policing & privacy
Monday, September 29, 2014 9
Is Facebook Friendship an Invitation to Creep?
A Confession Followed by Poorly Researched Musings
A
erin garbett › contributor
f ter finding out about the
passing of a high school
friend’s partner and respond ing to an invitation to her
memorial over Facebook, I spent the
better part of an hour browsing through
their pictures. This got me thinking about
my less savoury Facebook activities.
Then I did a little research and decided
to confess to Osgoode that I can be one
heck of a Facebook creep – not necessarily in that order.
I am guilty of Facebook creeping. I’d like to think I
don’t do it as much as when I was a teenager but it
still happens. I browse the travel pictures of a girl I
might have said five to ten words to in high school.
I look at family photos of the woman I worked with
3 years ago. I critique the wedding choices of the
couple I knew in the first year of my undergrad. And
it gets worse. Often when I meet up with long-term
friends, we discuss the happenings of others without
once having spoken to them. I will reveal that I “only
found out from Facebook” but, admittedly, only if
it comes up. I’m not proud of these actions and they
make up a very small percentage of the time I spend
on Facebook. That being said, when I objectively look
at this behaviour, it’s unsettling.
Although I suspect that I am the rule rather than
the exception, brief research didn’t turn up much
information on creeping/lurking (called passive following by more reputable writers). In a 2009 TED
talk, Stephana Broadbent quoted a statistic that the
average person has 150 Facebook friends but only
communicates with four to six of them on a regular
basis. According to Broadbent, this statistic comes
from Carmen Marlow, the self-proclaimed “In-House
Sociologist” of Facebook. However, I could not find a
print source for Marlow’s claim. Moreover, this data is
5 years old and potentially irrelevant. What I did find
is that the average Facebook user gives less than what
she or he receives. According to a 2012 Pew Research
publication, Facebook users receive more friend
requests than they
initiate, like fewer
posts than the
number of likes on
their own posts,
and get more messages than they send. Does this give any real credence
to my theory of rampant hordes of Facebook lurkers?
Unfortunately, no. So for now, I’m merely speculating
about its prevalence.
Moving on to the real question- are my actions
right, wrong or are they of no moral consequence? If
I’m Facebook friends with someone, is it ok for me to
relentlessly delve into their lives, even if I would only
say a quick “hi” if I passed them on the streets? Am I
invading the privacy of these individuals?
ê Friends don’t let friends drink and Facebook creep.
Let me make it clear. I’m not discussing a potential employer, a not-so-happy ex, a stranger or
anyone else outside your friend list trying to look
at your profile. Nor am I talking about the many
people who are not your Facebook friends that you
can access through actual friends. Those are both
Pandora’s boxes that must remain closed. I’m talking
about the people who have accepted your request or
whose request you’ve accepted (aside: the language
of Facebook can be unbelievably clunky). One might
say that by friending someone, we’re consenting to