Choose wisely when adding friends to Facebook

A real estate agent in Tasmania went to the Fair Work Commission alleging she had been bullied by her employer. The woman said she had complained to the agency principal that she was not getting a fair representation of her properties displayed in the front window of the agency and, later that day, she found that she been deleted as a Facebook friend by the colleague she was having “issues” with.
The tribunal found unfriending her on Facebook showed a “lack of emotional maturity” and was “indicative of unreasonable behaviour”.
Look, we have all seen the, at-times, tragic consequences of cyber bullying, especially in teens. There is obviously more to this story than the mere pressing on the unfriend button, but it makes you stop and think — if you do ‘friend’ someone on Facebook, do it because you want them in your life. Not because you feel some work or peer pressure obligation to include them.
In no way at all can, or should, we belittle what may be a bigger-picture workplace bullying situation going on here. But the fact a Facebook friend elimination has entered into the bullying equation has set a questionable precedent.
Seriously, our private Facebook pages are about the last bastion of social media privacy left.
At least you can choose who your friends are and, in ‘friends’ I mean those who you are more than happy to share your family and private information with and those life moments you don’t particularly want the rest of the world to see.
My personal Facebook page is my page — the only people on it are those who I have actually met, shared a drink or conversation with or actually spoken to in ‘real’ life. Remember that?
I made that choice a while ago when creating a ‘friends’ Facebook page and a ‘work’ page. There is a big difference between the two.
Public pages are usually business-oriented and depending on your work game, you use it to post relevant career things or you may occasionally give a few snippets away about your life without getting too mushy, personal or intimate.
People come in and out of our lives. Some of these perceived ‘friends’ do bad by you, simply because they misuse trust and use what they see on your Facebook page in a malicious, gossipy or nasty way.
That has happened to me, and it has probably happened to lots of us, so why the hell allow these people access to your personal Facebook page? Delete and unfriend away, I say.
There are also other ‘real’ friends who may not be huge participants in posting on Facebook but I like them so much I am more than happy for them to see what is happening in my kooky life.
Having someone as a Facebook friend is like unlocking your diary and giving them a slice of your life. And that is precious.
There are some things in life you do want to keep just for your few/few hundred/ few thousand or whatever number of Facebook friends you have.
So to be accused of bullying because you choose to strike one of them from your list seems astounding.
If we all just got out in the world a bit more and didn’t live our entire lives through cyber space, it just could help decrease the incidence of cyber bullying ... one click at a time.