Research has shown that stalking potential sex partners on social networking site, Facebook, is now the most popular activity in the world.
The research, carried out at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, indicated that almost every person between the ages of 16 – 45 uses Facebook to stalk or “creep” on potential sex partners from their friend network.
“We found that a light internet user who would typically spend 1 or 2 hours online per day was still using about 25% of that time to browse through the Facebook pages belonging to members of the opposite sex in their network,” claims lead researcher, sociologist Dr. Eric Thompson. “Heavy internet users, those people who spend between 6 and 10 hours online each day, were using even more of their time to creep on potential sex partners.”
One man who took part in the study, Anthony Preston, who is an admitted Facebook creep, explained his online stalking activities. “Well Facebook really opened everything up for me. I wasn’t the most popular guy in work or school so I wasn’t really on the radar of most of the girls,” explained Anthony. “Most of them would never talk to me in person but would happily accept friend requests on Facebook.”
“It started off with just a little bit at a time. It was just ordinary nosiness, but it soon developed into an obsession. Now it’s all I do on Facebook,” admitted Anthony. “I’ll spend 6 maybe 8 hours a day just cruising Facebook. I’ll look through their pics and leave cutesy comments or I’ll ‘lol’ or ‘lmao’ at their inane and unfunny status updates. If they like the comments that I’m leaving on their pages then I’ll totally get off on that.”
“You know those guys who post concerned comments asking ‘are you ok babe?’ underneath a desperate girl’s attention seeking status updates?” asked Anthony. “I’m that guy! I don’t really care one way or another but they think I do. And that’s what’s important.”
In his study Dr. Thompson indicated that it wasn’t only men who were engaged in Facebook stalking but women also. “It’s definitely something that is being carried out by both sexes but in different ways,” explained Dr. Thompson. “Women are looking at different facets of a person’s personality, how successful they perceive them to be, how kind, how well liked etc. Whereas the vast majority of the men are primarily concerned with using it as a masturbation tool.”
“Men are spending increasing amounts of time wanking alone in front of a screen,” explained Dr. Thompson. “If we were to add up those lost man hours and put them to productive work we’d probably have solved the financial crisis about 5 minutes after it struck or cured cancer years ago. But unfortunately, people would rather spend more time wanking than working.”
Anthony admitted that he is one of those men who uses Facebook primarily for masturbating,” I’m not ashamed to admit it. I’ll look through photos of girls that I like and I’ll pleasure myself. It’s not my fault, it’s the internet, you’re never more than two clicks away from hardcore super-sex…It’s become ingrained for me to wank at stuff online. It’s like how Tiger Woods is now ingrained to have constant sex with beautiful women. It’s not his fault, it’s the availability.”
“Look at it this way, before we had Facebook, if a bloke wanted to wank at a girl without her knowing it then he’d have to get a long coat and hide in a bush and risk upsetting the poor girl,” asserted an increasingly manic Anthony. “But thanks to Facebook I can avoid the stigma of being a sex offender. Facebook is the long coat and bushes for the 21st century desperate wanker.”
