Social media has definitely changed the world of communication and how individuals approach their real life relationships in the public sphere. Take, for example, marriage proposals. Proposals are meant to be a show of love and affection, to prove to your significant other how important you are to them. This no longer means popping the question in front of all your friends and family; it means alerting the entire electronic world. Can you imagine being proposed to through twitter? Living in the public sphere has obviously affected the intricacies of private relationships and the role that outsiders play in these relationships.
As Tanya explained in “We Live in Public”, when a couple is arguing, it’s more beneficial to step back, try to understand each side, and to compromise. But when the argument occurs in public, it becomes about egos and who “wins” the fight.
A 2010 survey shows that four out of five matrimonial lawyers claim that an increasing number of cases involve the use of social networking sites to provide evidence. One case I found shocking was the story of a woman who had her husband arrested for bigamy after seeing photos of his second wedding on facebook. The couple had been separated for a number of years, but had never officially gotten a divorce. When he deleted said wife from his friends list, he did not alter his privacy settings and she was still able to see the photos from his second wedding. She then had him arrested for bigamy.
Clearly social media has the ability to build relationships and tear them down. Ultimately it’s up to the user to determine how they use the interface to affect and influence their real world relationships. But will this have permanent effects on socialization and communication in the future? Does providing an alternate source of communication allow for freer expression or does it mimic the purpose of greeting cards (allowing us to defer the responsibility of communication by saying the words we physically can’t)?
I remember Tanya or Josh saying that viewing the comments that people made about their fight is much more interesting than the actual fight. I think everyone wanted to know what people view them as because of their self consciousness. Josh and Tanya is the same. The viewers that interact with them via the chat room also told them what they think they should do.
As a viewer myself, watching the fight between Tanya and Josh, I couldn’t help but think that Josh is wrong. He claimed that he was bored and wanted sex from her in front of everyone. She told him “no” and he proceeded to slipping his hand under her skirt. With most of the viewers, I agreed with her choice of making him sleep on the couch. Josh even said so himself that Tanya sided with the viewers and made him sleep there. When the fight becomes public, it is just not between the couples themselves. Like Gee said, it “becomes about egos and who ‘wins’ the fight.” Other people’s input about the fight will make the couple think about alternatives, whether they are completely right or completely wrong and the actions that should be taken. Josh even claimed that the opinion of the viewers made the fight worst. They were arguing just to see who will win.
I believed that social media allows people to do and say things that they normally wouldn’t in a relationship. It is easy to express love for a shy person and yet, easier to cheat for a loyal partner.
“We Live In Public” shed some light on what social media can potentially do to an intimate relationship. I agree with Tanya’s comment on how a relationship thrown into the public eye can turn into more of a competition than anything else. This is similar to the fascination with celebrity couples and their lives, and how ordinary people want a piece of it. Tabloids are incredibly profitable because they showcase people’s intimate moments. However, Facebook serves as the everyday person’s tabloid. This added pressure of having your relationship out there can essentially destroy it as seen with Tanya and Josh. Josh even says, “I couldn’t wait for her to leave.” The people watching Josh and Tanya live their lives were easily accessible for advice and became a third party to the relationship. We have to again ask ourselves to what degree should we put our lives out on social media, and also, if we are, essentially, losing ourselves in it. We seem to become reliant on others’ judgments and cease to be independent thinkers. Facebook also creates this excuse to gossip or assume things about someone’s love life. For instance, a Facebooker and his fiancée whose relationship statuses had been “Engaged” decided to take down their status completely. Their Facebook friends were quick to assume that the engagement was off and everyone messaged in their “sorry to hear” notes as soon as possible. A relationship is between two people on a normal scale, but if you add Facebook to the combination, you have a relationship with hundreds of spectators.