{"id":106,"date":"2017-01-19T21:00:42","date_gmt":"2017-01-19T21:00:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.blog.buprojects.uk\/2016-2017\/kirstybendter\/?p=106"},"modified":"2017-01-19T21:00:42","modified_gmt":"2017-01-19T21:00:42","slug":"106","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.blog.buprojects.uk\/2016-2017\/kirstybendter\/2017\/01\/19\/106\/","title":{"rendered":"First world problems: Making it Facebook Official"},"content":{"rendered":"

You\u2019ve finally found \u2018The One\u2019 (and he\/she always responds to your texts!<\/a>), and it\u2019s all sugar and spice and everything nice. But now the next concern you and your fluffer face: Should we make it Facebook Official?<\/h2>\n

For most of us social media is our primary source of news. Even if I just have a quick scroll through my feed I know whether it will be raining today, who got engaged to who, what stupid thing president-elect Trump tweeted last night, that there are still Southern rail strikes *sigh*, or that Jenny\u2019s pet tortoise died last night. Using Facebook <\/a>to find out stuff is undoubtedly inevitable for our generation and there seems to be a belief that events are not official until they are on Facebook.<\/p>\n

Hence why changing your relationship status to \u201cIn a relationship (with…)\u201d and declaring your newfound love, A.K.A. making it \u201cFacebook Official\u201d, seems like a code of conduct that must be followed.<\/p>\n

\u201cChanging Facebook relationship status has, for better or worse, joined first date, first kiss, first night together, exclusivity talk, and first “I love you” on the list of important relationship milestones.” Samuel Axon, Mashable <\/a>(2010).<\/em><\/p>\n

According to research done by HerCampus.com, the most important reasons for making it Facebook Official were to show that you are committed, to show that you haven\u2019t got anything to hide, and to just show off online. And because it is probably quite cool to know that your idiot ex now knows that she has lost your **** forever.\u00a0 Oh and also, it is cool when you get like, two hundred likes and \u201cAahw cute, congratulations!!\u201d comments. To summarize that: we make it Facebook Official due to the significance of external validation<\/em>.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor anyone who has ever \u201cgone Facebook Official\u201d with a partner, there is an undeniable sense of significance to it. This sense of significance may be accompanied by drama, anxiety, elation, dread, or any number of other complicating emotions, but the recurrent theme appears to be around significance.\u201d \u2013 Lincoln & Robards (2016)<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

I\u2019m sure all of us have done it at least once in our life. However, in the past two to three years there has been a massive decline in the number of couples that still confirm their relationship status on Facebook: Buzzfeed Pol<\/a>l results in 2015 showed that 40% of the twenty-something year olds would not put their relationship status online. There are various reasons for not wanting to make it FB Official:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Keeping your personal information private. Not everybody has to know your business. Also, that way no one can put a juju<\/em> on your precious relationship. (I blame my superstitious upbringing for this)<\/li>\n
  2. You basically open the door for shitstirrers.<\/li>\n
  3. It shows little autonomy and space. Like, why would you even want your Facebook page knotted with your SO\u2019s?<\/li>\n
  4. No one cares.<\/li>\n
  5. Breaking up -if you break up- is literally going to be the equivalent of a Manchester United press conference.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Imagine a year after the switch, and after constantly having gushed about your partner online and having done all the cheesy things that a very lovedazed person does, you have to change your status back to \u2018single\u2019 because it turns out your lover was still chatting others up or something? And BAM, the quassi-sympathetic-texts-from-people-who-just-want-to-know-what-happened-tap is open and your fairytale has basically just become Sharon and Steve\u2019s dinnertable gossip because you choose to publicize your relationship in the first place.<\/p>\n

    Hell, I remember the way I had to live out my terrible break up online in the Facebook heydays. If doing it in the public eye wasn\u2019t enough, I was not even aware of the relationship being officially over until my ex unobtrusively decided to make his singleness Facebook Official. (Shameless Propaganda: More on that in my vlog so keep an eye open for that too!)<\/p>\n

    Thankfully I\u2019m not the only one that has gone through that experience. In her article<\/a>, Sofia Barrett tells her FBO story: \u201cA few days pass and he changes his status from \u201cIn a Relationship with Sofia Barrett-Ibarria\u201d to \u201cSingle.\u201d People \u201cliked\u201d it. People wrote comments. Some girl wrote something on his page to the effect of \u201cHey, boo, miss you.\u201d I officially wanted to crawl in a hole and just not come out. Ever.\u201d<\/p>\n

    So, that was that. I might sound like a Negative Nancy but I honestly haven\u2019t got anything against relationships or displaying them on Facebook. I can appreciate a cute picture of a loved up couple on a tropical island. But sometime\u2019s the best way to enjoy things is in privacy.<\/p>\n

    However, if making it Facebook Official is up your lane, then by all means do it. I will not forget to bring my popcorn when the drama unfolds.<\/p>\n

    \"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    You\u2019ve finally found \u2018The One\u2019 (and he\/she always responds to your texts!), and it\u2019s all sugar and spice and everything nice. But now the next concern you and your fluffer face: Should we make it Facebook Official? For most of us social media is our primary source of news. Even if I just have a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":115,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[3,17,18,13,15,16,14],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.buprojects.uk\/2016-2017\/kirstybendter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.buprojects.uk\/2016-2017\/kirstybendter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.buprojects.uk\/2016-2017\/kirstybendter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.buprojects.uk\/2016-2017\/kirstybendter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.buprojects.uk\/2016-2017\/kirstybendter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=106"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.buprojects.uk\/2016-2017\/kirstybendter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":121,"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.buprojects.uk\/2016-2017\/kirstybendter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106\/revisions\/121"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.buprojects.uk\/2016-2017\/kirstybendter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/115"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.buprojects.uk\/2016-2017\/kirstybendter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=106"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.buprojects.uk\/2016-2017\/kirstybendter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=106"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.buprojects.uk\/2016-2017\/kirstybendter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=106"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}