the above. You can take responsibility for your own situation and do the same.
Twitter I can delete. I don't browse facebook, I try not to browse instagram - but these platform's messaging facilities, along with whatsapp, google chat, signal, telegram and more are used daily by my friends and family to communicate.
Sure you can simply cut off those who don't use your preferred platform. But I've seen what happens to people who do that - when the first facebook backlash occurred back in the late 2000s. They disappear from the real world 'social graph' of their non-local friends.
Of course it would be better if everyone used one, encrypted messaging app. But thats not likely to happen any time soon. Of course social media is a poison, as OP pointed out. But its utility for low effort passive relationship maintenance with my old friends from college, jobs, school etc is an essential part of my social life. I suspect thats true for millions of people.
Everyone is at least on Whatsapp, Signal or Line. Just ask for their number... if you don't think it's worth asking, that's probably because they're not your friends at all.
This is not true, at least outside the US. The varieties of service people use to communicate vary much more than this. Line for example, isn't used by a single person I know. Many won't use whatsapp (as a Facebook company). Signal is strange and intimidating to non technical people and so on.
> if you don't think it's worth asking, that's probably because they're not your friends at all.
I'm specifically talking about good friends, non geeks, I've known for decades. They're comfortable with their platforms of choice. This kind of inflexible - my way or the high way communication style you're advocating, isn't a healthy or effective way of maintaining very long term friendships.
Nah. I closed twitter and anything meta except whatsapp (for family), in which I have a big large text as the profile icon to search for me in signal. I have exactly the same social life as before, and this has been going on for years. Don't let the FOMO win.
Phones continue to exist. Not to mention email! If someone doesn't warrant a phone call, or even email, are they truly your friend? Is that really a relationship?
As someone old enough to remember the days before social media existed, I find it hard to conceive of social media as "essential". Convenient? Sure. Addictive? Yes, certainly. But essential? No. Humanity indisputably survived and thrived without it. Indeed, the argument can be made that we were happier without it.
Spoken by someone who is extremely repulsed by the current Facebook/Insta, but it was a very unique and useful tool in my life.
That wasn't the advice. The advice is that if you want to maintain a relationship with someone, make a little effort to do so. Social media has made people ultra-lazy.
> Am I supposed to call them on the phone to get a verbal update on their life, or they are not my "true friends"? Have 1:1 sessions in Signal to discuss what exactly? Their Facebook photos?
I mentioned email, but your reply mentions everything except email.
Anyway, as far as what you're supposed to discuss, yes, you'll want to get an update on their life. "Hi, wondering how you've been. What's new with you?" Not that difficult.
It's almost as if social media has created learned helplessness, and we've forgotten how to be human.
exactly. Today people won't even comment on something, ask you something. They just see the posts/stories, or at max, click 'like' or one of the reactions.
You don't need to communicate every day or write long essays, but leaving a comment on a photo, or asking "did you like it?" if a friend post that they were watching a movie/etc, is not a lot of effort.
The point is you shouldn’t dictate how someone you are interested in staying in touch to use certain tools.
Ask for it?
> What if they came back a few months later with “we’re good. Didn’t check email for a while. Can you use FB instead?”
I'm not going to play hypotheticals. You can imagine a possible worst case scenario for anything. Confront that problem if it occurs, but what if it doesn't occur? You seem to be arguing that someone shouldn't even bother trying to leave social media, because there's a small chance that something inconvenient might happen. It's fatalistic and defeatist.
Some of those Facebook people were good folks that I miss, sure, but my life is my own now.
edit: also, low effort friends aren't friends, they're either trophies you're keeping or else tasks you don't actually need. Friends are the people in your life. Your college buddies are your college buddies, you're only supposed to see them at reunions and occasionally at the hardware store. Stop living the paradigm that the corporate platforms make the most money from and start living your life. Get the hell off.