Creeptastic!

Here's something a friend and I were throwing around the other night: the modern usage of the word creepy.

If I recall my high school (pre-facebook) years correctly, the term creepy was reserved for things that were actually creepy...say...a man hiding in an alley or a windowless van parked in front of an elementary school. However, in recent years (thanks to social networking maybe?) the term creepy has begun to take on a whole new meaning. A person can creep on or creep in. They can be a creeper. They can creep your profile or your pictures or facebook as a whole.

So who are all these creeps?? Your friends, both of the real and facebook variety. Their crime? Viewing the things that you post on your profile for people to see. Maybe if you don't want the whole world seeing pictures from your spring break, change your privacy settings. Still worried about what your so-called friends are seeing? Thankfully facebook knows you don't want Grandma to see you doing a keg stand and has implemented this little thing called filters. How do you use a facebook filter? Simple! Make one of those friends list. Give it a title like "Managers" or "Old People". Next time you make an album, change the settings to custom and in the little box of who NOT to allow, type in the name of the list. Too complicated? Well, Tila Tequila, maybe it's time to do a little spring cleaning (see previous entry).

One of my advisors brought up a very good point. Maybe some people aren't so much creepy but rather socially awkward. I went to a college that was 75% MMORPG 25% Art Student. There's LOADS of socially awkward people. I don't think 90% of the so-called creepy boys at my college are actually capable of causing harm off the WOW playing field. (Source: The t-shirt being given out in 2005 that read "9 out of 10 ___ students stop the first time their partner says no.")

Let's review here. You go to a party on Saturday. You post pictures on Sunday. You go to class Monday. Your friend comes up to you and says "Cute outfit at the party!" Creepy? No! Of course not! She's your friend! You put the pictures up so she could see them, DUH!! The kid sitting next to you that you don't really know says "Hey you looked good at that party Saturday." Creepy? Of course it's cree---NOT SO FAST!! He's your friend on facebook. He saw the pictures. Hell, he might have even been there. It doesn't matter that you don't know his name off the top of your head. Putting pictures of facebook is the equivalent of passing the one-hour photo envelope around your English class. So. Creepy? Nope. Socially awkward. Yes. He just doesn't know how to deal with girls or he received so awful advice on how to pick up chicks. NOW if he said "You looked good while you were sleeping last night. I especially like the lace on the edge of your tank top." THAT'S CREEPY.

So interweb residents, keep on creepin' on. And if you have any funny creeper/socially awkward people stories, feel free to share.

xoxo

To De or Not To De: That is today's question.

Alright kids, gather round. Today we're going to talk about today's ultimate burn: being de-friended on facebook. I'm really not sure of the yesteryear equivalent. Being picked last for the kickball team? Being completely ignored, kind of like the episode of South Park where Cartman thought he was dead? Anywho. Let's get on with this.

To de-friend someone on facebook is to pretty much say "I never want to see you again. I want nothing to do with you. You are dead to me. I am cutting you out of my life completely." Once your former lover/roommate/best friend de-friends you, your updates will no longer show up in their news feed. They won't be forced to endure status updates, pictures posted, or farmville notifications. On the other hand, depending on your security settings, if they for some reason WANT to creep your profile, they won't be able to see anything, save your networks and MAYBE a small profile picture. Maybe.

Personally, I have only felt compelled to de-friend people on two occasions in my life. The first was a completely normal occurrence. Remember when facebook was for college kids only?? And the best moment of your summer before freshman year was getting your college email address so you could get facebook?? And how many random people you friended that were members of "FALL INCOMING CLASS 200X!!" Yeah...well...after I finally arrived on campus and realized that I wasn't going to actually be friends with all these people who I had told about my down-alternative bed spread and string lights, I did a little cleaning. Understandable, yes?

The other time I de-friended somebody was more recently. I was having a bit of a stalker issue and it got to the point where I didn't want him in my life anymore. I didn't want to drag authorities or anybody else into it yet, so I simply de-friended him, thinking that MAYBE he'd take the hint. He didn't. Instead, he re-friended me and included a little message. I don't remember it word-for-word anymore but I'm pretty sure he thought I was awfully rude for removing him from my friends list. I'm sorry. I didn't like when you facebook i.med me twenty times in one day. At this point I had to take it one step further and block him. I had never blocked anybody on facebook. At the time, my blocking knowledge was limited to AIM. I'm assuming it worked because I never heard from him (at least on facebook) again. Also, I can't search for him. So it does go both ways. That's alright. I don't need to see his creepy/emo status updates.

So, interwebs folk, what brings you to the point of having to de-friend a person? Did your break up leave you in your pajamas for a week with only Ben and Jerry for company? Did your best friend steal yo man? Sick of looking at somebody's ugly mug? Let me know what's up on this one...as usual it's a modern phenomena that confuses me.

xoxo