There was a social experiment done recently by David Plotz of Slate that attempted to test the “fakery of Facebook.” He celebrated his birthday three times, six months away from his actual birthday and waited to see who would catch on, essentially. A few people caught on to his scheme, but a fair number simply carried on wishing him a happy birthday.
When the results of this completely unscientific experiment came through, there were people who immediately came after facebook (some simply went after the internet) for having ruined our ability to remember things.
There are a number of things I dislike about this, but mostly I hate the misconception about friends and the social structures we share.
1. This assumes that more than your immediate family and two closest friends would ever normally remember your birthday without some sort of reminder.
2. This assumes that people who would not normally remember your birthday are not, for some reason, close enough to be able to reasonably wish you well on your birthday when reminded.
3. More than anything, it assumes that, given a reminder, no one would respond positively if they are not very, very close to you already.
Now this, is just ludicrous.
I have never been carded during the month of my birth when my server didn’t wish me a happy birthday, belated or early. If you were to tell the homeless man on the side of the street that your birthday was coming up he would wish you a happy birthday. People are social creatures. When someone in your group passes a milestone, then everyone is happy for them. If someone outside of your group passes a milestone, we don’t necessarily wish them harm but there isn’t an active outreach and congratulation.
Most connections you have on facebook will have been face to face at some point and you would have, at that point, made the choice to include them or not. They also made that same choice.
Next time someone you haven’t spoken to in a year wishes you a happy birthday on facebook, thank them. Maybe you’ll find that they really do want to know more about you.