Dear Jessica Brennan,
This post may seem harsh, but in the spirit of saying what everyone else is thinking, sorry, but give me a break. One of the most irritating things that Social Media has given us is the ridiculous Cryptic Cliffhanger.
PS, You are creating an annoying Cryptic Cliffhanger if your Facebook status says something like, “Days like today only could happen once!” With no words after that to explain why. Or, simply, “I can’t believe it”, or “Wow, that just happened”. Do us all (and yourself) a favour. If you have something to tell us then say it, otherwise don’t bother posting until you do.
My ex-mother in law had this way of communicating down to a science, far before there was social media. If you asked her how she was, she would say “Fine, but isn’t it something about Anne”, (total silence…hold it, hold it…) forcing you to ask boredly, “Why, what’s wrong with Anne?” She did this all the time, and so eventually, people just ignored her and carried on with a different conversation. They stopped asking about Anne, or whomever, because this particular attention-seeking conversation tactic is well, aggravating frankly, and a bit unfair.
The person who curses us with this sort of cryptic social media post is motivated by one of four things according to Tim Urban of Huffington Post.
- They are doing it so they can ignore you when you ask what is up. This gives them a deep and joyous sense of being too important to answer you. They can be Beyonce for a day! It is an ego boost that’s intoxicating. All these people, their followers, are interested in them and their news! (Single-file for autographs please).
- They are doing so because they are dying to tell-all but want to be invited to share. (Since you asked!) Likely they have already written paragraphs and paragraphs about the event in question just ready to paste them into a reply. The poor unsuspecting person who asks, “What happened”, opens up the floodgates for us all and way too much information gets spewed out even for an intimate companion, let alone a group of public strangers….oops I mean “friends”.
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They want to maintain the juicy mystery of this cryptic post and prolong it so they can have even more attention. This is generally when the news is bad, so they make the bad even worse for the sake of drama, and continue to drag people along with replies like, “It wouldn’t be right to tell you,” or “So sad.” They knew it first, but they really shouldn’t say.
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Not that unlike the above, is my favourite reason of all. They need to build an entire feeble self-marketing campaign around “I’ll tell you when I can” to feed their ego. “It’s going to be so good you won’t believe it”. They not only are trying to keep you hanging, but they are also trying to look superior as they spin an exciting proclamation to their imaginary salivating masses. This exciting, amazing information will be delivered with appropriate build up, at a later date (of their choosing). Oooh I know something you don’t know!
So here is the truth. When you post like this, people do give you attention and do start to talk about you, mostly behind your back. They say things like, “I guess she got dumped,” or “the condo must have sold,” and then they move on. Quite often they’re correct in their assumption which makes your fantastically, unbelievable announcement fall pretty flat. Let’s face it, this is an attention seeking tactic that is obvious to all who read it as soon as you post it.
Do you want to be that person?
Some of your “friends” will politely “like” it, or ask “What happened?” and feign interest, but at the bottom of it all, they know you’re at home shamelessly drinking wine from the box and stuffing Oreos in the mouth of your spoiled, inner-child. If you wanted to share something, you would, so don’t try to string us along. You would be far better to just declare. I mean, we all have lonely days sometimes and that’s okay.
Try this instead. “I am feeling like I’m not getting enough attention today. My narcissism tank is only ¼ full. Please feed my ego with your inquiries about my life which is so much better than yours by the way.” People would actually respect that more.
Love Mum xo
PS – What a day I had today!
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