Stalker Culture

"Collecting information about someone is not the same as knowing a person. Stalkers are ordinary people who study from afar the people they're too afraid to really know." (Bob Goff, Love Does, 202.)



Stalking has never been easier than in our culture today. A vast majority of people are online and have a profile on one or more social media sites. I have at least 5 profiles on distinctly different platforms, and while I keep them mostly private from the prying eyes of the general public, anybody who is my "friend" can sift through a fair amount of my life with relative impunity. And I'm not sure if I like that. I guess maybe I don't mind that someone else can do it to me, but I'm coming to not like that I can do that to other people. Rather than talking to you and developing a relationship with you, I can check out your Facebook profile and discover all sorts of interesting tidbits. "Oh look, you like Ted Dekker! And The Day After Tomorrow! That was a good movie...hmmm, your hobbies are playing basketball and crocheting ugly Christmas sweaters. Man, I feel like after reading through your profile that I know all sorts of things about you...I'm tight with you now!" All while never actually engaging in relationship with that person. I can even read your carefully crafted status updates (don't fool yourself...you have a reason for writing them, and writing them that way) and feel like I have a pretty good handle on what's going on with your life. Outside of a friendship. And this sickens me. I think that our culture has bought into this, so that we are more interested in stalking people than in knowing them. I find myself buying into this, being much more interested in looking at the profile of a girl who I'm attracted to, rather than pursuing an actual, legitimate friendship with her. It's easier. It's safer. There's no rejection, and it feels as though it's almost as good as an actual relationship. That's true about any friendships there. I can even put stuff out there on my statuses or tweets or blog posts or whatever, that is either fishing for responses (maybe even from specific people<!>) or trying to let a person know something about me.

I want to interject a case study here. I have been listening to a hip-hop artist named Transit for about two years now. He lives in Calgary, his full name is Daniel Bennett, he's from Victoria, he married a girl named Elise this summer, he adopted a five year old son named Finley through that marriage, he loves listening to hip-hop and rap, and it really excites him when he gets a chance to perform with artists who have been his heroes growing up. I even have a pretty good idea of how he reacts to negative and critical feedback. Also, I have seen him at the past two family camps. I really enjoy his music. Despite all this information, I have never met the guy. I've followed him on Twitter and on Facebook, I know what he looks like, and I know a lot about him...but I don't know him.

As I was originally thinking about this post I thought of titling it "Confessions of a Stalker." I figured the header I chose would carry my intentions just as well, without scaring off any potential readers. But the truth is that I have spent much of my life learning about people without knowing them. I've even used the internet for hours to search up whatever information I could find about people that I was interested in. And the scary thing is that since this is becoming a culture, it's not limited to our internet misuses. I think to a relationship that I had a year ago - one of the most important in my life at the time. Looking back on it now, I think that I can say, despite the fact that I spent a huge amount of time with her, I was more gathering information about her (stalking her) than coming to know her. There's a huge difference. I don't think that having a desire to know her would have changed our outcome...but maybe it would have. And this I do know...I will need to make it my clear and very intentional priority to know the next person I date. It seems as though real relationship is not high on our priority list, not when we can have an imitation, almost-as-good experience.

Why do we do this? Running from relationship has been a problem that has haunted the human race ever since Genesis 3. In that story we see Adam and Eve running from relationship with God, and Adam being willing to sacrifice his relationship with Eve in order to pass the blame. This is not a new form of relating. It's the same as talking with other people to learn more about a third party. It's the same as the young schoolboy gazing across the playground at the cute girl. And it's the same as Hal (Tighten) in the movie Megamind who creepily stalks Roxanne (watching her like a dingo watches a human baby). But maybe we have the wide-ranging tools today, more than ever before, to have more gratification without actually engaging in relationship.

Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Flickr, Google+, LinkedIn, Flixster, Foursquare, Pinterest, Tumblr, MySpace, Goodreads, SoundCloud, YouTube, and on and on and on. Yes, and even Blogger. All of these are different ways that we use social media. And I don't deny that there are positives. Instead of exchanging mailing addresses or phone numbers after camp this summer, I was able to look up fellow staff and campers just through their Facebook accounts. Now I can drop them a note or have a way to facilitate meeting up in person, just by knowing their name. We can share photos taken at camp, and reminisce about good memories over the summer. Despite not liking the culture that social media brings, I can see distinct benefits. Even on this blog, I can share this stuff with more people than maybe would be interested in a long, drawn-out discussion with me on this topic.

It's only been in the past couple of days that this thought has come to the forefront of my mind. I read Bob Goff's book Love Does, and this theme was really only a minor chapter in which this it was not the main point. In reality, the two sentences that I quoted at the top were all it took. When you look at your life - at your interactions with others - what do you see? Think about it. Don't just read over this. I have close friends, and there are people who I know (in the sense that I am actually coming to know them...how they tick, what makes them them), but there sure are a lot of people that I'm just stalking. I don't think that I'll disable my Facebook account, and clearly I'm not going to completely stop blogging (even if I haven't done it much). But I doubt I'll be on Facebook much anymore, and I'll be putting a lot more thought and intention into what I post there, or blog here. What really matters, way more than how many friends I have on Facebook or how much traffic comes to this blog, is how much I am influencing those around me to be more like Christ. And maybe spending time with them over coffee, or on a hike, or working, or even through Facebook Messenger (although still not ideal), and being intentional about building relationship through those things, would carry more impact for God's kingdom and our friendship than stalking their profile.