Do Not Pass Go, Continued

oops . . .

In a burst of preparations for what I knew was going to be a rough week, this post went live a week early. And I was still working on it. Ugh. My apologies to author Collins Hemingway, whose week it was, and to all our Gentle Readers. Here’s the finished post on the right day.

“Aux Armes Citoyens!”

Bastille Day proved to be another Day of Censorship for me. I majored in French language, history, and literature, so you can well imagine I know the first verse of La Marseillaise by heart, word for word. I am also partial to “Casablanca,” just like every other red-blooded American, so on July 14 each year I am sure to play it again, Sam. Not this year. Though an attorney friend happily posted the movie cut on her timeline, it was instantly removed—with a nasty note—from my own timeline. “Too divisive.” 

Headed for the Danger Zone

I could not resist posting a meme of a fake Time magazine cover depicting a certain politician many of us love to hate in a pitch-dark room, opening the door to leave. There was a sarcastic caption which I am forgetting at the moment. The “fact checkers” found this to be false. It was instantly removed with another nastygram. 

Meanwhile, over the same time frame (from July 14 to the present), I clicked on two separate ads for items I might be interested in. Both took me off to an exceptionally vile pornography page. My Mac intercepted me each time and brought me back to the dubious safety of Facebook. I reported both ads as violating community standards. Both reports were rejected. Gentle Reader, if I had underaged kids they would no longer be using Facebook, even with supervision. And I wouldn’t care a fig for assertions that Facebook is doing its best.  

The Enchanting Sound of Money

A peaceful, rainy Saturday afternoon, even in July, is the perfect time for a nap, and after I enjoyed mine, I decided to check out Facebook before settling in for some rainy day Netflix.

It’s a good thing I did! A friend broke in for a chat. Her situation was desperate. She needed $300 to pay a bill, and the bank had put some sort of freeze on her credit card. Could I please, please help?

Of course I could! All I needed was a little security. Did Dear Friend remember when I visited her city a couple of years back? Of course she did. Now would I please send via PayPal . . . Well, just a minute. If you remember the visit, you remember the purpose . . . Of course she did. Just deposit the money. If you can’t do $300, how about $200?

The pleas grew more desperate and less grammatical as I tried unsuccessfully to get in touch with my friend. When I’d had enough, I cut off and blocked the fake account.

Unfortunately, that was the end of it. No help was had from Facebook; they weren’t even interested enough to send me an auto reply. All I could do was wonder how many times each day similar incidents unfold.

The Skein of War is Wound . . .

I have been quietly, passively fighting back. My initial target was ads on my timeline. I began closing them with requests that the advertisers be blocked. I did this pretty much indiscriminately. I did target hearing aid adverts. Facebook knows that I am hard of hearing because of listed volunteer work and occasional posts. I have been considering new hearing aids, and as soon as I visited a commercial site related to hearing aids, I was blanketed—blitzed—on Facebook with ads for hearing aids. This did not set well, and I took the step of going in and editing my ad preferences. It’s extremely tedious, probably so that people won’t bother, but I bothered. The blanket of ads has shrunk to a handkerchief size, and I am still handling those one at a time. I also close any health, insurance, or medicine related ads. This makes me feel—at least—that I’m not giving them any more information than necessary about myself. 

The next thing I did was to declare war on clickbait. Games are easily gotten rid of; just don’t play them. The fun isn’t worth the information you are handing them. 

Next for me came “articles.” You know those articles entitled “These Karens Got What They Deserved from Outraged Airline Passengers” or waiters and waitresses, or beleaguered in-laws. The stories are sometimes culled from other sites such as Reddit or sometimes made up by people who write for a penny per X number of words. Usually, they depict obnoxious people getting their just deserts. Before you read, take a look at the title of the site you’re visiting—not the title of the article, but the website. Chances are it bears no relation to the “information” in the story. What would a travel site be doing featuring a tale of neighbors taking revenge on other neighbors? Or wedding faux-pas? Or bad teachers? The reason for this disconnect seems to be failed websites. Either the original travel site fails and someone else buys the domain name at a bargain price, or the owner of the website tries to make money off the failed website by promoting—you guessed it—clickbait. They’ll serve you up one ad after another and get paid some pittance for doing so. It’s to everybody’s advantage to have you click; that is, it’s to everybody’s advantage but yours. 

An Uneasy Peace

Just by closing off and blocking clickbait sites and unwanted or intrusive websites, I regained a lot of real estate on my timeline. Groups and advertisers I like were suddenly able to contact me. People I had stopped hearing from were suddenly visible again. I began to enjoy my daily visits to the Book of Face. I’m currently working on how to see reels from people, merchants, and providers I enjoy. That’s going to take a while, but I’ll let you know when I’m done. 

I’d love to hear what you may have done to get a little of your own time back. Happy reading!