We now live in a world where public and private are confounded by devices that make it easier and easier to completely check out while physically in public and hook in when you might have otherwise had privacy. This has many consequences - no, I don't think it's changing my brain(!!!!!), but it definitely degrades basic civility stemming from the awareness that others actually exist(!!), one of my pet peeves - but the one I'd like to address today is eDA.
I'm addicted to facebook, so any element in choice in reading my feed has been eliminated. That said, sometimes logging into FB feels an awful lot like being stuck in a movie theater full of teenagers exchanging baby talk and groping each other. Can you please shut up, I'm trying to see the movie!
Is it just me or is there an inverse relationship between how demonstratively effusive (LOOK AT US WE'RE IN LOVE, LOOK AT US!!!!!) and the longevity/quality of the relationship. Maybe it's just more prominent when these relationships crash and burn (and start again, and crash again, and start again), but I still think there's a certain level of media-whoring that suggests either a breathtaking amount of smarm (really, do you *really* want to be a d-list embarrasing celebrity so badly that you turn your friend's facebook feed into your own one-person gawker report???) or a baseline level of relationship insecurity that is so desperate for assurance that you must beg everyone for recognition constantly. I don't know. Either way it doesn't bode well.What really disturbs me is when a person seems so consumed with another person that they completely abandon their own identity. It's an odd combination of narcissism - in the exhibitionist style - and complete abnegation. It's like screaming "look at... her, look at ... her, look at ... her" as if "her" and "me" are now the same thing.
To be fair, *some* eDA is not only normal, but completely positive. I like that people are still in love after being together for a long time. I can even crack a little smile to see them flirt online.
Besides, we're social animals - there's an affirmation of indicating something about ourselves in a public manner. From the way I dress to those with whom I affiliate, putting myself and my tastes out there and recieving positive feedback is something I'm programmed to do, however delicately.
Arguably the biggest shows of devotion and commitment are those that make breaking ties that much more of a pain in the ass (I mean, look at marriage - talk about a pain in the ass to end!) Declaring to the world that you are committed to a relationship with someone ups the stakes of the commitment by holding it up to public scrutiny. It's kind of like when you were in grade school (and were a girl - bear with me here if you weren't). You could tell three or four or five different girls that they were your best friend and hope it wouldn't get spread around between them, but if you were to publicly declare one of them your best friend your social credibility would diminish if you were to then declare another girl your "best friend". PDA in many regards is a means of displaying to the world "yes, this is the person I have chosen" and in a similar way makes breaking ties more difficult without reflecting poorly on you.
We're judged for our tastes, and this extends to our partners. I won't affiliate myself with another person's brand unless who they are says something that works with want to say about myself to the world. I've dated guys whose brand would have ultimately said "she's insecure and settling" for instance, which I haven't much desired to share with the world. If I'm not willing to associate my name with my S.O.'s, then that bodes ill for the relationship. Public displays of affection come hand in hand with being proud of the person you're with - probably a good thing as long as it complements instead of supplanting your own "brand" in your self-image.
I'm using PDA because eDA is just a natural evolution of PDA. It's the equivalent of a couple holding hands in public. But some really amp it up to a point where the real-world equivalent would be mounting each other and dry humping while screaming to their friends "I LOOOOOOVE THIS WOMAN! AREN'T WE SEXY TOGETHER????"
I have friends who would be physically uncomfortable seeing couple even touching and others who probably wouldn't mind hearing grotesque details of somebody's sexual escapades while both escapaders are in the room, so it may fall to somewhat subjective taste, but here's where I draw the line.
I'm going with the Glamour themed "sexy" versus "skanky" but substituting "sweet" and "smarmy" (and occasionally obnoxious, which I think is more along the lines of the grey area)
1. It's sweet and fairly normal to post a profile picture of you and your significant other. (Or you and your baby. Or your friends. Your parents. Your parakeet...) It's a little obnoxious to post a new photo of you and your significant other every day or several times a month. When you're posting photos of your significant other (minus you - apparently you are so invested in the relationship that *you* don't actually have any identity!) every day or two with captions about your sexy s.o.'s sexy sexiness... smarmy!
2. It's sweet to post the odd comment on your S.O.'s fb wall, photos, or status updates. Sure you probably see each other in person all the time, but we're a digitally connected society. Maybe the moment you see the particularly relevant xcd.com cartoon or that lol cat who looks JUST LIKE that cat you saw the other day is the moment you're apart. And like I said, there's something really affirming about displaying your positive emotions about a person in public arena. It's obnoxious to post high-school worthy love poems on your S.O.'s wall - we all have to read them, so at least go with the Shakespeare. It's smarmy to post sappy love poems, which your S.O. "likes" and also responds to in kind, then "like" your S.O.'s response, then post another and another all of which you both "like" on and on and on and possibly cross-reference your ongoing conversation in a new status. Once you're having a conversation, no matter whether it be scheduling or sap... call each other for god's sake. You know how hard it is not to eavesdrop on another person's cell phone conversation?? Amp that up by ten and you have the wall-to-wall sap session.
3. Along those lines, when those public "conversations" go on for a while, they will inevitably start referencing inside jokes. If you're exchanging a few, that can be sweet to mildly obnoxious. You know when you're sitting at a table with "friends" and are the only person who doesn't get the inside joke? Groups develop inside references to establish unity: The ones who "get it" are part of "us" and those who don't are immediately excluded. A hint: people don't like to feel excluded. It's not such a big deal when it's a passing reference. It's awkward when it's a more involved reference involving that weird facial limbo of "everyone else is laughing, I should mimic that, but they know I don't get it so it'll make me look even worse! What expression should I go for here??". It's downright annoying if that's the entire conversation and your face starts to ache from passing between neutral, scowling and smiling. It's healthy for a relationship to build an inner vocabulary and syntax to develop that sense of unity. But again... awkward when that dialog is being forced onto you while you're browsing your feed. It's kind of the equivalent of "LOOK AT ME LOOK AT ME LOOK AT ME... YOU'RE NOT A PART OF THIS GO AWAY!" I've been the third wheel many, many times in my life and turning all of your online friends into a third wheel is something that I personally consider bad karma. So, a line or two... ok and maybe cute. An entire shared dialog and or continued cross reference... smarmy
4. It's sweet to have photographs of your significant other in your albums. You spend a lot of time together so it's likely that you'll share the memorable and photogenic moments of your life Occasionally you'll see your S.O. doing something interesting or funny that otherwise deserves being recorded - after all, being proud of your S.O.'s appearance, sense of humor, and style is a good a thing for the relationship. It's obnoxious to frequently post albums of you and your significant other posing for the camera. It's smarmy to stage bi-weekly photo shoots for the sake of photo shoots of you and your S.O., or to devote an entire album for photos of your S.O. that you downloaded from other places and involve events that have nothing to do with you, with the album title of "MY SCHNOOKY-OOKUMS!!!"
5. It's sweet to mention your S.O. in your status updates. All that time you spend together probably means that some of those random thoughts you're throwing out into cyberspace have to do with him/her. It's obnoxious when it's more often than not all about your S.O. It's smarmy when you tag-mention your S.O.or refer to them as MY ____ (insert any hundred of "I have an S.O. LOOK LOOK LOOK" nouns) in every single post and - for reasons mentioned above - write an intentionally obscure comment that only said S.O. could possibly understand, but is just suggestive enough for others to get that you're making an in-joke.
6. Ok, sweet probably isn't the right word but it's normal to change your relationship status when you either become an item or break up. In the first case, it's become a relationship milestones and often very handy in fending off single suitor/"friends" without having to say a word of rejection. In the second case, people who have strong support networks tend to survive break ups better and it often avoids a lot of awkward "how's S.O. ... oh you what? I'm SOOOO SORRY!!" It's obnoxious, albeit somewhat understandable, to then mention your feelings about this change in status in your subsequent status updates and/or to change your relationship status every couple of weeks (it's like throwing a big ceremony for your tenth wedding - we only have so much enthusiasm to go around). It's smarmy to make every update for the next twenty days a testament to your feelings about that relationship status, to reference it in your comments to other people's status updates, and to take the opportunity to self-comment on the change by giving an entire biography your self-made wikipedia entry that includes all the intimate details of your relationship.
That's just my ten cents, feel free to add or defend...
1 comment:
I'm going to go do all of those now.
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