Asklemmy @lemmy.ml

10mo ago

if you don't use facebook, what social media do you use to stay in contact with family?

139 comments

Text messages and phone calls. I don’t need to see my boomer relatives racist posts.
- That was disappointing, when you grow up thinking your parents are progressive and then as old age and its symptoms happen their guards drop and you find out that they always had some racist tendencies. I guess credit to them suppressing them for so long.
  
  In my parents' old age they've gotten more progressive. I reject the notion that people naturally trend towards conservativism as they age... I just think there are a fuckton of entitled "I got mine" boomers.
  
  I am originally from the south but my mother joined the Air Force and we moved away after she divorced my dad when I was very young. I’m so glad that I was able to experience life outside of that racist bubble. I’m not sure how I would have turned out had I grown up there.
  
  i really must be lucky because my mum and dad are as liberal and accepting as can be. i guess i was just lucky to grow up in massachusetts and attend a pretty liberal methodist church. my pastor growing up even hand wrote me a letter when i came out as trans and apologised for how some of the church needs to change.
  
  We just didn’t see it in the past because we were all kinda racist. But we grew out of it.
  
  FB got my sweet pre-school teacher who I never, in 30 years, saw be mean to anyone turned into a MAGA who hates people. The programming worked way too well.
  
  This, but it was more surprising for other relatives, aunts and uncles mostly.
  Like, Jesus Aunt Beth, I didn't realize you religiously watched Glenn Beck and believe Muslims are trying to take over American by genetic conquest.
- I'm the opposite. I don't need to see my Gen Z relatives desperate pleas for attention.
  My boomer relatives are relatively liberal and don't feel the need to share more than the vacation they're on, the cocktail they're drinking, or their high score on candy crush.
  Edit: I assume the downvotes are from butthurt Gen Zers. I don't mean to generalize, I can't imagine anyone doing that when discussing an entire generation, I'm simply offering my own personal experience. When my cousin is posting photos of himself in a banana hammock and my sister is posting daily cringe videos of her words of "advice", AND IG keeps trying to show me this because the algorithm is trash, this keeps me off social media. Right, I should just not "follow" my relatives. Or, I could just stay away entirely. It's fine.
- Seriously, every time I see stuff like this, I just wonder if people have completely forgotten that you can text and call your family and friends.
- This is the way.

- There are also these crazy things called SMS and phone calls

I don't. They have my phone number. They can text or call.
- Same. I have no desire to be informed every time someone takes a shit, or does something AmaZIng!

Send me a text or call me. The family and friends I want to talk to will make an effort. The rest I don't really need to know about.
- Yeah we have one big group chat. And even that I have on mute. Some people glean energy from constantly seeing updates in other peoples lives. I’m the opposite, if you need something from me just call or text. It’s been 6 years or so since I deleted my Facebook and instagram. Don’t miss it at all

I don't use social media to stay in contact with family; I use various messaging/call technologies.

I know where they live and have their phone number

SMS and telephone and IRL.
I haven't used Facebook for over ten years. I was using Instagram for a while but the algorithm makes using it utterly pointless.
Do you really need to be on top of everyone all the time? Give your relationships room to breathe. Allow yourself to have engaging conversations with people to catch up and get to know them and the things that matter most to them. Allow yourself the liberty of not knowing the most ridiculous crap that they choose to share with the world.
Edit: Oh! I have a friend who I turned on to GroupMe a long time ago. He and his family still use it regularly. So, if you're looking for something, give that a look.

A private Signal group for nobody besides us.
- Yeah same here, we even have a bunch of different groups like a sort of venn diagram. Works perfectly well including meetups.
- Yeah it took a while to get everyone onboard but signal has been the only messaging app that I use. Now even some of my friends and family use it for chats I’m not part of.
  I donate $1/year per person I convinced to use it.

They’ve been informed that if they’d like me to know something, they’ll have to tell me. As it turns out, the phone works as a phone too!
- Seriously, has everyone forgotten what a "phone" is? I mean I have trouble hearing and don't like to hold long conversations on the phone, but it's still one of the quickest ways to get in touch with someone.
  
  Do you have experience with Auditory Processing Disorder? I say that because I started noticing symptoms in my early 30s when I developed tinnitus.

My phone number.
- And christmas cards every year.

Texting?? I also use this technological innovation called living with your parents.

I don’t use any social media. I give my phone number to family members. They can call/text if they want to reach me.

Stay in contact with family? No thanks
- Had to scroll too far down to find this. Amen.

Signal

Via my spouse.
- Me too. And SMS since we are on mix of Android and Apple.

You feel like you can't disconnect from these things, but you can. Group text plus family learn quickly that you're outside of social media. They learn to deliberately send photos or call and if your spouse is more social, they become the conduit for "news" and it's filtered down to you when important

I dont

Simple. My sister keeps in touch with the family via Facebook and I keep in touch with her by phone. 😁

I use this alien technology called a phone.

What? You don't use phone as a phone anymore?
- lol you are all such boomers. this thread has been hilarious
  
  I’m a millennial and don’t use Facebook. None of my zoomer family members use Facebook. In fact the only people I know who do use it are boomers.

I call them

None, I like it that way. I also don"t pick up the phone when they call.
I have a few friends though, we Signal.

Signal for whole family chat; phone and SMS variously; discord for some

Signal groups, works great

Signal

Not social media, just Signal. I was able to convince them to use Signal even just for our own family group chats.

I just text and email, also actual mail.

They can suck my balls on WhatsApp

Telegram group chats. It's perfect.

Why would I stay in touch with family? Those people suck.

Giant group texts. One has over 30 people, mostly used for baby/marriage announcements. Then a bunch of other group texts for different social groups (stoners, siblings, camping, etc).

a phone number

If my family isn't on Steam Chat, then we don't speak.

I don't use social media to stay connected with family. I lift up the phone, go visit, or if we need to communicate online, I have an XMPP server for the family with end to end encryption. Can share pictures, text, and can even do video calls if need be, send files, and so on.
Don't see the need to involve any kind of social media.

i pick up my phone and call em....

Bold of you to assume that I have family that I want to keep in touch with. Entire family tree is twisted and gnarled, and full of white-trash sociopaths and narcissists.
For the one remaining person I might keep in touch with, it’s a text message at holidays.

My mother and my kiddo live with me. I don't really have any other family.

I've convinced them all to use matrix with me. For some reason they still use Skype with each other.
Also it sounds like you still use facebook? In which case doesn't that make you the boomer of this comment section? I don't see why you would use a public social platform to communicate with your family - that's what messaging services are for. Also what's wrong with SMS? It's literally just another messaging service, built into phones by default.
also also if SMS is for boomers.
and people's parents are likely to be boomers.
does it not make sense that people will use SMS to communicate with their parents?
something something something I win.

Lol, if I had family in my social media I would have to stop using social media.

Phone, SMS, Signal/whatsapp (which technically belongs to facebook)
Why would I use a social media to do so

WhatsApp. I'd prefer something not owned by Meta, but tech supporting my parents already costs me enough time without adding extra apps to the mix and all their other contacts use it.

That's the funny part - I don't!

Lemmy is my only online presence. I use.......
My phone.

Groups in Signal and Threema. For my grandmother, WhatsApp (she doesn't want to use more than one app and her friends are on that one) or calling (because her grasp of that app isn't quite complete.)

honestly it's sort of useless for that function. The only thing my family posts is dumb crap. I still basically have to see them or talk to them to actually catch up. As a means of keeping up with people I have found FB as practically useless.