Social Media as a Love Drug: Destructive or Complementary?

The New York Times has an interesting series of articles up right now debating the role of social media in today's relationships - Social Media Is a Romance Contraceptive. Before I started to read the various opinions from the dating experts (if there can truly be such a thing), I spent a significant amount of time thinking about how platforms such as Facebook and Twitter affect my relationships and those of my friends and families.

I used to think that Facebook provided a good outlet for one person to get to know another. While many people attempt to maintain their privacy by hiding their pictures, posts, and activities on the site, it generally isn't too tough to dig a little deeper for information. Looking up mutual friends provides one quick outlet for scratching the surface. THe information that Facebook offers up in the pre-dating stages can help someone decide whether to pursue or look in other directions. Certainly in this instance, Facebook absolutely aids in the development of romantic possibilities.

I can think of a few instances where this has resulted in successful dates and a few disastrous mismatches. Facebook isn't always going to provide the best or most accurate representation of the person. For the purposes of a pre-relationship, however, it serves as a pretty solid base and can certainly catalyze relationships.

In my experience and that of others, I can safely say that is where social media platforms stop being beneficial to relationships. One of the stupidest arguments I see arising because of social media is the Facebook relationship status. For those who are single and perusing Facebook to see who is single, a person listed in a relationship certainly makes their job a little easier for who they may want to date. Beneficial for the single person, certainly. But for the couple in the relationship, that simple act of listing themselves in a relationship may have prompted a war between the couple.

Facebook is a quasi-dating website whether they intended to have it function like that or not. Anyone who says that they have never looked up someone they were interested in to see if they were in a relationship or not is a liar. But just as some people do not want the public to see their pictures or wall posts, some do not want it public who they are dating. Seems reasonable, right? Unfortunately, in today's world, many couples see the relationship status as an important step in the dating process. If you do not want to be listed in the relationship, questions of trust arise.

What, you are afraid that people will know you are taken and not want to talk to you? You need the satisfaction of talking to girls/guys who think you are single? My attention isn't good enough?

Now, I realize that at the age of 23, my dating experience is limited. But as someone who grew up in the generation of Facebook's ascension, I would like to think that I know how this goes. The relationship status is a microcosm of what Facebook does to relationships. If not treated carefully, it plants seeds of distrust and insecurity. Facebook and social media on the whole can take even the most stable relationships and start to crack them with suspicions, whether justified or not.

Posting on a person's wall too frequently, posting a questionable status, being tagged in a picture with the wrong group of people. I have seen every single one of these instances result in an argument between a couple, which is absurd, absolutely. But the problem is that social media is weaved so cohesively into our everyday lives that we cannot help but cause these problems. To the older generations, these issues sound insane. To people my age and a little older, everyone can name an instance where they have fought over an incident from social media. Or they know someone who has.

The biggest problem with social media and relationships is that it doesn't offer any productive value for couples. It doesn't build romance or trust. Think about the couples that you know who use Facebook to talk about how much they love their significant other or to show off the flowers they were bought through a mobile upload. You hate them. I hate them. They annoy practically everyone on social media. It is exactly why you see fewer and fewer people talking about relationships on Facebook. I'm not interested in your Valentine's Day plans, just like you probably are not interested in mine. And I can almost guarantee you that none of your other 800 friends want to know either.

Social media, and Facebook in particular, is just not the place for people to enhance their romances. As I mentioned earlier, Facebook serves a great purpose to see whether people are single or taken and to give a quick high level summary of an individual. But beyond that, it doesn't deserve a place in relationships. It razes them faster than Monica Lewinsky ever could.

The problem is that it is too late. Social media is in relationships for the long haul. For better or for worse.