New York – Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg changed his status to “married” Saturday and received over one million “likes” from his followers. But the site he founded isn’t always so marriage-friendly. In fact, lawyers say the social network contributes to an increasing number of marriage breakups.
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More than a third of divorce filings last year contained the word Facebook, according to a U.K. survey by Divorce Online, a legal services firm. And over 80% of U.S. divorce attorneys say they’ve seen a rise in the number of cases using social networking, according to the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers. “I see Facebook issues breaking up marriages all the time,” says Gary Traystman, a divorce attorney in New London, Conn. Of the 15 cases he handles per year where computer history, texts and emails are admitted as evidence, 60% exclusively involve Facebook.
“Affairs happen with a lightning speed on Facebook,” says K. Jason Krafsky, who authored the book “Facebook and Your Marriage” with his wife Kelli. In the real world, he says, office romances and out-of-town trysts can take months or even years to develop. “On Facebook,” he says, “they happen in just a few clicks.” The social network is different from most social networks or dating sites in that it both re-connects old flames and allows people to “friend” someone they may only met once in passing. “It puts temptation in the path of people who would never in a million years risk having an affair,” he says. Facebook declined to comment.
Another reason to melt Facebook. They don’t need asifas to realize this.
save a marriage! Save a family!
Wow look what an impact the internet asifa made on Sunday by thursday even non jews admit that the internet is a churban
Si I guess the Rabbis at the internet asifa were up to something and were 1000% correct. … An affair via via Faceboof can hapen with a few clicks …. It puts temptation in the path of people ….
And this is coming from a non jewish website, the rabbonim are obviously not so fanatic after all.
they also need an asife and make a filter
The problem isn’t Facebook. The problem is that people don’t respect their marriages, have no sense of spirituality, and forget to put their families FIRST.
Facebook may be one of the tools people use, but I know someone else whose marriage ended over an affair using CraigsList.
These days there are fee-based web sites SPECIFICALLY for who are married and looking to have an extramarital affair. A recent article I read about one site shows they have over 1.5 MILLION customers.
That makes my heart sink a little. It tells me that our nation is losing sight of what marriage is.
Hmm, seems like we should have had K Jason Krafsy, speak at the Asifa, well, that is only if you are looking for real results…
Before Facebook nobody ever got divorced or had an online affair, say a bunch of divorce lawyers.
It’s so true even in our community it did a lot of harm every person male or female shouldn’t be using this network that’s what Thay should’ve talked about by the asifa this is worse then pornography a lot of broken houses from this
Or how about it is possible to track affairs with FB while in real life you would never know that your spouse had cheated on you 35 times?
Facebook doesn’t cause extramarital affairs. Marriages do. You can have an extramarital affair without Facebook, but you can’t have one without a marriage!
I’m glad this came from a non-Orthodox magazine. When it comes from are Gedolim a lot of the posters here feel the need to bash them and say their wrong.
It’s unfortunate that we need “stats” and “surveys” to tell us these things.
We should heed the advice of our great Gedolim. They are a lot smarter than you and I and they do know what they are talking about.
Zuckerberg “married” a shiksa, and his stock plunged, go figure
People cheat on their spouses usually because they are unhappy with their spouse.Facebook and the internet has nothing to do with it. You actually would have to be an idiot to cheat with Facebook because there is a storng likelihood of being caught and having it used against you in divorce court. The best advice to prevent cheating is to work on your marraige and treat your spouse well and make them the focus of your attention. So yes in that respect we should say turn off facebook , the internet, the telephone, and pay attention to you family whether it is your kids or your spouse. As far as the Yetzer Hara, I think men have it more than women, but ladies, if you pay attention to your man, if you know what I mean, you will be doing a really big mitzvah and go a long way to keeping his Yetzer Hara at bay.Men don’t be jerks, treat your wives with respect and they will show you love.
Don’t blame the hammer when you hit your thumb…
Scary
You get what you are looking for, in Facebook as anywhere else.
People should be taught to use that filter, appropriate for all devices, which is located behind their eyes and between their ears.
This is like saying that we should ban washing machines because they are the leading cause of basement flooding.
Marriage has been in decline here for a long time. Today, upwards of 60% of couples lived together prior to the wedding. The days of Ozzie and Harriet, Father Knows Best, Leave It to Beaver, and The Waltons are looooooooong gone. As one who grew up without Torah in the home (clearly), I can only be grateful for the wisdom and guidance to make a real marriage work. The Internet with all its ills and temptations is merely a catalyst for an extramarital affair. It’s an indicator that something is missing – as in “Absence makes the heart go wander.” Think about it.
Facebook doesn’t cause divorces, idiots who don’t know how to use it properly do. I have a fb account, but the only men I am “friends” with are relatives, so they can see pictures of my kids. I am a BT and had a few boyfriends before becoming frum, and some of them have tried to friend me, but I rejected the requests. It’s totally idiotic to friend an “old flame” if you are married, no matter how happily, Pirkei Avos says we cannot trust ourselves till the dying day…
Also, remember, that snarky remark about how your husband can’t wash dishes properly or what have you, should be kept TO YOURSELF, or if you are that desperate to vent, then to your Rebbitzen. You should NOT be broadcasting your marital disputes- not the silly stuff, kal vachomer the serious stuff- to the whole world. It’s that simple.
The major point, as “Esther” pointed out, is that even if the marriage is good, if a person “friends” other women, even innocently, what can ultimately happen from there can destroy a marriage or three.
Of course, there are also Craigslist and other sites that allow znus, etc., but unlike the others which require intent to be mizaneh, Facebook SEEMS harmless to many people until it’s CH”V too late and the damage is done.
This is the unique danger of Facebook.
There will always be those who lie, cheat, etc. Facebook and such make it a lot easier for those who are looking to stray. What most Rabbis and and parents are concerned about are the innocent children and young impressionable teens who have access to the internet and are not old or savvy enough to make informed decisions.
Before facebook or the internet no one ever had an affair. No one ever got divorced. No one ever had a bad marriage.
Sorry. the internet and facebook are just recent means for doing it. Get rid of it and those who want it will just go back to using the phone. Ban that and they will just meet up in the grocery store. It happens. It did in the past and still happens (for those who don’t want a paper trail).
“Facebook” does not make it easier to cheat, it just makes it easier to get caught.
This is really not a big deal. Facebook and social media just provide another battle ground for the immaturity and embarrassment to play out. Pretend you just added a new floor to your house; it would be no different than you just added a new floor where you can fight too. Nothing lost, nothing gained.
The exact opposite is true!
In kabalistic technology it is referred to as “I’taarisa dl’tata I’taarisa dl’eila”
all of us down here make things happen up there…
G-D expects from us to do our utmost, and that is exactly what happened on sunday afternoon when thousands came together crying out to the almighty NASA V’NISHMA…
Some predicted that as soon as we will beg hashem and call out enough is enough! things will start shaking, an awareness among the nations of the world will follow, that doesn’t mean that things will change overnight, for G-D works through natural events…
It does not take much for the government to wake up and realize that morality and family values are in the gutter, all because filth can be paddled through the internet to all ages…
Social sites like FB cannot be stopped, however a report like this coming out from the intelegencia community might very well create a butterfly affect of awareness with the government clamping down on right out filth (after defeating all freedom of speech lobbies’t of course)…
People wreck marriages. Facebook doesn’t allow pornography and they aren’t pushing anyone into or out of relationships. This is absurd.
Wow, before Facebook and the internet, there was absolutely no marital infidelity, no pornography, no crime and everybody lived in total utopia. Sorry but I do not believe that. What ever happened to self-discipline and being accountable for one’s actions? Thankfully my parents taught me the difference between right and wrong, so I do not need an “artificial” filter to “protect” me from the horrors of the internet. My systems analyst husband’s rule is simple NEVER click through on a pop-up or a hyperlink to avoid picking up a virus or being led to an undesirable site. My husband and I met through a Jewish Singles internet site o/w we may not have ever met or married.
With regard to 44 and 45, Shirley Glass did more research on this area than just about anyone else, and her conclusions are as I reported them. If you have someone of similar standing who disagrees, please inform us. I realize her conclusions are counter-intuitive, but they are based on many years of research and experience in the field.
My facebook experiences so far and how it has benefitted myself and Israel:
contact with 3 rabbis. correspondence.
contact with friends.
chance to express my own issues and considerations in a polite manner to a group of say 250 friends and allies.
Chance to disagree with ongoing things in human experiences.
Offer to win the world over by being polite and expressing myself in a manner that coincides with Israels needs at times as a people and to convey Jewish life and interests to a broad audience.
Long live Facebook. I am learning, having fun and enjoying the day. And no, I have only seen ervah maybe once and it was blocked. No permanent damage in any sense.
All of the photos I have viewed with the exception of 3 posters who are no longer on my friends list have been kosher in the sense that they are not offensive.
I like to post political cartoons and I like to make quips.
Facebook really is Kosher to me. Its not what the format is, its how you govern yourself.
Some people are trying to vent on this subject
Remember: a broom that cleans also gets dirty
facebook is wonderful. those in charge against it are trying to keep people disconnected and unattached to others for fear they may decide they dont want in anymore and can have a better life elsewhere..
facebook only helps marriages not the other way around. a divorce is better than an unhappy marriage and apparently if spouses are cheating using facebook they should indeed not be married at all. objections?
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