Facebook Friend-ing

I recently read this article about Facebook friending, and how awkward it can become when someone tries to friend you that you barely even know. Sometimes, it's uncomfortable because you don't WANT to be friends with them!

I've dealt with this situation too- people come out of the woodwork, and suddenly I'm getting requests for random friends of friends that I don't even know, or people that I went to elementary school with and don't even REMEMBER speaking to! Ever!

I recently went through my friend list and "edited" (is that mean?!) my friends. Basically, if I had no idea who you were, or didn't ever remember speaking to you, you were GONE. I wondered why I had accepted all these friend requests in the first place! I guess I feel really guilty if I didn't befriend these people.

So then I got stricter and told myself that I'm not trying to be in a competition to have the most number of facebook friends possible: the rule was, if I don't know you, I hit "ignore." I mean, if I haven't spoken to you in YEARS, or haven't even thought of you, there's probably a reason, right? I wish there was a social networking site like facebook that was for "acquaintances" or "I think I kinda know ya's."

This worked out well, but then one day I got an EMAIL message on facebook, from a person I had ignored! So, what did I do? I IGNORED THE MESSAGE! And sure enough, a couple weeks later, I got another friend invite from that same person, with ANOTHER email, blatantly saying they were offended and hurt that I didn't "friend" them!

THEN, some of the people I deleted started sending me friend requests AGAIN! Ugh, this is getting ridiculous! If Seinfeld was still on, I'm sure they'd have a show about Facebooking, and feeling OBLIGED to friend people that you barely know, and then offending people if you don't... can't you picture it!

Oh, and it goes without saying, none of my readers of this blog are part of this facebook unfriending thing. If you're reading this, rest assured. You ARE my friend. (And don't send me emails telling me off!)

So, how about YOU guys- have you ever had these kind of experiences with facebook? Share your comments below!