How Did You Facebook Stalk Me?
Today’s stupid question is one that I asked. It’s stupid in the way that other stupid questions on this blog are stupid in that the answer leaves something to be desired.
If you care to hearken back to my very first post, you will recall that two tenants moved out around the same time. It was this post that sparked the following exchange on my Facebook page:
While these offensive statements are perhaps uncalled for, you must admit that no names are mentioned. If you add to that the fact that I have a private profile on Facebook and that I was not friends with the parties in question, and that no one really gives a shit what’s on my Facebook page anyway, you might surmise that there would be no way I would personally offend either of the parties in question.
You would, however, be wrong.
Less than a day after posting what you read above, I received a diatribe of an email. The letter began by stating that it wasn’t an attack, but continued by calling me a fraud, rude, “on the internet pretending that [this person] is some kind of pervert”, and asking me what I was running from, among other accusations.
I will bet now that the person that wrote this letter to me is going to be one of the first people to read this post. In fact, I can guarantee that he is one of my biggest fans.
Without going into more detail, I will simply focus on the second response I wrote. You can see it below.
After the word vomit that we had both spewed forth into the e-universe, this is short and sweet and asks a simple question.
Here is the response it received:
Pretty patronizing, right? Slander? Not once has this person’s name been written, nor was the party in question ever insulted in any serious or hurtful way.
But then the Internet is a cruel place that can reveal what people really think about you if you care to repeatedly stalk them, insist on taking offense at what you dig up when you go where you’re not invited and then confront them about it.
And the answer is stupid. Especially when my settings are private. I have done nothing to change any of them since this exchange and the screen-caps are below.
When I logged out of my page and googled even the exact words on my page, googled myself, pasted my profile into the URL bar on my browser, I could see nothing.
Then I decided – enough with the obsessing. That’s for perverts!
We’re out there! Pretty scary if you think about it. Then again, who cares.
Man oh man. Dejame contarte- hoy, recibi un mensaje de mi padre por algo que yo habia escrito en uno de mis blogs (yo no sabia que el estaba consciente de aquel blog) sobre el. No era gran cosa, pero le ofendio y me dio un cantazo verbal en su email. Me di cuenta de que aun cuando crees que estas anonima, nunca es asi.
Eso pasó hoy, Julie? Que raro – y es la verdad – nunca somos anonimos.
I guess Carlo that if you’ve got something to hide, it’s a lot scarier than if you don’t.
Ah, always happy to get a reminder of why I’m not on FB. I will never submit!
I feel the same about Twittering. Let’s fight.
Nice haircut, Kate. Couldn’t have cost more than $4, right? $1 a side?
It’s time you go full dyke.
Actually, my hair is quite long, but thanks for the advice!
Hey, just perusing through matador and ended up here somehow. Not sure if you’ve figured out the facebook privacy settings or if you even care….but either way I’d like to attempt to explain. Your settings are for ‘network and friends’ and not ‘friends only’. Meaning that anyone in the same network (i.e. region, city, school) doesn’t necessarily have to be friends with you. Just in the same network. I’m in the Detroit network. Add it to your networks and you can see me without adding me as a friend.
I was forced to become adept in such things due to a similar yet very different situation. Change your settings to ‘friends only’ and you’ll not have that problem again.
Cheers,
Kris
Thanks, Kris. The settings are always changing, but I’ll take it under advisement, though I never really thought anything I said on the internet was a secret and now I have conclusive proof!