Writing’s on wall for the fallen

The nearest to social mingling is the exchange of photographs.

Facebook has entered our bubble. You’ll probably say: “Wow! Where have you been all this time?”

Simple answer: hiding from a monster transforming normal people into cyber zombies. No physical contact. Soundless conversations.

The nearest to social mingling is the exchange of photographs. But thanks to younger brat, the dreaded programme was loaded onto my computer. “For mom, not you, dad,” he sniggers, aware of my sentiments.

So it came to pass that my Heidi embarked, albeit tentatively, on responding to friends and family. She normally prefers face-to-face fraternising. Soon the monster’s tentacles spread from friends to friends’ friends to more friends’ friends.

And they keep coming thick and fast. I remain aloof of this unwelcome intruder. That is, until the Facebook shareholding debacle hit the headlines – and the billions of dollars involved.

So, this monster was generating a bucketful of bucks and was now on the verge of making even more money with ever-increasing shares.

My imagination pricked, I set about looking at the goings-on of this money-spinner more intently by spying on my wife’s exchanges at random.

Not so much hoping to find some juicy bits, but to do an in-depth analysis of the overall content of the chit-chat. To draw so much worldwide response, I expected the subject matter between the network pals to be uplifting, provocative, or at least interesting.

Wrong. What a paradox. On the one end, the billionaire who came with a winning formula, undoubtedly a clever individual, bordering on genius. On the other end of the scale?

The user. The abuser.

Or, as an old schoolteacher shouted at dumb scholars (like myself): “You fool, you idiot, you ass!” Never have I witnessed such garbage going back and forth 24/7. These folk suffer from insomnia. And mental paralysis. A sample of what I picked up on the “wall” reflected a fraternity of illiterates. Nonthinkers.

Example: “Hi. Check our pic. Dronk, mate, dronk!” The photo depicting two blotchy, bloated faces. The immediate reply: “Cool man, gooi met eish!” Millions of lonely, bored disillusioned folk who found a way of expressing empty lives. Or maybe I’m still my old teacher’s dumb-ass?