Has anyone been unfriended on Facebook?

[Anonymous]

So for the second time since I joined FB about a year ago, I just noticed that I was "unfriended" by someone. My friend list only hovers in the 80 range, so in both cases I noticed after a while that I wasn't seeing status updates from those people anymore and sure enough...unfriended! Wow. The first was an old coworker who I wasn't super close with. I probably would not have friended her, but she friended me so I figured no harm in accepting - but never interacted with her except to congratulate her when she announced she was pregnant. Then I guess she changed her mind one day. I'd like to think of my FB participation as pretty mild and I honestly can't imagine what I would have done to offend or put off someone - but who knows. The second is a girl I knew from high school, though we were different ages - I was actually the same age as her brother and knew him more. Same thing...she friended me, I accepted. I actually enjoyed her more - made some nice comments here and there about her family photos, etc. Now I just noticed she's no longer a friend. Even though I'm not close with either of these people - I must admit it feels like being rejected a little and kind of weird! Just wondering if anyone else out there has had the same sort of bizarre experience or if it really is just me...

[Anonymous]

I unfriend people all the time.
If we don't interact why let people occupy virtual space on my virtual life?
8)

[Anonymous]

I unfriended people who posted nothing but political crap.

[Anonymous]

Get this - one of my best friends from high school unfriended me. Yes we've grown apart and hadn't seen each other in years. We only spoke a few times a year and such, but really?! Who unfriends someone who used to be a very important part of their life? And I look at Facebook as a great tool to keep up with those kind of people, people who aren't close geographically but who I'd like to stay in touch with. The strangest part was that a few months later she sent me a message via facebook...completely ignoring the fact that she had unfriended me. Bizarre.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Get this - one of my best friends from high school unfriended me. Yes we've grown apart and hadn't seen each other in years. We only spoke a few times a year and such, but really?! Who unfriends someone who used to be a very important part of their life? And I look at Facebook as a great tool to keep up with those kind of people, people who aren't close geographically but who I'd like to stay in touch with. The strangest part was that a few months later she sent me a message via facebook...completely ignoring the fact that she had unfriended me. Bizarre.

crazy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I unfriend people all the time.
If we don't interact why let people occupy virtual space on my virtual life?
8)

OP here. Out of curiosity, are some of these people who you friended in the first place or did they all friend you? I have to say that I actually friend very few people these days - only if I know in the first place that I'm really interested in connecting with them - and most of those folks I'm already friends with. I'm more about the quality than quantity - both in my virtual and real life.

1:44 - I hear you. I hid one guy's status updates because of his crazy conservative views that he felt the need to constantly share. But I didn't have the guts to unfriend him, even though I barely know him anymore. (Another person from college who friended me who I would not have friended but didn't want to offend but not accepting...)

And on the ex-best friend thing - that is strange, especially since she later sent you a message. Doesn't it make you want to ask her what made her unfriend you? I guess that's what I find myself wondering. Oh, how the dynamics of FB must have opened up a whole new area of research into interpersonal (and online) relationships!

[Anonymous]

I used to un friend ppl that requested me as a friend (ppl that I either worked with or met at a party, never a true stranger) and then never ever wrote to me, commented on anything or send their condolences or congrats when big things happened to me. I did this bc I did not see what the point of being their friend was if they said nothing. I look at FB as a way to connect with old good friends that you truly care/d about and the ones that just met you friend you bc they want to get to know you better which is totally fine with me but if you are going to act like a dead fish - then bye bye. I am an active FB user and have resorted to making my name unfound and that no one else can request me as a friend. I also get unfriended from time to time.
One last point - are you sure they unfriended you? Some ppl deactivate their account therefore you lose them as a friend. Lots of ppl close their account temporarily or permanently.

[Anonymous]

I have unfriended some people I friended. Mainly because I could see we just weren't going to interact. I doubt they've even missed the fact I'm gone.

That was when I was a newbie. Now I know how to set my privacy settings so I don't worry. I would accept a friend now and move them to my friend, but don't bug them with updates, etc. group.

[Anonymous]

I hardly ever post on people's walls because I am spending all my internet time here so I hope I'm not offending anyone. I had one person close their account w/o telling me so I thought I had been 'unfriended' but I knew this person enough to say, hey, i saw you were no longer on FB and they told me why they had shut the account down. Another friend discussed shutting her account down for a long time before she did it so it wasn't a suprise. I was 'unfriended' by one other person, whom I had met in a class. I wasn't even on FB for the two or three weeks we were 'friends' and when i went back on, she was gone. No clue why. It does bring up some odd junior high insecurities at the moment but it's the kind of thing that's easy to shrug off and forget.

I have unfriended a couple of people who made me feel awkward about posting about my life, because they were friends with people I did not choose to be friends with (family).

[Anonymous]

I joined FB because my HS reunion was coming up. I got friended by a guy who I knew in HS and a bit in college. We exchanged a few friendly notes. Anyway, the week of our reunion, he unfriended me! I have no idea why - I don't post much at all. It was a strange feeling, sure, but to do it even before the reunion???!! I saw him there but didn't say anything -i thought it would be too awkward.

[Anonymous]

I have been unfriended several times, I think, because my friend number fluctuates. Usually I can't figure out who it is and I think sometimes it's just because people deactivate their profiles. In two instances I figured out who it was that unfriended me, and they are still on Facebook. The first was a high school friend who friended me first, but we were never going to reconnect in any meaningful way. It kind of surprised me, but oh well. I think her FB strategy is to friend people, see what they're doing now, and then get rid of them. Nothing wrong with that if that's what she wants to do . The second was a friend-of-friends whom I don't like anyway. I am pretty sure I know why she unfriended me, too; I suspect it was after one particular status update. Totally doesn't bother me. She never posted anything anyway and when I see her in person (which I do sometimes), I dread having to talk to her. And I am not sorry about the status update that drove her away, either!

[Anonymous]

I think some people unfriend for privacy reasons. I know someone who had a FB page and was posting photos of her kid. When she thought more about it she realized that she probably didn't want her child's images that accessible on the internet, so she changed her settings or whatever so that really only a very limited group of people could view it (I don't do FB so pardon me if I'm not accurately representing how it works). So I offer that only to say, at least in her case, it wasn't intended to be a statement about how she felt about her "friends," she just recognized that she needed to be more responsible (in her view) about her child's privacy. So I wouldn't take it personally, there could be any number of reasons like that one to explain being unfriended.

[Anonymous]

As a pp said, check to see if they are still even on FB. That's happened to me a few times - people just deactivated their account so it's hard to take personally.
Also, I'm not sure why this happened but there are several people who, for a while did not show up as friends and then later on they did. I know that in one case the person's account got a virus so I think it was shut down for a few days then reactivated.

If you don't want to see someone's constant rantings or craziness, you don't necessarily have to unfriend them, you can always just set it to not show any of their postings.

[Anonymous]

Please pardon me if this seems like a hijack of this thread, but just wanted to add w/re the PP, I work in a position that, for better or worse, has required me to become knowledgeable about child pornography crimes. FWIW, I personally -- and this is only a personal recommendation in the hopes that folks will at least just think about it -- think people should exercise extreme caution about putting their child's images on the internet where anyone and everyone can see, download, and access them. At a minimum, please consider using only a secure site where you can control who has access to the images. Yes, we are all proud of our children and want to share photos, but in this day and age folks should consider using good judgment in doing so. Also, as mentioned above, your child's personal privacy is an important thing, so please think about respecting it for them by limiting who has access to it until your child is mature enough to make his/her own judgments about their own privacy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Please pardon me if this seems like a hijack of this thread, but just wanted to add w/re the PP, I work in a position that, for better or worse, has required me to become knowledgeable about child pornography crimes. FWIW, I personally -- and this is only a personal recommendation in the hopes that folks will at least just think about it -- think people should exercise extreme caution about putting their child's images on the internet where anyone and everyone can see, download, and access them. At a minimum, please consider using only a secure site where you can control who has access to the images. Yes, we are all proud of our children and want to share photos, but in this day and age folks should consider using good judgment in doing so. Also, as mentioned above, your child's personal privacy is an important thing, so please think about respecting it for them by limiting who has access to it until your child is mature enough to make his/her own judgments about their own privacy.

Just to clarify, I raise this w/re the previous point that someone might unfriend for privacy reasons.