I started using Facebook very
recently just after starting my freshman year at KMLA. I made my profiles by
stating my personal information including my hometown, school, and birthday. While
creating my profile, I saw many blank spaces where I could put in a lot more
specific information. I could list my family members, marriage or dating status
and more particularly, my political and religious opinions. I left the marriage
or dating status empty and rather put my two sisters as family members. I
thought that this would be the same for every KMLA student, just typing their
family members’ name and leaving others empty. However as I used Facebook more
for contacting my friends, I found some of the people in my friend list added
their friends’ name in spouses or relatives space. It was kind of bizarre that
they add their friends’ name even though they were not real relatives or
spouses.
I started to think about Facebook
itself before I further contemplate about that particular function. Facebook
has provided a global connectivity which is very unique in our times. As long as
I can add anyone in my friends list, I can just send messages no matter where
they live. Especially, the function of Newsfeed enables me to share life with
anyone. Even when I am not with my friends, I feel as if I am still talking to
them because I can write comments like a conversation on many photos, videos,
and statuses they post. At the same time, I can see how they are doing. I
concluded that Facebook has become its own virtual world to billions of people
who use it.
However this virtual world focuses
more on people I am surrounded by in the society rather than family at home. Facebook
is not mainly designed to share stories with family. I believe it is designed
to communicate with friends continuously and people use Facebook to cultivate
social relationships outside of my family. Therefore, people are listing their
best friends as spouses or relatives because they are considered more important
in the social circles of Facebook, in other words, the role of family is
weakened in Facebook. My parents don’t use facebook because it is not popular
among their generation, and noticeably I contact more with my social circle of
friends than my two sisters.
From another view, for KMLA students
who do that, I think it attributes to the special environment we have in KMLA. It
has only been four or five months since we entered KMLA, but here, about 400
students eat, sleep, and study together in a same place. We face the same
people every day. Indeed, for this year, students have spent more time living
with other students than with their family. This is the reason we often say
KMLA family. I have not found friends that I feel as close as my family but for
others who did, I think by marking them as family, they would feel a closer
relationship because it also means that they consider and care about them like family.
It is also partly for entertainment purposes. Furthermore, whereas I felt
somewhat lonely when I left those spaces empty, they instead put their friends so
that they feel content as if they have spouses.
I will continue to live with my
KMLA family until I graduate, and the friendship that I have with them will
become deeper. I would accumulate many valuable experiences and memories with
them and maybe after two years, I may consider them as close as I do with my
family.
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