The messenger that is Facebook

There are things I have learnt about old friends that I can’t imagine I would ever have known with a similar immediacy had it not been for Facebook. It was through Facebook that I learnt that the husband of a girl who was one of my best friends in early High School died of leukemia last year. And now it is through Facebook that I discover that the fellow killed in this accident, and the seriously injured little boy, are the husband and son of another girl who was in my year at school.

Over the last two days I was wondering what all the foreboding wall messages piling up meant, so I asked another mutual friend last night. That brings me to what else is weirder still about Facebook: I now feel like I am eavesdropping on all the things people say in initial response to a person facing one of life’s greatest griefs, as they are written all over her wall. Without wanting to make a social experiment out of someone else’s tragedy, that has been quite informative. (As is perhaps to be expected, some are a lot more sensible and sensitive than others, and the ones I consider to be the least sensitive are those that attempt to offer some sort of “instruction”.)

And I am now faced with wondering what to do in light of the fact that I am now aware of the tragedy. We weren’t close at school, I have never met her husband, but I can’t just ignore what I now know. So, do I just add yet another message to a Facebook wall? (It made me wonder how people are going to be able to respond to all the information it is now possible to know about distant friends via social networking sites - and if you don't actually want to or just wouldn't respond to their information why do you have them as your "friends"?) If I think Facebook is sufficient for “Happy Birthdays” is it also sufficient for condolences on the loss of a spouse? Hmmm ...