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DartNewsOnline

The student news site of St. Teresa's Academy

DartNewsOnline

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Facebook: Teenager’s Best Friend?

Facebook stalking.

Everyone is doing it. Hours and hours of endless entertainment getting updated on any of your friends’ lives through photos, wall posts, status updates and much more. The art of stalking is a simple matter. All someone has to do is spend all the time they want looking through all 892 photos of the same person instead of using valuable homework time on a weekday night. What’s not to love?

But the world of Facebook has practically consumed our lives. People like to joke about ‘stalking’ their friends when in fact, what we are actually doing is studying traces of people’s lives that are posted on the internet. We have even come up for our own term, “stalking,” to somehow justify that what we are doing is somehow normal.

How often do you Facebook "stalk"?

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Not only can it consume hours of our lives, but Facebook can also be dangerous. With just the click of a button, you are giving millions of people access to your personal life. You have made the choice to put a face to a name, first and last, when you simply ‘tag’ a picture. The friendly ‘stalking’ we joke about can become something much more serious when we are choosing to put ourselves out there in the world for anyone with access to the internet can see.

In society today, teens have become too reliant on the connections of social networking. Our lives have become under constant surveillance regarding someone’s next relationship status. We have become too focused on the details of people’s lives and feel the need to know what is constantly going on in the lives of our peers. We know too much about each other and fail in getting to know one other through old fashion conversation. What happened to the classic event invitation in the mail, snail mail that is? What happened to the nice birthday given through a letter opened up greeting you on your special day. Instead, we result to interacting through the internet, posting a “happy birthday babe” post on someone’s wall, commenting on someone’s witty status or ‘liking’ a recent picture at the latest party.

However, Facebook has become part of our daily lives. It is a friendly place to say ‘hello’ and create an entire network of friends with something you know you have in common. The only way we can keep this form of social networking friendly is the proper safety precautions. If teens are simply more aware of what things are available for anyone to see, Facebook can remain a safe place.

Facebook is a constant source of entertainment and interaction with an endless amount of people. Anyone has the capability to connect with new friends from around the country, family down the street, or exchange students from around the world. It has endless opportunities. So hop on a computer, assign those privacy settings and stalk away. Just don’t be too creeped out when you know someone is doing the exact same thing to you.

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