Re Your Social-Media Condolences. Thanks, But No Thanks! -The iPINIONS Journal

I published a tribute on Tuesday to mark my Bibi’s death. A few of you responded by contacting me directly (via phone, email, or the “Contact” atop this page) to offer condolences. I found this truly comforting and responded in kind.

But I gather many more of you responded by publishing condolences on social media. Perhaps you missed this:

[A] special report by WebMD found most people who are grieving find social media posts or messages about their loss to be either pointless, irritating or actively distressing – in fact, barely anyone thought they were a good idea.

(Daily Mail, July 12, 2019)

That provoked me to respond with this from “Hey, Moron, Personal Tweet Is…an Oxymoron,” March 6, 2015:

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I fatefully lament the trend of people using social media to convey personal messages. A chat I had with an old acquaintance yesterday (via phone) demonstrated how normalized this form of ‘human connection’ has become.

She had access to my personal phone number and e-mail address(es). Yet she demanded to know why I failed to acknowledge the ‘heartfelt condolences’ she tweeted upon learning of a death in my family.

But her indignation turned immediately to consternation when I asked her to explain why she posted her condolences on Twitter; that is, instead of conveying them to me on the phone (or via e-mail). I kid you not, I might as well had asked a stupid question like: Why do people go to restaurants, instead of eating at home?

Regretfully, condolences these days seem intended more to draw attention to those tweeting them than to comfort those (who should be) receiving them.

But there’s something profoundly dehumanizing in people thinking that no thought, expression, or deed – no matter how personal or intimate – has any redeeming value unless it’s posted on social media. …

For the record, I am not, and never have been, on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Tinder, or any other social media platform. It follows, therefore, that if you sent a message to me on any of them, I never saw it. Not that it was for my eyes only anyway.

At long last, is nothing personal, intimate, or sacred…?

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My antipathy for social media is well-documented. In fact, I have expressed it in too many commentaries to count, including in “Why I Hate Twitter,” February 1, 2013, and “Facebook Exploiting You Like a Pimp Exploits Prostitutes,” December 20, 2018.

But I featured a Mike Baldwin cartoon in “Selfie-Centered Social Media and the Death of Intimacy,” November 26, 2016. It speaks volumes: