My coworkers and I were swapping weird/crazy facebook stories this week over lunch, and while Rachel* was describing her's, faces of disgust and shock swept the table as she spoke three, innocent words: The Phone Book
The summery of the story:
Rachel, now in her 40s, was contacted through Facebook by a boy she once dated when they were both 16. They engaged in friendly banter over Facebook messages, he asks for her number, they continued reminiscing over the phone. Now, as Facebook friends, he started putting off-color remarks on her wall. A few days go by, and flowers arrived at her house from him. She gets freaked out, naturally, and she called him to ask where he got her address. His answer: THE PHONE BOOK.
Cue looks of disgust, fear, and shock all across the lunch table.
When did it start feeling icky that someone, anyone, can find a home address in the phone book? No less than ten years ago, the phone book was the first place I looked for residential addresses and, god forbid, PHONE NUMBERS. Need to send a thank you note to my professor? Look in the phone book. How about the number of the smart kid in history class for last night's homework assignment? Yep, Mr. Phone Book.
Fast forward ten years, people put their whole lives online, especially on Facebook. Their jobs, email addresses, videos of their kids, drunk pictures, wedding pictures, hobbies, religion, likes, and dislikes are all out there for someone, anyone, to see. Yet, when one of their "friends" looks their home address up in the phone book, we were all shocked. SHOCKED.
Note to all: unless you want to be labeled a creep or a weirdo or a stalker or a sleezeball, throw out your phone book. I would toss mine, but I don't have one.
*coworker's names changed to protect the innocent
1 comments:
Oh, I remember being a kid and looking things up in the phone book. I imagine that it's just creepy now because we routinely use less intrusive means, like e-mail to stay in contact.
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