Two days ago I had the nerve, the nerve I tell you, to inform the readers of Road&Track that such a thing as darksiding exists.
This morning I woke up and my Facebook account had disappeared.
Several months ago, in an effort to avoid offending people who wanted to be my “friend” on Facebook, I changed my name on Facebook to Mawhrin Skel. Those of you who spend way too much time reading books will remember that name from The Player Of Games. I thought it was reasonably witty and more importantly, the name change worked; I went from getting hundreds of friend requests a month to none.
Which was good.
It was also a blatant violation of Facebook’s “Real Name Policy”, a policy which is currently in the news because FB is using it to “out” drag queens. You wouldn’t think that Facebook would willingly attack drag queens, since they are basically the alpha privileged minorities of the feelspace, but that’s what you get when a supposedly liberal corporation finds that liberal stance interfering with its ability to profitably sell its product. (Facebook’s “product”, as we all understand by now, is you, your data, your connections, your private messages, and your phone records.)
Note that Facebook isn’t interested in obtaining the actual identities of its less well-heeled participants. They can be marketed to as a group because they spend less money individually and demonstrate less individual preference — or so it’s pretty to think, anyway. Nor is Facebook actively patrolling their userbase looking for “fake names”, at least not publicly.
The official policy of Facebook is that in order for them to suspend an account, someone has to snitch.
Two days ago, I had a remarkably hilarious discussion on Facebook with anti-“darksider” and chronic road-rash recipient Wes Siler and his friend Bruce Steever, a PR mouthpiece at Motorcycle Consumer News. Bruce is pictured above. Bruce had been remarkably abusive and insulting to various R&T readers on the website, so I returned the favor. I also got him to admit that, even though he considered himself to be a motorcycle industry professional and an expert rider, he was unwilling and unable to actually race motorcycles. He’s just the kind of expert who knows a lot of stuff, just because.
He, in turn, accused me of impersonating a motorcyclist.
Then he challenged me to a “timed contest on the street”, which I found to be pretty hilarious. Someone’s been jerking it to Biker Boyz enough to cause chafing. I responded by suggesting that we just race heads-up on the street in traffic to see who is the coolest dude. At this point I should note that I have ridden maybe 25,000 miles on a motorcycle total in my entire life and I have no idea how to “drag my knee” or any of that cool stuff. However, I can sniff a coward a mile away and I knew that the chances of Bruce Steever putting a number plate on anything besides his ninth binder of newly acquired hentai manga were somewhere between no way and no fucking way.
Mr. Steever eventually retired from the discussion with his tail between his legs, as I knew he would do.
Then he snitched me out to Facebook. Or one of his friends did. Or someone else affiliated with him did.
As a result, I woke up this morning to a suspended Facebook account. Facebook would not let me in until I entered my full legal name — with a warning that I would get one chance to do this. It then helpfully changed my name for me and locked me out of changing it to anything else.
I thought, and continue to think, that this was an act of remarkable cowardice. More importantly for the sake of this discussion, however, it’s an example of the phenomenon discussed the other day. Bruce didn’t feel he was winning the discussion — and the results of that discussion were being observed by hundreds, maybe thousands, of people — so he tried to get Facebook to shut my account down. If he couldn’t dominate the discussion, he wanted it to end.
That’s despicable, and cowardly, and un-American. But more shocking than Bruce being a bit of a weenie was the imperial ease with which Facebook suspended what I have to admit has become a big part of my life. It was a wake-up call, one that made me uncomfortable and unhappy and depressed all at once.
I can address this in one of two ways: I can make it my life’s mission to screw with Bruce Steever in every way possible, from asking every advertiser in MCN why they’re paying the bills of someone who supports street racing and wants to participate in it to driving to his house and slapping him in the face like the pansy he is.
Alternately, I can try to be a grownup about it and just let it go.
Or, I can try to benefit from it. Which I’m going to do. I’m going to deactivate my FB account for a minimum of sixty days. And I’ll spend the time that I would normally spend on Facebook writing articles for publication instead. And I’m going to take whatever money I earn doing so and I’m going to try to use it to enter an actual 600cc (or 250cc, maybe!) motorcycle race in the spring. The usual caveats apply — at last count I’d broken well over fifty bones in my body and been in the ICU for enough time to knit a sweater, so it might just be a bridge too far for me to get my medical and make it to the grid — but I’m going to try.
I believe that the “me” who leaves Facebook and tries motorcycle racing will be a better “me” than the current one. But I’m fairly sure that I’ll continue to provoke discussion wherever I go. No matter how hard people try to shut me down. If you’ve decided you’re going to silence me, then as TLP says, you better come at me strong because I will take you down.
This is why I read jb first. I don’t always agree and I don’t always approve, but speaking ones mind is the purest and jb speaks his mind. Keep loving your boy and loving your women and writing things that inspire dialogue. Please.
Jack, you’re dealing with people who think you can’t be an enthusiast and/or professional unless you are an enthusiast/professional in the exact ways they approve of. You’re dealing with snobs. and to torture an overused simile, arguing with snobs is like wrestling with a pig in mud. you both get dirty, but the pig is the only one who enjoys it.
That’s also the Democrat Party way!
Facebook??? You realize that Facebook is The Devil’s Tool, don’t you?
Close the account and don’t ever look back.
+1
You won’t miss it. How many pointless and false pot-stirrers and burned-out-slags-with-offspring pictures do you need for a lifetime?
+2
I shut my FB down two years ago. Complete waste of time. An exercise in narcissism and voyeurism all at once. The chances of something hitting your feed that is entertaining, interesting, or informative are slim and none. Now I can read a book, rent a movie, ride my bike, have a conversation, cook a new recipe, write to a friend or relative — any number of productive things — rather than sit in front of the computer scrolling through humble brags, funneh cat pixshers, and duck face. Good riddance.
Looking forward to seeing the additional articles. I haven’t outright deleted my facebook yet, but I don’t think I’ve logged in more than once or twice in the last month.
Jeezus! Jack, you can’t scratch every itch… and when you do, it some times leads you down a dark path to no good end. Move on… its not worth the energy, until you do, they own you in an ugly way. And, aren’t you to old for tit for tat. Sand box BS.
Your not them, and that should be enough. Put that energy into your kid, your friends, your work. Your son needs your good energy that isn’t sapped by the negative energy you unfortunately seem too ready to embrace.
Just my opinion… for what its worth.
Yeah well, I tried to friend you on Facebook a couple years ago, and you never accepted it, so therefore I am never reading anything you write ever again you selfish bastard. I will however continue to read Bark’s posts just to spite you.
Isn’t that how all of this fake online hatred is supposed to go?
You forgot to call him stupid and a bigot. Bigot is the ‘go to’ to shut down conversation these days.
That’s misogynistic!
A Skel was someone who faked a war injury (Stolen Valor?) to get a beggar’s permit a long time ago. It is one of my favorite insults.
According to some conspiracy theorist’s, Facebook is a plot dreamed up by the gubmint to get us to reveal all our deep dark secrets, and entrap all of our “friends”. Discounting that, I never could understand why I would want to be “friends” with someone on the internet that I wouldn’t have a beer with in reality. Based on one, or both, of the above, I have never had a Facebook account. I don’t like their policy’s so I choose not to make them money.
Yet at least twice a week, my spam filter catch’s a couple emails wanting to know “why haven’t you responded to my friend request on Facebook?”
I’ll tell you one thing, FB (especially as a stock) is certainly backstopped by .gov to a certain extent and you don’t need a tin foil hat to see that, FB is a worldwide identity database where the surveillance subjects voluntarily fill our their own entries (and even go so far as to tag photos so as to assist in facial recognition). This is an indispensable tool (not a coincidence every one has to have a real name now). And not to mention the guy who runs it summed up his own business mantra in 5 words: “they trust me- dumb fucks”. Seriously think of the trillions of dollars spent by .gov every year and now in that frame of mind try to put a price tag on FB….
In the future there is a good chance FB accounts will work as a form of ID in the future or take the shape as a type of supplementary Social Security Number.
Jack- good for you, fuck facebook. There are so many ways to stay and touch and build social network without it these days, I think you have given them enough data for one lifetime. Though I am sure your repulsive images of the ghetto will be greatly missed Im sure.
Kinda like this “joke” poster I have seen floating around the interwebs: Computer crashed? Lose all your data? Contact the NSA for a copy of your files.
The same thing could also be thought about cell phones. If 20 years ago the gubmint had demanded that everyone between 10 years and 80 years old carry a device that would allow you to be tracked, there might well have been a revolution. Now all of us willingly pay $10 to over $100 per month and do just that.
Ok gotta go and add another layer to my tinfoil hat.(looks nervously over shoulder)
“I’m fairly sure that I’ll continue to provoke discussion wherever I go.”
No argument here.
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Cowards are every where sad to say .
I can’t imagine using facebook , what a waste of time for just the reasons described above .
-Nate
The slap to the face - hold onto that one. God knows the American male would benefit from the occasional physical comeuppance.
I never created a facebook account from day 1.
My friends, family & co-workers are (have always been) mystified by this, until just recently (i.e. the last year or so, when a few have informed me that they now better understand why I didn’t creat a FB account and/or informed me that they are thinking of “attempting” to close their own FB accounts (though I suspect this really can’t be accomplished, at least from a ‘they booked your data/details and it will never be truly scrubbed’ sort of way).
I agree, fuck facebook
I have never had an account either
unfortunately the human desire for celebrity appears to be boundless
are we all just sheep?
“Harmlessly passing your time in the grassland away
Only dimly aware of a certain unease in the air”
wow it appears “fuckfacebook.com” is available?
Why do you even get involved with knobs like this in the first place?
I deeply dislike the implications for privacy there. If you want to participate in online discussions without using a real name, you should be able to for whatever reasons-to escape harassment, to escape random requests, because it’s a stage name-I don’t care, it’s none of my business. And it’s really none of Facebook’s business.
BID. I’m clearly not a motorcycle person, so I got nothin’ on the pros vs. cons of darksiding. If the bead doesn’t match up with the rim, it’s clearly sketchy, but yeah. Ratting someone out over it using one of Facebook’s worst decisions ever is pretty terrible.