Are you really who you portray yourself to be on Facebook? Facebook is increasingly becoming a space where people are living out their dreams of being the people who they never can be in reality. On Facebook, one can become the superstar who he or she never could be in life off of Facebook. This social media network allows you to have many moments of fame through the composing of statuses that will get you all of the attention you long for. When you log off of Facebook and return to your broke economic and social realities, the fame you have on Facebook does not fulfill you. If you really want to know whether or not you are living a miserable life, I can tell you that you are living a miserable life if you get satisfaction from the attention your falsehoods get you on Facebook.

On Facebook, you get to see the most fake thugs! You know, the folks who talk about what all they will and are going to do to people and then when you see them in person they reveal themselves to be the true scary and phony people they really are. Stop talking all of this junk on Facebook that you cannot back up in person. Stop trying to deceive people through your statuses on Facebook. Stop trying to use your “relationship status” to fool people. These invisible (fake) relationships that people are in, as indicated by their statuses, really would be funny if these were not grown folk carrying on non-existent relationships.

Facebook allows people who are homosexual or lesbian and who want to hide it to do so. All you have to do on Facebook to fool people that you are not gay or lesbian is to talk about the opposite sex all the time, and what you will do to the opposite sex all the time. Make sure you have “in a relationship” in the designated location on your profile and make sure that you have the opposite sex listed on your profile in the “interested in” location on your profile.

Okay, if you want to be successful on Facebook in acting like you are a true Christian, all you have to do is talk about God all the time through your statuses, post scriptures periodically, and make sure you use Sundays as days when you really get all holy through your statuses.

People also post pictures on Facebook to try to manufacture a false image about themselves. If you want to be viewed as heterosexual and you’re not, just post pictures of yourself surrounded by members of the opposite sex. If you want to trick people into thinking that you are a thug, post pictures that show you smoking weed, drunk, and throwing up gang signs on tricked out cars.

Another way that you can falsely present yourself as a thug on Facebook is to intentionally write like you don’t have any understanding of proper grammar, spelling, and usage. Here’s an example: “Fam, I ben gon let yall no dat we gon b at da crib 2nite so holla atcha boyz wen u get a minute. Aiite we n der!” Now, if you compose all of your statuses like that, you will be considered “hard” (a thug) and straight. So if you need to hide the fact that you are a scary punk and gay, then just write what you have to say in your statuses in the manner of the aforementioned example and you will be instantly a thug and straight.

I strongly encourage people to always be themselves, even when you are on Facebook. It really is okay to be yourself. You should not feel like you have to present a certain false image just to obtain the approval of others. The best you is the real you. In the Black Church, people love to say, “Don’t let the Devil use you.” I say, “Don’t let Facebook use you.” Let’s keep Facebook as the social networking site that it is. Let’s not turn it into a space that promulgates and proliferates falsehoods daily. We get to see many of you living those falsehoods off of Facebook—don’t let us have to be constantly reminded of your falsehoods while we are enjoying our experiences on this site too.

Do you really think that you are fooling people with these false images that you work so hard to communicate on Facebook? You may fool some people but you will not fool most people, especially clear thinking people.

Antonio Maurice Daniels

University of Wisconsin-Madison