How Facebook creates a dangerous vulnerability of its users while requiring only a select few to follow its rules.
Facebook (FB) requires you to use your real name. But only some of you. Not everyone.
The policy is only enforced if someone doesn’t like you and reports you for using a moniker that is not your “authentic” name. Otherwise, FB doesn’t really care. FB does not require any user to verify the authenticity of their name upon creation of an account—FB only requires it if someone rats you out.
There are many great reasons for not using your “authentic” name that are neither illegal nor sinister, and privacy is a logical one. Self-protection is another.
For example, you want to be part of the greater social community, but you really don’t want your boss, your neighbors, that creepy dude at the corner store who got your name off your credit card and can’t seem to keep his eyes off your personal goods, to start following you online.
Now there’s already a crapload on the internet that anyone can find out about you if they know your name and approximate age. But you reveal so much more, so many nuances of your life—from the faces of your children to your favorite food, to the habits of your least favorite coworkers (even if you don’t name them)—that while you love sharing with your chosen friends, you wouldn’t want insanely easy to find on the internet by anyone else.
And there are those past people in your life that are, quite frankly, abusive, relentless, or even just fucking annoying, and gosh you just want to leave them there . . . in your past.
So, you use a false moniker. Not something offensive. Not for any sinister or nefarious purpose. Not even to fool Facebook. Even if you’re willing to prove to FB who you really are for their recordkeeping (or reporting to Big Brother/NSA) purposes, you simply don’t want the whole fucking world to know. Just a name that you like and that would not come up on a search of your real name. Just one thin veil to draw over your personal life from the prying eyes of those NOT your friends.
Now, we all know FB is a private company and it can make any rules it wants to. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Whatevs.
But doesn't FB have an ethical obligation to make sure those rules are followed by all? If it's going to pick on some users and force them to prove their identity, and also change their profile user name to match their real identity, shouldn’t FB force compliance of ALL its users? Shouldn’t everyone from your boss to the creepy corner store guy have to also comply? And to comply from the get-go (that is, you don’t even get to create an account if you can’t prove who you are and that you use your authentic name for your FB name)? It’s a stupid policy to begin with, but if you’re going to have a policy, it should be enforced equally among all, not against only a few.
Selective enforcement is especially insidious because members can use the reporting to FB against another member as a form of harassment. And FB won't tell you who ratted you out, so you have no way to defend against it.
FB uses its power to suppress anonymous users only when it wants to. It doesn’t matter to FB why one wants to remain anonymous. It doesn’t matter if one simply desires to participate in the social community but avoid vulnerability and harassment.
FB will tell you how it has such great safety features. You can block users that bother you. But that doesn’t block users from being able to find you on FB through search engines, friends of friends, etc. Oh yes, it has boxes you can check to prevent that, but we all know they don’t always work, and FB changes up the security settings at its whim.
FB will regale you with how it has so many wonderful settings for your privacy. So many settings that it’s confusing and cumbersome to get that “just right” balance of being able to share with your friends without oversharing with the world. So many settings that are so easy to fuck up and leave your identity hanging out there in the wind anyway. And anyone can follow you without FB alerting you that you're being followed.
Having an anonymous moniker solves many of these issues. And there’s no reason FB can’t let you have one. If FB is afraid you will abuse it, FB can simply require proof of identity when you create an account that is linked to your moniker. No one but FB needs to see it; FB can know who you really are, and therefore the authorities can easily harvest that information when needed as well (as if they can’t figure that out from your IP address anyway . . .). Your friends will know who you really are, or presumably you won’t friend them in the first place.
Given that so many groups post their events and connections only on FB nowadays, it’s hard to not want a FB account to be involved. You know, like you really want to be able to share your quilting designs with the Kwazy Quilters, or see what your favorite band is up to, or simply be connected to your friends and family and keep up with how many kids your nieces and nephews have (even if you can never remember their names).
But if you are vulnerable, for whatever reason, you’re screwed, and FB doesn’t give a rat’s ass about your safety.
Like if you have the crazy-ass bitch of an ex-wife in Florida who came at you with a butcher knife while you were sleeping in a hammock (hence the “ex” part of her title, and why you now live in Alaska), and she still likes to taunt you whenever she finds you online. Or perhaps you’re a 42-year-old woman that has spent years in therapy healing from the trauma of your neighbor raping you when you were 14, and you’d really rather not have the rapist come across your real name on FB.
FB doesn’t care what your reasons are. You can explain to them until you’re blue in the face why you want to use a false moniker. You can validate your real identity in a million ways for them to keep on record, but you can’t be a part of the FB community without exposing that real identity to the world and opening yourself up to being targeted. You must kneel down naked for FB.
Unlike Zuckerberg, most of us can’t buy all our neighboring property and build a wall to ensure that undesirables can’t peek in on us. FB demands it be in complete control of your online self, and doesn’t care about you, your comfort, your privacy, or your safety.
I can only suspect that there is some obscene profit in forcing you to reveal your “authentic” self to the world, or sure as shit FB wouldn’t give a damn.
