Facebook And Modern Youth Relationship
Social networking has gone along way in influencing modern day relationships. This is especially the case in the young persons or the youths who are form the largest population in social networking sites. The most popular of all the social networking sites is Facebook which is had at least 132 million persons accessing the pages. From Gilberto (340), the social networking sites mostly face book has a lot of wonderful features that allow the users to establish profiles, upload photos, create events and groups explain their status or what is in their mind.
In the world of face book, any user has the option of creating friends and this means that one can have as many friends as possible all of whom have the authority to access their profiles and all other details. From Gilberto, women form the largest family in social networking sites mostly because they are more concern with or like getting into social relationships than their fellow men colleagues. Having numerous friends means that one has the ability to obtain as many comments on their walls or status updates and this shows just how social they are. In addition, Facebook allows friends are could be known to the particular user or just new to the users such that they have never met before.
In this paper, the discussion focuses on the debate concerning Facebook and the effects it has had on modern day relationships. On one side of the debate is a team saying that Facebook has not in any way affected users relationships negatively while on the other hand, is a team of persons who feel that the young generation needs to be more careful with social networking sites like face book since they are responsible for many cyber crimes or online sexual offenders who come in the name of friends and work keenly to stalk on their before issuing threats accompanied by forced sexual requests.
In the ongoing debate, the one important claim is that social media like Facebook is an important tool for establishing relationship as well as strengthening them (Bumgarner, 2007). This is because social network sites provide opportunities for communication either publicly or privately through the Facebook inbox feature. to begin with, all persons in any form of romantic relationships are provided with different features all of which confess a different form of romantic relationship condition for the Facebook fan. For instance one can be single, or engaged or married. Whether one is engaged or married, the two parties involved must provide their consent in which upon acceptance becomes part of the profile for the parties involved leaving no room for anyone in need of getting into a relationship with either party (Gilberto, 344).
In addition, the Facebook and other social networks form a great environment for single individuals who are searching or need to get into a relationship. This is because for all people in Facebook, their profile is accessible to as many persons as possible if at all it is not locked. This is to mean that any person who is in need of getting into as serious relationship with an identified person can easily request for friendships and access their profiles to details like contact information and which could be useful to reaching out for them. These way genuine relationships are established and later on develop into flourished and great relationships (Bumgarner,n.p).
Many people though, associate the Facebook and other social networking sites with foul romantic relationships but all the same it is necessary to appreciate the genuine and mature relationships that develop as a result of Facebook and other social sites. Apart from romantic relationships, Facebook allows the users in or out of relationships to share information, ask queries, share tips and news and create discussions that provide useful information that strengthens their relationships and get them moving on.
On the other hand, Facebook and other social network sites can buster relationships or result to relationships that lack gentility. To begin with, stalkers or sex offenders are always on the look out for Facebook users who they feel they need to harass or just for other hidden interests (Bumgarner, n.p). These persons present themselves as friends who at first are cool and not easily susceptible and so one always accepts them especially in instances where you two share mutual friends. After sometime, they invite you for dates and other events where they eventually place threats in exchange for sex. Most of the targeted persons have either been in fruitless relationships or are just single and searching for companionships or are just taking some break from relationships.
In addition, the already formulated and well established relationships are pretty much at the risk of getting destroyed due from the use of Facebook. Many stalkers ruin relationships that are well stable by getting into the friends lists ante later on putting on crazy comments that leave the couple vulnerable for a fight or disagreements. Facebook features like wall posts and status comments perpetrate such actions leaving innocent persons victims of unwanted compromising situations.
The most vulnerable to such act are women. This could be due to several reasons like the fact that they form the majority in Facebook and at the same time due to the fact that they are very insecure and lack the confidence necessary to reject threats and report such cases to the necessary authorities. Additionally, women post photos that present a clear and pleasant image of them and not those demonstrating vanity or incredible situations. In this case, they are rendered prone to sexual offenders and ill motivated internet stalkers. Again, it is common to create an environment of jealous between partners the moment they add unknown members of the opposite sex in their friends’ list. This is dangerous especially in the case where many couples do not communicate effectively to solve their problems.
In the case of establishing relationships and strengthening them, a lot of questions arise. For instance, one is engaged with a person who they do not know or have never seen and whom they can’t offer a clear witness of who they really are and what they actually do. Most of these relationships have always gone stale and I some cases, it becomes even harder since the families of the internet lovers don’t get to meet each other till the time marriage is being organized or after their young ones have already been engaged with these strangers intimately.
Internet or online love can not be attributed to the genuine dating and courting and is more often than not speedy leaving the couple with little room to know each other. The main information one relies on is the profile information of the potential lover (Bumgarner, n.p). However, so many questions arise from just how genuine the profile information is. Many lovers edit their information to get hold of their lovers who come to belief that they have found the perfect match partner only to fall in the wrong hands. In the case of a stalemate in such relationships, the consequences may range from sexual harassment to death and this is very alarming especially to the young persons of today who want to experience romantic relationships over the internet (Gilberto, 340).
In addition, the claims one having persons edit their profile information or putting up crazy comment about them is not necessarily a threat. In the recent past, Facebook has introduced instances where one can block a friend from accessing their information out of privacy and confidential issues that had arose earlier (Parr, n.p). For the persons that are susceptible one can block them just to ensure that they are safe or make their profile accessible just to a chosen few persons who they feel they can trust and are confident with. Before getting to online relationships, one must consider factors like possibility of stalkers or cyber crime or other distrusted persons who are out there to make life a living hell.
In this conversation, I begin by saying that, it is true that most of the online relationships that have been build never go very far before the couple come to learn the true nature of each other. Like the saying goes actions speak louder than words, it is only after spending time with each other that the online relationship couple come to terms with the true side of the story concerning their mates. More often than not, these couples are unable to bear with each other and end up going separate ways.
In some case, the victims may be so far from their nations and direct assistance becomes hard to get hence they end up being misused by their lovers and suffer a great deal (Parr, n.p). I argue that a bird at hand is worth two in the bush and so all should by all means avoid internet relationships that they know nothing about their partners or who they really are. Words are enticing and can be used or misused provided they fit into the needs of the intended victim which is what most internet lovers’ end up doing.
It is also clear that, although ladies maybe seriously in need of getting into a serious relationships, most men do not want to take up the family responsibility that comes with such relationships. For this reason, they only get involved with online lovers to misuse them and then leave them suffering from broken relationships. Women should therefore take care of such relationships since most men are out there to get into relationships which benefit them financially or sexually and not get them responsible for families. I agree Facebook relationships are complicated since without the details of each other, partners get into intimate romantic relationships only to get hurt and misused (Parr, n.p). Again, one has to seek for permission to take up new friends or just avoid them to avoid hurting their partners among other things.
Other persons may not agree with me, especially where they had tried the normal relationship which went soar and later took on online relationships and it worked out well. However, not everyone may be as lucky as the other. This is why I began by saying that, we must accept that genuine romantic relationships crop up from Facebook, however, the largest percentage suffers due to such relationships and it is only good to look for what works best for you without hurting you.
References
Bumgarner, B., (2007). The social networking site Facebook. First monday journal. Vol 12 iss. 11, last updated 5 Nov 2007.
Gilberto, (2008). “It's Complicated: Facebook and Modern Youth Relationships
Parr, B., (2009). Facebook increases jealousy in relationships. Retrieved on 25 Nov 2011 from http://mashable.com/2009/08/09/Facebook-relationship-jealous/.
