A Short Guide to Facebook Spring Cleaning

Even if we don’t like to admit it, social media has become a significant part of our everyday existence, and it needs to be regulated just like any other aspect of our lives. So cut out the bad, keep the good. Making your newsfeed a display of only updates and people you’re interested in is a good way to clean and clarify your life.

Of course, we are all guilty of abusing the freedom to post whatever we want through our Facebook updates. But the repeat offenders are the ones that are just so out of control that the rest of us are annoyed. So, if any of your Facebook friends fall into one of these categories, perhaps you should consider Windexing them off of your social media map:

The Attention Junkie

This is the girl that is constantly posting photos of herself with completely unrelated captions. Oh, you took a photo of yourself via webcam? Please tell me how that relates to your caption about strength through faith. We all know that you’re pretty, you don’t have to keep filling photo albums with your face to prove it. If you have a friend that only ever seems to be fishing for compliments or advertising her attractiveness, maybe it’s time to unsubscribe from her. You have enough of Kim Kardashian thrown in your face daily, you don’t have to put up with a less-famous version of her on your newsfeed too.

The Deep Thinker

This guy just thinks he’s the next great philosopher. All he ever posts is status updates about how dark the world is, how wrong society is, or how much smarter he is than most of the population. NEWSFLASH: No one thinks that you are a genius, no matter how lengthy and long-winded your statuses are. Personally, I find it irritating when my Facebook friends think that they’re enlightening me. I would rather read Plato’s The Republic again than be constantly subjected to your pseudo-wisdom. No one looks to their Facebook newsfeed for life advice. So thanks Mr. Deep Thinker, but no thanks. I’m unsubscrbing. 

The Complainer

All this person does is whine, complain, and cyber cry. Girls in particular tend to post about how much they hate being single or how much they hate their boyfriend. I’ve seen so many self-pitying posts just this past week that it’s depressed me. Does it occur to any of these people that everyone has problems? I have my own issues to deal with, I don’t want to read about the problems of everyone on my friend’s list. If there is someone who constantly pops up on your newsfeed in rant form, spurting streams of profanity, sad faces, and ambiguously aggressive updates, perhaps it’s time to trim that extra drama out of your life. You don’t need to continually be updated on everyone’s first world problems.

The Excessive Updater

This one obviously thinks that every aspect of his or her life is so fascinating that everyone on Facebook must be updated every few minutes. I hate to burst anyone’s bubble, but no one really cares that you are at Chipotle. Isn’t Facebook supposed to update people on interesting parts of your life? I like looking at your vacation photos and sorority photos and I even like looking at pictures of your cat. But a picture of your burrito? Maybe I’m eating a burrito too, but I’m not letting the whole world know about it. SO WHAT MAKES YOUR BURRITO SO SPECIAL? If you have a friend who is only filling your feed with pointless gibberish about everyday occurences, go ahead and unsubscribe. It can get annoying to have someone’s every thought change on your feed no matter what time of the day you check it. 

Even though a lot of people on your newsfeed can get annoying with their updates, there are some people you can choose to keep just for entertainment purposes. For instance, those friends that are constantly getting into comment-fights over Facebook. Or the girls that switch their relationship status every other week. Maybe you find some sick thrill in watching other people’s public drama. Don’t be ashamed! They’re airing their dirty laundry out for you to see, so if you enjoy watching the drama, feel no shame. 

It’s time to stop dealing with the clutter of irriating status updates, narcissistic photo albums, and completely pointless blurbs of information. Stop weeding through updates you wish were invisible. Make them invisible! Spring clean your newsfeed!