Ben Parr addresses some new statistics by Oxygen Media and Lightspeed Research:
“While the study covers all of social media, it’s clear that women in the 18-34 range are focused on their Facebook accounts. More than half of young women (57%) say they talk to people online more than face-to-face. A full 39% of them proclaim themselves Facebook addicts, while 34% of young women make Facebook the first thing they do when they wake up, even before brushing their teeth or going to the bathroom.
Here are some other interesting stats regarding young women and Facebook:
21% of women age 18-34 check Facebook in the middle of the night
63% use Facebook as a networking tool
42% think it’s okay to post photos of themselves intoxicated
79% are fine with kissing in photos
58% use Facebook to keep tabs on “frenemies”
50% are fine with being Facebook friends with complete strangers
What conclusions can we draw from this data? It’s not just that young women are using Facebook religiously: it’s that they’re very open with what they post and who they accept as friends.”
I would be a liar if I didn’t say that I love Facebook, but there is a point where its function becomes an obsession. It is funny how we are willing to publish our lives to the heartless world, but we are too ashamed to face the God who has demonstrated His unconditional love for us. We should very well be aware that when our 800-something friends see the relationship heart break and see our status change to single, that they really don’t feel our pain. We should know that we could tell the whole world all of our problems, but those problems will still exist when we check our accounts at the end of the day.
This has brought me back to a simple, but nonetheless timeless truth.
How we spend our time is a direct reflection of what matters most to us. Maybe if we spent more time on our knees than on our keypads, things would be different. Maybe if we spent more time updating God than updating our statuses, we would actually get answers. And then we wonder why God doesn’t hear us…
Thanks Roshni. Great point.
It is funny how we are willing to publish our lives to the heartless world, but we are too ashamed to face the God who has demonstrated His unconditional love for us.
Are you? You Christians sure are an odd bunch, then.
@Nick: Yes, yes we are. Being Christian doesn’t make us any less human, you realize.
Just curious, Roshni- where did you get these numbers from?
Judith, I still don’t get it. Prayer should be an easy thing for the serious Christian, who would assert that God knows hir heart whether ze prays or not. There is nowhere to retreat, therefore one had better face up to one’s deeds. The difficult thing ought to be not prayer, but ceasing to pray, letting go for the moment, and going out into the world knowing one will disgrace onself again. Yes? No?
I contend that the Christian to whom “we are willing to publish our lives to the heartless world, but we are too ashamed to face the God who has demonstrated His unconditional love for us” actually applies is either deeply unserious or simply a dullard.
Nick, I agree it doesn’t quite make sense, but this is really something that can be understood on my side of the fence. The only argument (which I think will fail to impress you) is that there are also spiritual forces of darkness that seek to keep a Christian from praying unceasingly (which is actually recommended by the Bible), which constantly distract us and make us look elsewhere for answers and affection, including facebook. In that respect we are not different from non-Christians, who are just as easily distracted from the Great Questions of life and meaning.
Being a “serious” Christian does not imply that prayer is an easy thing at all. Like Judith said, being Christian does not mean that we are not human. And I think that there is something in human nature that causes us to turn to people that we see rather than a God that we cannot. The second requires faith. Faith is not something that you are handed when you become a Christian; it is something that is tested and tried daily. And prayer is not just a means to face up to one’s deeds; it is how we build a relationship with God. It is just like our relationships with the people around us… if we never talked to them how would we know them? How can we know God if we do not talk to HIm. God is always able, but faith opens the door and allows him to act. And yes, it is ridiculous that Christians turn to people who can do nothing to help them when they know that they have a God that will–but this is something that even I struggle with. We are Christian, but we are human, and because of that we are not perfect. It is easier for us to trust things that we can see, and sometime we forget the power in the unseen.
Judith, the website where I got these stats is
http://mashable.com/2010/07/07/oxygen-facebook-study/