Over proximity!

I've been reading Slavoj Zizek's Living in the End Times and it's been a slow read, not because Zizek's writing is difficult, quite the contrary, it's interesting and provocative, but because I just haven't spent enough time alone with the book. Soon that situation will be remedied. Yesterday I was struck with a passage of Zizek's that appeared to resonate with recent thinking I'd had about my relationship with others on Facebook, even though he was actually discussing the 'neighbour' and American versus European attitudes towards disclosure of private thoughts and deeds. I quote:

Why are we so traumatized by the neighbor's over proximity? Habit and custom are the predominant ways in which we maintain a distance towards the "inhuman" neighbor's intrusive proximity, and we are today effectively witnessing a decline of habits: in our culture of self-exposure and "sincerity", they no longer provide a screen ensuring our distance from the neighbor. (2010:123)

The unusual thing about Facebook is that the very interface, which provides a certain safe distance, enables and encourages private disclosure. It's so easy to reveal information that remained hidden, secreted in one's mind and really ever only told to people you're really close to. How are our special people special anymore if we have already revealed our inner most thoughts to strangers? On reflection we realise it might have been better not to tell. Suddenly it's like a bright search-light has been flashed into your face ~ you are/have been exposed and to someone who really doesn't know you. You find solace for a short time in the fact that others too have exposed their lives ~ laid themselves bare for all to see. So, is this the humanizing aspect of it; to reveal our vulnerabilities and fragile nature, to expose our narcissistic tendencies, our competitive behavior, our desire to be recognized, to be seen and heard? Does our accumulation of fb friends verify to others that we are worthy, valuable members of society? To be removed from someones fb friends list considered a trauma ~ you're just nobody unless you're virtual with your virtual friends! I remember a time when men used to go to the pub after they'd had sex with a girl and they'd tell all their friends. They'd never really had sex until the experience was shared. But it's not just the men now, women too heighten their experiences by telling all ~ nothing is really experienced until is it told and re-told. Can we no longer savour the experience by holding it close to ourselves as ours and only ours? I am as guilty of this as others ~ may I blame technology, its predisposition to encouraging communication and revelation, superficiality and repetition. And I haven't even mentioned those of us who are OCD. The obsessive compulsive desire to check our Facebook messages, to make posts, to continually be there, to have a virtual presence ~ not to be forgotten, not to be left out. I've considered all of this and I've decided I'm the person of whom Zizek speaks. I am traumatized to a certain degree by my neighbor's over proximity, on screen. Since my time on Facebook coincides with the period of time I've been taking photographs of people in Melbourne, I'm thinking perhaps that I've had too much exposure to the other, to their similarities and differences ~ time to put up the screen, even if it is an illusion ~ perhaps when I venture out of the cave I will see things with new eyes!