If Facebook cared about the mental health of its customers it would remove public likes. One of the big crushers of self-esteem is seeing your own post get 5 likes while a friend's gets 50.
FB won't, of course, because it's a big part of what keeps people engaged. Getting a lot of likes is a big dopamine hit. If no one sees all your likes - well that's not as satisfying. If no one sees likes they are probably less likely to "like" something. I get that, but it's still a sad bottom-line based decision.
Interestingly enough, last time I opened Instagram it offered me to completely hide the number of likes on all posts (others' and your own as far as I understood).
> One of the big crushers of self-esteem is seeing your own post get 5 likes while a friend's gets 50.
That's also a symptom of a problem outside of Facebook's control. From my personal experience, comparing myself to others has never been an authentic source of self confidence. But it's hard to remember that when modern culture and media values perfection and popularity.
Facebook is opportunistic and exploitative about it, where the entire product is engineered to be addictive keep you coming back. And so are thousands of other apps, news programs and articles, tv shows, etc.
That's part of it, but I'm also sitting here with the warm satisfaction that my earlier comment is up to 12 votes. Without votes or likes, I tend to assume that no one has read my comment, or no one finds it interesting. The effort I put into posting it ( I assume) was a waste of time and effort.
I write to engage. I'm enjoying my time in this topic since I'm getting some response and I always upvote all responders hoping to encourage the conversation to continue. I've gotten highly upvoted comments with no responses and I find that unsatisfying.
You can do it like i have been doing in hn and reddit. The moment my account gets enough points, i just delete it and start a new one. I think this is my third in hn or so, but i have been through more than ten on reddit
Even before likes were introduced to Facebook, the site was still capable of delivering a blow to one’s self-esteem, because comments were another sign of attention given to you. Plenty of people can tell you how in the period 2005–2009 their status update saying, for example, that they were having a hard time with their lives got zero comments from supposed friends, while someone’s vacation photos got many gushing comments.
Removing 'likes' won't solve all the morale-crushing issues of course. When everyone you know is posting pictures of the happy hours that you weren't invited to, and the fabulous vacations that you don't have the time or money to take, it's pretty miserable.
There are people I unfollow just because their posts fill me with envy and a destructive hope that they secretly have problems they don't talk about. I can sit here and tell myself they might be under crushing debt or have bitterly miserable marriages - but that's a nasty, unhealthy frame of mind. Some people have better lives than I do. I have a better life than some other people. Expecting some sort of karmatic "fairness" isn't going to help.
FB won't, of course, because it's a big part of what keeps people engaged. Getting a lot of likes is a big dopamine hit. If no one sees all your likes - well that's not as satisfying. If no one sees likes they are probably less likely to "like" something. I get that, but it's still a sad bottom-line based decision.