Facebook – Everybody wants to look at Amber

In a recent edition of the excellent net@nite podcast, host Amber MacArther stated that Toronto is the Facebook capital of the world with a greater proportion of its inhabitants having Facebook pages than anywhere else on earth. (Facebook is a social network site that helps you to keep in touch with old friends – originally for university graduates but now open to all comers. One of the key features is the ability to upload your photographs for people to look at)
There is a growing number of these social networking sites which all feature the ability to load your photos which are then available for anyone to see. MySpace is one example and Flickr is another. On Amber's home page featured in the pod cast is a link to her Flickr page and sure enough there were some photo’s there of holidays and some events she had covered in her day job as a reporter.

I can understand the attraction of being able to load some family snaps up onto your internet homepage in a private album in order to share them with friends and family; I’ve done it myself with images of kids’ school plays for the grandparents living in Spain to see- but I feel distinctly uncomfortable about sites like Facebook and MySpace which not only encourage but facilitate a voyeuristic approach to looking into strangers lives and public photo albums. In fact looking at some of the comments posted under the photos on Amber’s Facebook- the majority appear to be from strangers, or is that strange guys, saying things like ‘phwaa she’s gorgeous…’

Is this the next evolution of the cult of celebrity where now ‘ordinary’ people become the objects of our adoration – unawares – and we live vicariously by reading their diaries and photo albums rather than by living our own life?

For me, I prefer the approach laid out in the Bible – Jesus said he came that we (all) should have life in all its fullness (John 10:10) – which to me means that my own life is full of joy, excitement and adventure – my own photo album is full of images I want to look at – and I don’t need to cast envious glances at anyone else’s. More than that, let’s not forget the prime directive in the 10 commandments (Exodus 20) not to be envious of other people’s possessions or relations as that road only ends in disaster for us.

The life that each of us has, is one destined for greatness – that’s what the bible says when it describes us as adopted sons and daughters of the master of the universe and co-labourers with him in the grand plan of the restoration and ultimate rule over all of creation.

Forget facebook, give me the good book any day.