seeing what we want to see

It’s easy to filter your Facebook feed to see only what you want to see. Without unfriending people, I have hidden Facebook friends from my feed. I might do this if I too often see posts that offend my sensibilities or that are just annoying or if someone’s posts are too frequently excessively frivolous. In the last week one Facebook friend, gloating about the Republican victory in the elections, started sharing posts, originating from dubious sources, bashing the left. Rather than hiding that person entirely, I just told Facebook that I didn’t want to see posts from those sources. That is something that works in my Web browser on my PC, but not on my Facebook iPad app.

One would wish that we could have an environment of civil discourse. So much of what is on Facebook is highly biased either left or right, and some of it is just plain wrong. I have to admit having been guilty of perpetuating some of the left-leaning material myself.

I think back to the early 1980’s when I lived in in Oklahoma City. I used to regularly watch William F. Buckley’s Firing Line on PBS, even though his views were at the opposite end of the spectrum from mine. He was intelligent, literate, articulate, and had his facts straight. That last point is not something you can say about Fox News (or I suppose MSNBC as well at times), nor about much of what appears on Facebook.

I have no answers. Only my observations.