Facebook

[Josh]

I'm still completely puzzled by anyone who claims they need Facebook to stay in touch with family and friends. Do you really have family members who steadfastly refuse to communicate via mail, phone call, email, WhatsApp, and Telegram?

[Ken]

I'm still completely puzzled by anyone who claims they need Facebook to stay in touch with family and friends. Do you really have family members who steadfastly refuse to communicate via mail, phone call, email, WhatsApp, and Telegram?

You don't NEED Facebook to do anything. But sending 100 letters to everyone in your extended group of family every time you have something trivial to announce doesn't ever happen. Without electronic communication and social media the universe of people you are in actual contact with will quickly shrink down to a very small number which might be the number that you send annual Christmas cards to if you even do that.

Do I need to stay in touch with all my cousins and cousins once removed? No. But without electronic media like Facebook or similar I'll only ever see and hear from them about once every 5 years during a family reunion and then only some of them.

I don't use Facebook to stay in touch with anyone in my immediate family. We have group chats, occasional phone calls and visits, and more frequent holiday reunions for that. But the fact that a cousin in MI has a daughter is playing college soccer on a championship team? Or a different cousin in PA has a daughter doing volunteer work in Africa? Or a third cousin in OR is sending their youngest son to college in Spokane. Or an old college friend is running the UNICEF program in Bangladesh. I'd likely never hear about those things were it not for Facebook. Are those important things to know? Not really. But it does make us feel more connected I think.

[mike]

A lot of people say this. I guess people don’t have email, phones, envelopes, and postage anymore?

I write a friend in prison in Pennsylvania frequently. Snail mail costs $.66 plus the cost of the envelope, and the time to write or type and put in mailbox. It takes days to reach the mail processing facility in Florida, which photocopies the mail piece in black and white and sends the photocopy to the inmate, a process which takes a number of additional days.

PA has an inmate messaging system, similar to email, which costs $25 per message. They get the message as soon as they check their account at the jail kiosk, with a slight delay for the institution to approve the message. Often they get it the same day.

Guess which I like to do?

Wife: I’ve used an inmate messaging system, and I would think that’s a lot more similar to email than Facebook. You have to find the specific inmate and get approved, so that seems like apples to oranges.

It is. It was basically an answer to the question of why we communicate electronically these days rather than through the mail system.

[RZehr]

I'm still completely puzzled by anyone who claims they need Facebook to stay in touch with family and friends. Do you really have family members who steadfastly refuse to communicate via mail, phone call, email, WhatsApp, and Telegram?

You don't NEED Facebook to do anything. But sending 100 letters to everyone in your extended group of family every time you have something trivial to announce doesn't ever happen. Without electronic communication and social media the universe of people you are in actual contact with will quickly shrink down to a very small number which might be the number that you send annual Christmas cards to if you even do that.

Do I need to stay in touch with all my cousins and cousins once removed? No. But without electronic media like Facebook or similar I'll only ever see and hear from them about once every 5 years during a family reunion and then only some of them.

I don't use Facebook to stay in touch with anyone in my immediate family. We have group chats, occasional phone calls and visits, and more frequent holiday reunions for that. But the fact that a cousin in MI has a daughter is playing college soccer on a championship team? Or a different cousin in PA has a daughter doing volunteer work in Africa? Or a third cousin in OR is sending their youngest son to college in Spokane. Or an old college friend is running the UNICEF program in Bangladesh. I'd likely never hear about those things were it not for Facebook. Are those important things to know? Not really. But it does make us feel more connected I think.

Without Mennonet, I’d not met Ken, and not known that his college friend is running the UNICEF program in Bangladesh. We have a mission there in Bangladesh too, working with the Rohingyas in that refugee camp.

[steve-in-kville]

The people who bash social media are typically the ones using just as much as the rest of us, but on the down low.

I promise I won't tell your bishop, really

[mike]

I'm still completely puzzled by anyone who claims they need Facebook to stay in touch with family and friends. Do you really have family members who steadfastly refuse to communicate via mail, phone call, email, WhatsApp, and Telegram?

I'm completely puzzled as to why you use MennoNet. Do you really refuse to use to communicate with circle letters?

[steve-in-kville]

I like turtles.

painted-turtle.jpg

[Soloist]

The people who bash social media are typically the ones using just as much as the rest of us, but on the down low.

I promise I won't tell your bishop, really

This is exactly the sort of argument used.

I like turtles too.
There is nothing you can tell the bishop on nonsensical suspicions. He would laugh you off the phone. He actually was on Menno longer ago and wisely withdrew.

[Soloist]

The people who bash social media are typically the ones using just as much as the rest of us, but on the down low.

I promise I won't tell your bishop, really

This is exactly the sort of argument used.

I like turtles too.
There is nothing you can tell the bishop on nonsensical suspicions. He would laugh you off the phone. He actually was on Menno longer ago and wisely withdrew.

Wife: he actually gave us permission on Facebook this weekend. Well, actually, he was really confused at our strange humor, and I think he probably preferred the name Lizard.

[steve-in-kville]

He actually was on Menno longer ago and wisely withdrew.

Smart man. Get out while you can