I Quit Facebook More Than a Year Ago

Here’s why I’m never going back

Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash

The first months of the pandemic, back in 2020, I was basically glued to Facebook.

I checked the app every morning as soon as I woke up, every night before I fell asleep, and multiple times throughout the day.

I checked to see if my friends were safe.

I read articles about how the virus was spreading and how different countries were handling it.

I read both informed and uninformed opinions about how to best handle the unprecedented situation we were faced with. To mask or not to mask? Close schools or keep them open?

I thought that being informed would help soothe my anxiety. Instead, I was left scrolling through Facebook in the late hours of the night, looking for comfort but finding none.

I felt frustrated at the doublespeak and double standard in the discourse surrounding Covid. Why were we not masking here in Sweden when everyone else in the world was doing it? Why were we being told that children can’t transmit the virus, when neighbouring countries were closing schools?

Sifting through the disinformation and witnessing so many people spewing hate left me drained.