Fuck Facebook....

Hey There,
Well, this is funny in a sort of silly kind of way. I joined Facebook a few weeks ago, to do my thing, which is to be myself. A drawing, itinerant podcaster, & curmudgeon emeritus. That is, if a cartoon/avatar can actually be oneself.
But that's what I am, a cartoon producing what I believe to be the coolest little podcast on the planet. Of course, I have to believe that in order to keep doing it. It's not like there's any money in this. What some might call a labor of love, or maybe a compulsive desire to place oneself in some sort of artificially created spotlight. You decide. But I digress..

I've been 'exileguy' on the internet since late 1995 or so, and my cartoon self has had a bit of fun with the moniker, and I know that I've affected at least a couple of people, which is all anyone could ask, I suppose, of any endeavor. And I have fun with what I do.

So, I joined Facebook, gained many friends, and even started a group of fans of the Radio Free Exile podcast, and then, out of nowhere, the Facebook administration (I was going to say nazis here, but I thought that might be going a little too far...) deactivated my account for using an ALIAS for a screen-name, rather than using my given name, which some of you actually no, but the majority not...sorry, that's just the way it is...).
I could not believe it. I mean, after all, would they have deactivated Elmer Fudd or Popeye for not being real persons? And isn't your persona, the way you see yourself, the one creative thing about yourself that you really are, or at least the presentation? Maybe not, but that is the assumption that I operate under. Not that I claim to be the intellectual peer of Elmer Fudd, but he is out there, and let me tell you, honestly, he is not a real human being. I think.

Is there injustice here? I doubt it, not really. A failure to follow the rules I agreed to and being punished for it is not an injustice, but then, in a cartoon character sort of sense, those rules were impossible for me to follow. In their tiny minds I was being dishonest about my own self. Which in itself is enough for them to take the action that they did.
I wonder what they feel about folks who misrepresent themselves with fake pictures, no picture at all, or made up human being type names. Do they care at about that at all? At least in my dishonesty, I was being honest about the nature of what/who I am.

Am I now asking you to boycott Facebook? Not at all. Not even a little bit. It is a good place, and I really don't have an argument.

So, let me continue...
And now, banished from the land of Facebook, forced to abandon another venue, deeper into exile I go, wandering the planet in search of yet another social network, that will accept me as a cartoon, and not merely a human being...
peace,
exileguy