Yesterday, I read an article that implicated Facebook in the proceedings of 1/3 of divorces as a reason. One of my friends made a slightly sidelong counterargument, but the train of thought for me pointed out to my mind that Facebook is a thing. Things don't do anything unless they are acted upon by people. People's lives are the sum aggregates of their choices, even when some of the things that happen to us are orchestrated by others.
When people make poor choices, they usually search for a scapegoat. It's easier to blame Facebook because admitting culpability means admitting they made a mistake. That makes them complicit in their own problems. Most people prefer to be victims, because victims get special compensation. It takes two people to fight.
The argument is often made that guns are bad because they kill people. If that were bad, Facebook would be guilty by association for anything done by anyone who uses it. I am sure they have written their terms to free themselves from indemnity. Now, I have never seen a gun actively do anything to kill a person. Some people will argue that bullets are the problem, but every gunshot-related death has involved the poor choices of a human who handled it.
People are the active agent in most of the things that happen. We are the sum of our choices. We choose what we do, and we choose how we respond to things that other people do that affect us. In the end, I think what matters most is how we handle what we have more than it is what we have. Certainly, handling a gun wisely, assuming you have one, will bring better options into your life than being reckless or stupid.
Like all other things created or used by man, Facebook isn't to blame for divorce any more than guns are actually responsible for deaths. While it may have played a part, in the end it is just a tool, something that can be used wisely if the users are inclined thereunto. All too often, however, we unjustly ascribe things of our own agency to things that are not involved at all. It's an attempt to deflect blame, avoid punishment, and skirt the consequences of choice. Most marital problems can be solved by repentance, a turning around, a turning of the heart, an inclination to one for whom one has once pledged affection.
It is an abuse of knowledge to rail against things one happens to dislike. It is an abuse of power to outlaw them. If you are offended by something, you are not usually obligated to take part. You can choose to stand up, walk away, change the channel, or refuse to stay. Elie Wiesel writes in his memoir about living in Auschwitz that the last human freedom is to choose how we would like to be in the circumstances. All too few of us choose to be the way we ought to be.
Perhaps that's why we treat other people as objects rather than as agents. You see, objects are easier to demean, easier to blame, easier to villify; agents can choose to be something else. We blame objects because we do not equate them with ourselves. People we treat as agents are people we acknowledge as part of our equivalency class or peer group. Surely, because we love them as we love ourselves, agents cannot be to blame. It must be an object, inanimate or otherwise. That does not solve the problem. It deflects it.
In the end, the life well lived is a life in which one chooses to be choice.
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