Facing off – In 2012, Facebook changed American politics and relationships, too

This month, as Barack Obama takes the oath of office for his second term, some online relationships strained during the heated, social media-fueled election cycle still may need mending.

Between the 2008 and 2012 elections, I switched my political party affiliation away from the one I’d been raised with. This was a quiet act that came about after a long period of education and discussion with other professionals, friends and family.

And then there was Facebook.

When I “liked” my presidential candidate on the social networking site, my father responded by pasting a single, bone-chilling word directly on my Facebook wall: “Why?”

I looked at the face of the man who answered my questions about the sky and water when I was a little girl, the man who helped me bury a dead bird I’d found in the yard when I was 10, the one who cried on my wedding day, all captured in that tiny square.

In my mind, I could hear his voice, but he wasn’t in the room with me.

Facebook invited my comment.

A cursor blinked with the tasty possibility of a blank page and a built-in audience of people who, at some point, decided they liked me.

But Daddy and I had always talked about the issues standing in my parents’ kitchen. And so, I did what any respectful daughter would do. I glanced over my shoulder in shame, and then, with a great degree of trepidation, I deleted Daddy’s post.

I just wasn’t ready to hash it out with him on Facebook, in front of friends, classmates, colleagues and church members.

In 2012, Facebook changed politics.

In the days after this year’s election, many are left sorting out how, exactly, it changed We the People—our minds, our hearts, our community.

In a Mashable.com poll, nearly half of respondents—849—said they had “unfriended” someone during the election. In an informal poll of my Baton Rouge friends, the numbers were closer to a third of folks who took the hatchet to relationships during the election, citing blatant racism and hatred as good reasons to hit the “unfriend” button.

Kristy Hamner of Baton Rouge took a more holistic view, sticking it out with all of her friends, even when it wasn’t easy.

“I would never end a friendship over someone’s beliefs or political views,” she says. “I am glad to see the whole spectrum in my newsfeed.”

Fear of losing friends or placing a blue or red wedge into relationships kept some from saying anything at all.

Amy Shamburger, who lives in St. Amant and enjoys online discussions in a handful of community forums she is active with, buttoned her lip on Facebook.

“I always feel so vulnerable on Facebook,” she says. “It’s sad, really. The whole point of this page is to have an outlet, a place for me to be me. But instead I feel so boxed in and unable to really be me for fear someone, somewhere will get offended or judge me based on one opinion. I have begun to hate Facebook because of it.”

For many, Facebook threw together disparate contacts who might never otherwise have met if it weren’t for that tiny, seemingly intimate, but ultimately public and potentially profane space that is a mutual friend’s Facebook wall.

At one point, I played referee in a 125-and-counting comment exchange that included childhood friends, tailgating buddies, former co-workers, carpool mates and a hometown acquaintance who spoke more to me on my Facebook wall that day then we ever did in the 12 years we were in elementary, middle and high school together.

I talked to several people after the election who said they were taking a Facebook vacation. I’m joining them.

We’re weary. And there’s also this sense that our great new connection tool played us, disrupted our peace of mind and drew energy away from the actual people in our lives, the ones we live and work with, the ones who we will call on the phone when we’re wondering about them, instead of pushing a tiny picture of a thumb.

We’ve got a few years to figure out, as a society, where Facebook will fit into the next major election. Today, we figure out where it fits into our everyday world.

Let’s hope the humanity and heart that prompted us to enthusiastically add those friends in the first place will prevail. Facebook should be more living room, less war zone. So should politics. And so should life.