My radio station DJ was relaying a story about a counselor who has determined that, since facebook was started, 4 out or 10 of all the marriage couples she's worked with had affairs that started because of facebook. We've heard it all, of course...you enter your school information, you get contacted by past people, the flattery, the remembering 'good times' that may seem better than current times...

Makes me wonder what today's generation is going to have to look forward to with marriages, when they are growing up with this constant contact with everyone they've ever known. I would think marriages would be under even more attack for them.

Cat, this has to be very true.

My DS12 wanted a FB page. I resisted the idea for a long time and finally we created one TOGETHER.

I actually feel that I get some flirty stuff almost daily to ME. I will be leaving FB simply because of poor behavior from "friends".

If it's not FB, it's something else: classmates, reunions, MySpace (same as FB, I guess), email, etc. It's more a reflection on society today than Facebook.

That's true, but the lady doing the research (I haven't found it on the Web yet) said that it's facebook specifically because you are supposed to enter your junior high and high schools, whereas you aren't asked that anywhere else, so it kind puts you in instant contact with high school sweethearts.

I signed up a couple months ago at the request of our church youthleader, and within a week, a classmate from high school whom I haven't seen in over 30 years contacted me! I never in my life would have gone looking for her. So then, I looked at her 'friends' or whatever they call them, and saw the guy I went to homecoming with. Hadn't thought of him in at least 20 years. Didn't click on him, but I thought about it for a nanosecond. I can see how easily it happens.

And as soon as the DJ said that, he had 2 guys call up who said their wives got into affairs from facebook. One was working on his 23 year marriage with his wife; the other, married one year, kicked her out.

WHY does anyone not have their FB set to PRIVATE - only my friends and family can see me.

I agree with OurHouse - Facebook is just a medium. Affairs can start with emails, phone calls, chats at the bus stop, lunches in the breakroom at work, projects at your child's school... the problem is not Facebook, the problem is poor boundaries.

You don't *have* to enter your high school etc. into Facebook. You don't *have* to accept friend invitations. You can even block people so you don't see their profile, get their invitations to "be my friend" or receive messages from them.

It's all about boundaries. Facebook is a risky medium for those who have poor boundaries to begin with, but for those with well established boundaries it's just like the rest of life.

The nanosecond catperson spent thinking about her homecoming date would also have occurred if she'd been flipping through her yearbook and seen his photo. When she saw him on Facebook, she could easily click his name and block him. That way she'd be "invisible" before he ever knew she had an account.

So sure, Facebook can be abused. But if used properly, it can also help enforce boundaries. It's all about the person using Facebook, not about the site itself.

I agree. Facebook has put me in touch with lots of beautiful people from my past, who have not abused the privilege of being part of my life again.

And if anyone did, I have a mouse and I know how to use it!

Thanks Turtlehead. I'm not exactly a Facebook fan for many reasons but I think it gets a bad rap for the affair issue. It's like Craigslist taking the rap for the murders that happened when people advertised 'erotic' services.

There's a lot of social marketing out there. I have a Facebook page. I did it because I wanted to keep an eye on my kids' pages and keep them 'PG'. You can pick and choose how much information you want to post about yourself and how public or private you are. I started out on FB posting almost no info about myself and being very private. I'm still very private (only direct friends can see my profile and even read my comments posted on others' pages), and my 'info' page is pretty blank. However, I've become a member of my elementary school group, a member of the neighborhood where I grew up, I started a high school group (I went to a very small girls' high school) and as a result of this, I have connected with some childhood friends and some high school friends. If I had poor boundaries, I'm sure I could have done some damage. I'm sure that people on classmates.com, reuinion.com, etc., are capable of doing the same damage.

For that matter, I'm very active on LinkedIn. It's a business networking site and my profile is far more public, and I'm connected to far more people than I am on Facebook. And through LinkedIn, I've reconnected with a LOT of people with whom I used to work and yes, even one or two I used to date. If I had poor boundaries, I could be pursuing something there. And that's a strictly BUSINESS networking site.

So it's not Facebook. It's the person on the computer and it drives me crazy when the media blows it up out of proportion.

It is a tool....how is it used? I have a number of former high school classmates who are FB friends. But, I am in control of what I send them and how I respond to what they send me.

Furthermore, I send almost nothing flirty or suggestive to any man except my boyfriend. There is one other man I might, MIGHT, send something flirty to and that is a gay man with whom I used to work but whom I haven't seen in a couple of years.

You can take an axe and accomplish different tasks with it...you can chop down a tree, split wood for a fence or fire, or chop a person up.....

How are you going to use the tool?

Exactly.

The thing I like most about Facebook is that I can post my family photos there and share them all at once with all my family and friends to whom I'm connected and they can comment. In addition to being a great place to back up digital photos, it's fun to share events. My son went to his prom last weekend. I posted photos. I have lots of long-distance friends with kids about the same age and it was fun to see *their* prom pictures and exchange comments. It's a great way of staying in touch with people to whom you have a connection of some sort, but are too busy or too far away to connect with frequently.

I have one friend 3000 miles away whose daughter is a swimmer, like my son. We exchange info and comments about that. I have a friend who posted pictures of a huge freak spring snowstorm and it was fun exchanging comments about that.

I'm sure Facebook is used to further adulterious behavior but those people are going to find some outlet for their infidelity with or without Facebook.

I don't think the doctor was saying that facebook caused them to have affairs. She was just saying that, of those were were there because of affairs, 40% of them got in touch via facebook. Meaning it had a hand in facilitating it; i.e., it made it easier to run into someone you had feelings for from your past.

Not to belabor the point. I don't doubt that if someone with poor boundaries got in touch w/ someone via FB, the potential is there. But there's just a subtle way the media present things such as this and it's all done for the headline grabbing attention (and subsequent ratings) it gets and it drives me crazy. If 40% got in touch via FB and FB didn't exist, that same 40% would have either had an affair with a stranger, met up with an old flame through a reunion or another online site such as classmates, gotten in touch via email, etc.

It's just convenient to 'blame' Facebook and let people off the hook for their own behavior. This tendency to point fingers and say 'not my fault, such-and-such MADE me do it' or the general sense of entitlement prevalent in our society today drives me insane and the way this FB story is presented is just another typical example. If I were in public relations for Facebook, I'd be all over this story like white on rice.

This will come as a shock to the vast majority of BS whose WS had a WORKPLACE adultery.

>to any man except my boyfriend.

(giggle)

OT: Cinders has a boyfriend....I'm gonna sing that all day and smile, smile, smile.

not to belabor the point, lol, but this wasn't a news story per se; it was a woman who posted a research paper, nothing more. The media just picked up on the paper she wrote.

Ok, I won't slam the woman. I don't think I was slamming her to begin with. My beef is the media. Your statement 100% supports what I just said about how they just troll for headline news. Sheesh.

Well, just who did you think I meant every time I have referred to THE DIPLOMAT? And, those diplomatic missions - surely you didn't think I was referring to traveling with Condeleeza and Hillary!

Boyfriend....sounds like a teenager not a educated man with years of experience in different career fields. There needs to be a better term for 'mature' boyfriends. Like, when my mom had a boyfriend and she was in her 70s and he was in his 80s. Boyfriend - schmoyfriend. Manfriend doesn't work either.

BTW, he's coming to town next week for my daughter's high school graduation. Usually, when he comes, I send my children to their dad's. Gonna be harder to do this time. Sigh. We can't have such prolonged strategic arms negotiations with them around. Keep that PDA stuff to a minimum - behave like adults, not teenagers. Having a boyfriend and teenagers is tricky. :crosseyedcrazy:

Do you honestly mean you hadn't figured out The Diplomat, who has been around for years, is my boyfriend?

Speaking only for ourselves, but FogFree and I have discussed FB and other social networking sites after being invited by our children to join, and we decided that avoiding them altogether is consistent with our EP's that we've put in place to avoid any potential for inapporpriate behavior.

Personally, I think its a good policy for any M'd couple, ESPECIALLY those who have already been affected by infidelity.

How does this work, then? How do people find you in order to "friend" you?

I don't have a FB account so don't really understand it...though I would like to have one to find some old girlfriends I have lost contact with. These things are such an issue in our house, however, I'm not sure it could ever be POJA'ed.

Can you explain a little bit how it could be used safely?