I guess a spoiler alert is needed here in case you have not seen Catfish or The Social Network...
As a sociology major (and one who wrote 3 different college papers on Facebook), I was fascinated by the ways in which The Social Network and Catfish defined our generation: We are the entitled, the anti-authoritarian, the reckless, the overconfident, the pompous. We are hedonistic, chasing down every temporary high (to borrow a phrase from Stacey Orrico). We are overly trusting and yet with a lack of regard for our fellow humans. We are self-centered and believe ourselves suffering, despite our relative luxury and privilege.
I think the major lesson from both movies is that we haven't really thought through all the potential consequences of our lives on the Internet. We all kind of just leapt onto Facebook without considering how it could affect us ten, twenty years down the line, let alone tomorrow. I worry about what our nation will be like with everything documented and archived, with no such thing as privacy. With all of our diaries and embarrassing childhood secrets open to the public eye. When 20 years from now, our presidential candidates all have pictures doing body shots at Spring Break '08. And when our generation finally settles down with wives and children and yet continues to have unlimited access to know exactly what everyone they've ever slept with is doing with their lives.
Both stories make it pretty clear (often heavy-handedly) that what drives the plot forward is the desire for human connection. Despite the technology, the walls that we build up to define ourselves and to present ourselves in exactly the way we want to be seen, we are desperately and callously reaching out for romance, sex, love, a relationship, someone to get us. And yet, real connections don't come from our presence on the Internet. Whatever is on the Internet is not "real." We have created a disconnect for ourselves where we can behave in ways we otherwise would not. The Internet creates a layer of protection, a detachment from reality which allows us to play out dramas, sexual or Machiavellian, in which we can be heroes or villains or something in between.
Both movies are extremely male in their viewpoint. The women and girls fit into the most basic of prototypes: angels and sluts, manipulative shrews, possessive jealous girlfriends, innocent wide-eyed young girls and power-hungry groupies. The men are nuanced- even when we disagree with their decisions, we understand where they come from. Whereas the girls are flat, faceless, as personality-filled as Facebook profiles can be, there to look pretty or scared or use their siren-like good looks to manipulate our loyal heroes. Mark and Nev seem more interested in the pretense of love than anything close to a real relationship. Neither of them seems to really listen to the girls they both claim to love. Mark, driven by power and popularity, and Nev, unaware that he is being manipulated, ignore the parts of their so-called loved ones that they don't want to understand. I don't mean to say that all men are like this, but Nev and Mark both seem indicative of a certain kind of guy within our generation who look at women as beautiful but crazy and are completely befuddled by why we behave the way we do. After all, who would want a real woman with all her complications and flaws when one can have a nameless groupie, an airbrushed model, a trophy girlfriend to bring to punch events or a one-night stand in a bathroom stall?
All of the above is an oversimplification of course. Like our heroes, I simplify things until they are the way I want them to be. If we can't fit our lives into little boxes (of html or otherwise), how are we supposed to understand it? I am, after all, a product of my generation.
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