Like for a like: The need for virtual validation

Facebook's request for removal tool

In this week’s lecture, Dr Van Luyn (2013) discussed that concept of identity creation in the digital world, stating: “in a virtual network you are not the only person constructing your identity … you’re being told how to create your story.” On first glimpse, it may seem that you have control over the way you are presented on Facebook, but on closer inspection, this is not the case.

Dr Van Luyn’s ideas support McNeill’s (2012, p104) comments regarding the Facebook profile, whereby “the existence of the provided fields sets up self-conceptualizations in particular Facebooked ways, in keeping with the site’s idea of its imagined and ideal members.” Therefore, when we create a Facebook profile it is not a pure act of self-creation, but rather a creation that is conceptualized in a western, middle-class, capitalist way (McNeill, 2012, p 106).

McNeill (2012, p107) also argues that we not only produce our own life stories in this virtual network, but also consume and add to the life stories of others by liking, sharing, and commenting on their posts, thereby participating in a networked auto/biography. During my time as a Facebook (FB) member, there have been occasions when I have felt that an event or experience in my life is more worthwhile if other FB friends like or comment on it.  However, once the event is shared on my profile page, it is not solely my experience anymore but the experience of my whole virtual network. My ownership and control over my own experience diminishes and all the while I am subconsciously waiting for my FB friends to validate it. I know, it sounds weak, but there it is, and I never fully realised before how pervasive the need to post about anything of consequence is.

Vaas (2012) comments on another FB activity that results in networked identity: photo tagging. Vass writes: “many Facebook users want to simply block anyone from tagging them without having received express prior permission to do so. Unfortunately, Facebook has failed to give us this blanket tag-blocking ability.” With the ability of FB friends to tag photos and post our location details we lose more control over our privacy. For some people this loss of individual control may be enough for them to close down their account altogether, but for most of us, the terror at being excluded from the biggest social network we've ever been a part of is too great and so we stay, for as Chatwin (1987, p14) put it, to “exist is to be perceived.” 

Reference List

Chatwin, B. (1987). Songlines. London, England: Jonathon Cape.

McNeill, L. (2012). There is no “I” in network: Social networking sites and posthuman autobiography. Biography, 35(1). 101-118.

Van Luyn, A. (2013). BA1002: Our Space: Networks, narratives and the making of place, Lecture 4: Networked narratives. [PowerPoint slides]. Retrieved from http://learnjcu.edu.au

Vaas, L. (2012). Facebook privacy control overhaul will remove ability to limit who can find us. Retrieved from: http://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2012/12/12 /facebook-privacy-control-overhaul-will-remove-ability-to-limit-who-can-find-us/

Image Credits

Vaas, L. (2012). Request removal tool. Retrieved from http://nakedsecurity .sophos.com/2012/12/12/facebook-privacy-control-overhaul-will-remove-ability-to-limit-who-can-find-us/