views commentary Why I Quit Facebook, And Why You Should Find Better Things To Do I scribbled the screed below after wasting another weekday morn- ing poring over my Facebook feed, wondering who’d up-thumbed me or commented on my habitual Trump- Thumping. My wakeup routine was something like this: Scan the indispensable New York Times and Washington Post for the latest calumnies out of the White House; pop in on the New York Post for the more salacious stuff; then head over to Facebook David Weiss to see who was chattering about what and whom. But why? Because misery likes com- pany? Out of a sense of community? Or just to be another semi-informed smartass anxious to prove I was on the right side of the political spectrum — which is no great achievement when the object of your infection is one Donald J. Trump and his merry band of oligarchs and plutocrats. Mnuchin, Kushner and Pruitt — just saying their names all in a row should only set into motion the magical Rumpelstiltskin effect. Poof ! They all vanish in a cloud of swamp gas! But I digress, and yet again I grand- stand. The whole point of bidding farewell to Facebook with the extend- ed paragraph below was to avoid the daily temptation to achieve soapbox glory with a few well-placed barbs, the result of which was hurrahs and huz- zahs from fellow choristers or acidu- lous retorts from people I have never even met, nor ever intend to. The net result: The world kept spin- ning, the echo chamber was for- ever chock-full of self-admiring narcissists (yes, like myself ) and hope remained the elusive thing with feathers (and who looks a lot like Robert Mueller). But I think what griped me most of all was that a prepon- derance of faceless Facebookers seemed to have reduced their information intake and output to simplistic GIFs and memes — a kind of shorthand code for fel- low travelers, no matter one’s ideological persuasion. This kind of stick-figure, primary-color rendering of a complex political landscape is an insult to the dogged editorial labors of the NYT and WaPo, which ought to be required reading for anyone with time enough to waste posting cute cartoons about serious subjects — from gun control to nepotism to money laun- dering. It’s called the Fourth Estate, and without it we’d be no better than Putin & Co. It is our last bulwark against tyranny and privilege. A final word before I forever hold my peace: I immediately suspended my Facebook account after disgorging the polemic below, then drove over to the Jewish Family Service office some 20 minutes away — to see if I could Contributing Writers: Ruthan Brodsky, Rochel Burstyn, Suzanne Chessler, Annabel Cohen, Don Cohen, Shari S. Cohen, Shelli Liebman Dorfman, Adam Finkel, Stacy Gittleman, Stacy Goldberg, Judy Greenwald, Ronelle Grier, Esther Allweiss Ingber, Allison Jacobs, Barbara Lewis, Jennifer Lovy, Rabbi Jason Miller, Alan Muskovitz, David Sachs, Karen Schwartz, Robin Schwartz, Steve Stein, Joyce Wiswell Arthur M. Horwitz Publisher / Executive Editor ahorwitz@renmedia.us F. Kevin Browett Chief Operating Officer kbrowett@renmedia.us | Editorial Managing Editor: Jackie Headapohl jheadapohl@renmedia.us Story Development Editor: Keri Guten Cohen kcohen@renmedia.us Arts & Life Editor: Lynne Konstantin lkonstantin@renmedia.us Digital/Social Media Editor: Hannah Levine hlevine@renmedia.us Editorial Assistant: Sy Manello smanello@renmedia.us Senior Columnist: Danny Raskin dannyraskin2132@gmail.com Contributing Editor: Robert Sklar rsklar@renmedia.us | Advertising Sales Sales Director: Keith Farber kfarber@renmedia.us Account Executives : Wendy Flusty, Annette Kizy offer my newly liberated time to some needy cause or another as I’d self-righ- teously urged others to do. They told me thanks for the effort and supplied me with a website address where I could better explain my need for pen- ance and self-sacrifice. Oh, well — back to the dreaded Internet, the last refuge of scoundrels and La-Z-Boy Revolutionaries. MY FACEBOOK POST: If one added up the cumulative hours Facebook junkies spent posting sim- plistic memes and slogans, and if that time were instead spent contribut- ing to the community in any manner whatsoever, small but palpable chang- es would ensue that would benefit the world at large. But the nano-endor- phin rush that social media dabblers get from “likes” and such far outweigh any visceral need to participate in the civic world itself. What’s even sadder is that 90 per- cent of the puerile, armchair activists wasting their lives in self-aggrandizing posturing are usually being read by ABSOLUTELY NOBODY at all, or by an “audience” you could count with half the fingers of one hand. My humble suggestion: Get off your do-nothing posteriors and donate two hours a week to the cause of your choice; turn off the bleeping idiot-box (computers have replaced television as the opium of the masses); and hit the pavement instead of posing as | Production By FARAGO & ASSOCIATES Manager: Scott Drzewiecki Designers: Kelly Kosek, Amy Pollard, Michelle Sheridan, Susan Walker | Detroit Jewish News Chairman: Michael H. Steinhardt President/Publisher: Arthur M. Horwitz ahorwitz@renmedia.us Chief Operating Officer: F. Kevin Browett kbrowett@renmedia.us Controller: Craig R. Phipps | Social Media Producer Andrea Gusho socialmedia@thejewishnews.com Sales Manager Assistants : Karen Marzolf | Business Offices Billing Coordinator: Pamela Turner | Fulfillment Joelle Harder jharder@renmedia.us prophets and pundits from the com- fort of your den. You know who you are: conservatives and liberals alike, hiding behind your keyboards and screens and pretending to give a whit about anything except who’s paying attention to your recycled aphorisms and pithy inanities. As my main man Freddy Goethe wrote: “Let everyone sweep in front of his own door and the whole world will be clean.” Guess what, folks? Nobody cares what you think. Rome is burning and y’all are playing a tiny, out-of-tune fiddle that nobody can even hear. Or as my other goombody, Friedrich Nietzsche, said: “In individu- als, insanity is rare; but in groups, parties, nations and epochs, it is the rule.” Facebook proves that point and then some: We are the Irrational, Unthinking Mob we have all come to fear. And now we all have a voice. As a great statesman once said: “Sad.” • David Weiss of Los Angeles (aka David Was) grew up in Oak Park and attended the University of Michigan. He formed a band in the 1980s with fellow Oak Parker Don Fagenson (aka Don Was) called Was (Not Was). He posted about this deci- sion last week on Facebook and expanded it for Deadline Detroit. Reprinted with permission. CORRECTION UMatter’s “One Thing I Wish You Knew” program (March 8, page 20) takes place on Wednesday, March 21. R egister at friendshipcircle.org/umatter-event. | Departments General Offi ces: 248-354-6060 Advertising: 248-351-5107 Advertising Fax: 248-304-0049 Circulation: 248-351-5120 Classifi ed Ads: 248-351-5116 Advertising Deadline: Monday, 2 p.m. Editorial Fax: 248-304-8885 Deadline: All public and social announcements must be typewritten and received by noon Tuesday, nine days prior to desired date of publication. 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