A temporary step away

I quit Facebook on Thursday.

I mean, of course I'll be back, but I had to quit. It had been a week since I could conjure up a good news limerick. I didn't have any clever thoughts or cute quips to share. And even after listening to April's Conference and reading scriptures regularly, I didn't have any spiritual insights to share.

So I had started drifting toward politics.

As uncomfortable as political discussions can be, I really feel like we need to have them. We need to have them with people we disagree with. We need to learn how to let ideas to compete with each other.

But it's not as easy as it sounds!

For example, I am pretty non-confrontational online, so when someone disagrees with me I start to panic. My usual form of dialogue is to try to validate what the other person says and then persuade them that I'm right anyway. To quote the Lego Batman movie, I try to use 

and

But not everyone uses that style of debate. Sometimes people go into a debate not wanting to learn anything. They go in wanting to win.

And I think that's often a good thing. If I was paying a lawyer a lot of money to defend me, I sure wouldn't want them conceding the other side's points all the time. I would want them to create a strong case for me!

But social media isn't a courtroom. It's just a bunch of people who say what's on their minds. Every person has their own way of using it and their own way of conversing with the friends or friends of friends or strangers they meet there.

So what do you do when you have a mismatch of discussion styles?

Well, I just leave! Haha!

To be honest, that wasn't the real reason I left. The reason I left is that I wrote things for the wrong reason -- to be persuasive. In my attempts to persuade people to see things the way I do, I tried to meet them where I thought they were (since everyone knows you don't change people's minds with facts). But this meant I wasn't acting in integrity. I was saying things that hurt people, and they weren't even things I believed myself! My attempts at persuasion did no one any favors. And did they change any minds? Ha! Of course not! This is Facebook you're talking about!

So I deactivated.

Of course, I'm still brimming with opinions. Mostly related to these articles. And everything he writes. And I'm sure we could have some hearty debates about his articles. And I'm reading this book and would love for other people to read it and discuss it.

But if it all has to wait until after the election, that's okay.

In the meantime, I'll try to do a better job of writing without pandering. And I'll try to get back into limericks. And cute quotes. And general optimism.

I'll just do it here or here instead of on Facebook. 

Hope to see you around!