Why I have left Facebook

I just left Facebook. Downloaded all the stuff I put on there over the years. Wrote a statement to inform my friends. And then I pressed the Delete Account button…And now I have thirty days to control myself not to reopen my account.

As I said before, I have many reasons to quit Facebook. Simply put: from a pleasure it has become a burden in various ways. Lets start with the easiest one: the time.


My Facebook usage has been time consuming, to say the least. And that was non-productive time as well. I spent many many hours just scrolling mindlessly to see if something had happened that I could Like, could Respond to or could read.  It is as mind numbing as just sitting in front of a TV set and let program after program pass you by. On top of that, it is addictive. And I don’t care to admit it: I have been addicted to Facebook. It explains why I am suffering through some withdrawal symptoms. That alone should be reason enough to leave. I also have found some better uses for my time than this. But for that I need FB to be gone.

What other things did I do with Facebook? 
Well, there was the social media aspect: stay in touch with family, friends, acquaintances or follow some celebrities. All very nice and great… if it works. 
And I gradually became aware that it actually does not work.
 “Social” implies ‘interaction” and I started noticing that with the exception of preciously few people, interactions were very few and  far between. On holidays or birthdays, you’re showered with well wishes, which is very nice, but very often I posted or shared something with little or no reaction from my 200+ ‘friends’.  When that happens too often you start wondering why you are actually bothering. And that eventually added up to the decision to leave.

There is another aspect of the social media  that I need to address here and that is what I call the “Too Much Information” issue. That happens when people post or share things like extreme right wing views, racist, homophobic, misogynistic (or misandrist), islamophobic or antisemitic posts, commentaries or “jokes”. Things that probably would not have popped up in an everyday conversation or during real life occasions, but that have a serious impact on your view of such a person. Unfortunately, that has happened on quite a few occasions and it is also a reason for me to quit, cause I don’t want social media to further impede the normal social interactions I have with friends and family.

The word “racism” has fallen and that leads me to another reason: growing “toxicity”.
There is a lot of ugly stuff going around in our world and  much of that enters our social media. In fact, a lot of that has to do with the functioning of our media  and our social media themselves. Part of that I willfully sought out myself: the various antiracism platforms, for instance but many others simply enter my timeline from others sharing them or  lately, due to one of Facebook’s algorithms that deems it of interest to me. At some point I had enough of all this poison flowing my way as it started to affect my sense of well being. Also, time to leave.

What really consolidated my decision to leave, however,  happened when I inspected the Archive file I had downloaded  some time ago and noticed how many parties are in possession of my information. It is really mind boggling to realize that-without me ever realizing this- there are now hundreds of companies that know who I am and what my preferences are. And with some very few exceptions, I know nothing about them. That’s quite scary, folks.

So, here you have a few reasons why I wanted-no, needed!- to leave Facebook. It has not been an easy decision. But what also helps is the realization that for the largest part of my life, there was nothing like FB or social media. And I think I was happier then….