Has Social Media Become Just Another Form of ‘Women’s Work’?
Aren’t you tired? Facebook, Instagram, Twitter. Christ I’m tired.
I’ve never been a curmudgeon about social media, I swear. I’m a Gen-X woman. I know how to navigate the whole mess, without giving my life over to it. I was always big into the idea of Facebook as a personal platform; a way to ‘take control of, and shape our own narrative’. (I’m so old and such a second-wave-feminist geek that I used the word ‘narrative’ before conservative news media co-opted it.) I imagined over time we would find powerful new ways to use our platforms, beyond competing with each other socially. And in some ways, we did … #metoo happened, after all.
The problem is that I just … can’t any more. I’ve taken breaks before, over the years. I’ve done moderate versions of a social media ‘cleanse’. Now though, the breaks are getting longer. I’m slipping off the grid, becoming a digital ghost, wandering the lonely corridors of the Facebook or Instagram feed, liking the occasional photograph or meme, wondering when I’ll get my social media mojo back.
At those times when feels like it’s all just noise, I don’t want to add to it. Is it, as some suggest that passively observing the activities of my wider social group has drained me of my genuine drive to connect? In fact, I believe that it’s my desire to genuinely and…
