The un- words always sounded a little – what shall I say – desperate, to me. What is it about Un- (+verb) when dis- or de- will do just as well, or better? Like unlearn – what is unlearn? Or UnWork, or UnConference? And don’t even mention UnLike, the way facebook wants us to use it (here is a hot tip: when in doubt, blame facebook) – someone posts a link to an interesting article, updates a status box with something even remotely funny and we all rush to like it – but once liked, why ‘unlike’ something?
What does ‘unlike’ here mean anyway? I am not similar to this link in any way? This status update is not like me; I am oh, so different?
Anyway. The point of all this is ‘Unfriend’, declared the word of the year by the venerable New Oxford American Dictionary.
Unfriend – (verb) ~ To remove someone as a ‘friend’ on a social networking site such as Facebook.
My grouch with this word, let’s say my primary grouch, is the way this word makes the process of unfriending seem so easy – as easy as the process of ‘friending’. (I have as ‘friends’ on facebook several people I barely know). Click on a button, and hey! a person is out of your (online or otherwise) life for ever. Or till the next time you meet her elsewhere on the internet.
Not in the real world, no.
I have recently tried to ‘unfriend’ in real life and the experience is agonizing – as much as being on the receiving side of unfriending. Though the word sounds harsh, it is true that what I was attempting was declutter; if people I considered close friends were giving me more angst than anything else, then why not let go? Just that there is no ‘remove from friends’ in real life; click and they vanish, taking with them all the years, the memories happy and sad, the times spent together gossiping and bitching, confessing and advising, fighting and laughing… I feel lighter for having done it, but not happier in any way.
Unfriend? Not my word of the year – or any year.
Also read – more on friends in facebook.
Language keeps evolving, is it not… Esp English… Ya, unfriend has a very unfriendly tone about it..!
Tell me all about it! If only ‘unfriending’ was as simple! Duh! As you said, it does serve oneself good after decluttering – after all, there comes a point where one has to choose between the so-called-friends and onself. That said and done, after one lengthy session of blaming yourself, one tends to move along with times and in life. If only all this pain would just vanish on the click of a button…. oh yes… the unfriending……
of all the un words, I like unwind the most 🙂