KANSAS CITY, Mo.—
Breaking up is never fun, but Facebook has made it super easy! (However, it may not be the most compassionate approach.)The most common offenders tend to be teenagers. When ending a relationship, rather than making a phone call or scheduling a time to talk, many opt to skip the confrontation and just post it. Publicly. And it's the public notification that informs the jilted party they've just been dumped. And that's just not cool.
Two seniors from Gardner Edgerton High School in Gardner, Kansas said half the people they know have experienced a Facebook breakup, including themselves. McKensie Morgan and Michaela Newton said it's humiliating.
"It's extremely embarrassing to have the entire world, everyone that can see your Facebook page, know that your significant other broke up with you on your Facebook wall," Morgan said.
"Yeah, and if you're not online, it's there for everyone to read for awhile, and you're the last to know," Newton said.
But a break-up post on one's Facebook wall isn't the worst way to end a relationship, according to Newton.
"Blocking someone is the worst ever," she said. "Don't do that."
Another method of breaking up on Facebook that causes further heartache includes changing one's relationship Facebook status to single (or, worse, to "in a relationship with XXXXX"). Finding out on Facebook that your boyfriend is suddenly in a new relationship with a classmate just plain sucks, said Morgan and Newton.
Facebook is like a public, online scrapbook. If you make the details of your relationship public, your break up will be that much difficult to deal with. But Morgan said there's a way to protect yourself against that kind of public heartache.
"If you're in a relationship with someone over Facebook, don't write on their wall every single day, saying, 'Hey, babe, what's up?' or 'Hey, I love you!' Just keep it like you would in public," she said.
Newton echoed those sentiments.
"Yeah, you don't say, 'Hey, baby,' every two seconds in public, so don't say it on Facebook," she said.
With a new school year approaching, new relationships will bloom, blossom and break. Morgan and Newton have one suggestion to their classmates.
"If you're going to break up with someone, do it in person," they said, almost simultaneously.
Morgan said she has a theory of what will become of those in 10 years who've chosen to break up via Facebook.
"They will eventually join a speed dating service," she said.
"Rejection hotline," Newton chimed in.
"I think that will be their life because that's the easy way out," Morgan said. "They don't like confrontation, so they'll just join a speed dating service, and that will be their life."
