For example: (Peter Thiel) - believes in a theory called "memetic desire" which uses people's social groups to manipuate their wants and intentions. - Copy pasted will spelling error^
A theory is not something you believe in, Memetic Desire ( Google René Girard) is a very interesting psychological idea, I find it interesting , will the author paint me as having evil intentions as well..
I'm sure you're a nice person. I also honestly think that Facebook, the NSA, Al Jazeera and even Cheezburger are full of nice people who want to make the world a better place. (Maybe not FOX news though. :) ) That doesn't necessarily condone what their organisations do.
The hard reality that revenue needs to be generated is a very real struggle. This was evolving pre-facebook, it just so happens that they are able to take advantage of what was already going on.
The answer is not to abandon social media, but to force awareness and possibly regulation, but again it's not easy when commerce is involved. I think that this will come in the future, right now the ground is still unstable, but it's important to look at the big picture and take the goods with the bad.