Complicated

Not a rumination on that dreadful but nonetheless era-defining Avril Lavigne song, this is rather in reference to the concept, as articulated by Facebook, of the "Complicated Relationship."

Seriously, I log on to Facestalk this afternoon and the first item on my Stalkerfeed (I hope that by appearing cognisant of the bizarre power this technology affords everyone even vaguely in my life to know my every movement and me to know theirs, I become less of a sucker for using it) is that Old High School Aquaintance That I Never Really Liked In High School Anyway And Only Accepted On Facebook To Make Sure She Wasn't Doing Better Than Me In Life (let's just call her Ohsatinrlihsaaoaftmsswdbtmil, or Ohsa for super convenience) is apparently in a Complicated Relationship.

This begs several questions.

The Facebook option of being in a Complicated Relationship (or, as it is indicated in your relationship status, "It's Complicated [with XYZ if you so choose]") is obviously an acknowledgement of the situation that many of us have found ourselves in over time whereby you are seeing someone on a semi-regular basis, you're doing the kissing and maybe even the sexing, but they or you are, for one reason or another, emotionally incapacitated to the extent whereby they still refuse to call this a relationship. Now, you're not single - because you're having the sex, as it was so eloquently put by Paolo in Friends - but you're not in a relationship, because labels ruin things, and being a girlfriend/boyfriend is subjugation and entrapment, and you don't see why it's anyone else's business, which seems to be a favourite line. So It's Complicated. Seems logical enough. Except if that the whole reason It's Complicated is because you Don't Want People To Know ... doesn't putting it up on Facebook - that is, the most public arena the world currently offers us - doesn't that COMPLETELY DEFEAT THE BLOODY CONCEPT AND IS REALLY JUST YOU PUBLICLY DECLARING TO ALL AND BLOODY SUNDRY THAT YOU'RE HAVING SEX WITHOUT HOLDING HANDS OR HOLDING HANDS WITHOUT HAVING SEX?

The second question, more just a matter of me being semantically finicky, arises from the sentence itself: "Ohsa is now in a complicated relationship." Well, excuse me, but what the hell what Ohsa doing before with everyone else in her life? Clearly delineating them into easy categories where each person serves a single, simple purpose which they performed every time they meet without fail? That's the relationship you have with baristas and bus drivers maybe, but not, you know, people who actually have an influence on you. (Not that baristas and bus drivers don't influence you. They influence me greatly. Just in uncomplicated ways.) I have complicated relationships with lots of people but that doesn't mean that we're engaged in intense negotiations over sexual politics. Now I know this isn't really Facebook's fault (or even Ohsa's - but she's pretty annoying so I like to snigger at her nonetheless) but still. I thought it interesting, because I'm into things like that.

Interesting unplanned third point: between writing my last paragraph, I logged onto Facebook once more, only to be informed that Girl I Have Met Once or Twice At University and Yet Again Do Not Particularly Like (henceforth known as Gihmootauayadnpl, or rather Gihmoot) is "no longer in a complicated relationship." This, like the information in Ohsa's update, is displayed with an accompanying little love heart - not the broken one you see when people break up, but the nice whole one you see when people get together.

How do these two seemingly contradictory events work together? By Facebook's logic, being in a Complicated Relationship is worthy of a heart, therefore it must be a good thing for the people involved. But getting OUT of a Complicated Relationship - and, Facebook presumes, In A Relationship - is also worthy of a heart, and therefore must also be a good thing.

Well, what if being in a Complicated Relationship isn't good? What if being in a Complicated Relationship is leaving Ohsa with unanswered questions and doubts about her self-worth and the worthiness of her emotional investment? What if being in a Complicated Relationship makes Ohsa feel like she is giving everything to a person who can never commit meaningfully and is simply stringing her along for her sexual and/or emotional benefits without taking on any of the responsibility that comes with being In A Relationship - the responsibility to prioritise the needs of that person, the responsibility not to be infidelitous (assuming that they are not In An Open Relationship, another of the myriad of relationship options Facebook affords us, politically correct souls that they are), the responsibility to openly and happily acknowledge the relationship? What if Ohsa is going through that thing that happens when long term couples break up and then still sleep together and hang out together and have keys to each others houses but aren't actually together because for whatever reason, a simple question of naming leads to a total change in behaviour? What if Ohsa's status as Being In A Complicated Relationship is simply her way of trying to reassure herself that she's in a Relationship at all? And, as I think I pointed out earlier, doesn't that just defeat the purpose of this particular kind of Complicated Relationship?

Similarly, who makes the decision that for Gihmoot, not being In A Complicated Relationship is suddenly a move up in the world? I stalked her down just to make sure I wasn't going to misrepresent her here in an arena she will never encounter. Her relationship status no longer exists - you know, that tricky thing people do when they take it away completely because they're so utterly confused or depressed by whatever their Actual Status is that they can't bear the thought of other people looking at it every day. So Gihmoot is no longer In A Complicated Relationship - but according to her profile, she's also not in a Relationship at all. Maybe she has completely ceased all interaction with other human beings around her, I don't know. This does not necessarily warrant a perfectly formed pink heart in my mind. Why does Facebook - who said Being In A Complicated Relationship was a good thing now say that getting out of one is equally good? What if Gihmoot's Complicated Relationship was nonetheless mutually satisfying and rewarding for both parties? What if neither of them wanted, for whatever reasons, to subscribe to approved-of avenues or definitions for their interactions with each other? What if they cared deeply for one another but lived in different cities or states or countries and for that reason could not commit to being In A Relationship as it is commonly conceived of in our limited vision of said? What if Gihmoot is crying into her pillow tonight over the loss of her Complicated Relationship? What if Ohsa is crying into her pillow tonight over the existence of hers?

What, then, of all our other relationships? If only Facebook would allow me to define the relationship I had with each of my 237 "Friends"(please note very deliberate use of inverted commas there.) Why is this one relationship, instantly understood to be romantic in nature, priveleged above all the rest? I restate: I am in a lot of relationships in my life, many of them complicated, or in the very least complex, and some of them are with people for whom I have, or have had, or may one day have, romantic feelings but generally they are not. Can I set my Relationship Status to Multifaceted?

Finally, what are we to make of the mere fact that I can know any of this at all? What are we to make of the fact that last week, when a friend of mine who knows almost none of my other friends (he can be Fomwkanomof...OK, Fom) broke up with his girlfriend, I was confronted by three of our vaguely mutual friends (that is, mutual friends on Facebook), not on as close terms to him as myself, who had heard of this development within hours of its eventuation because the couple in question, you guessed it, changed their status on Facebook? What are we to make of the fact that if I were to change my currently Single status to It's Complicated or In A Relationship or even if I were simply to remove it at all, at least 237 people (in fact far more, seeing as I am too much of an internet whore to ever set my profile to private) would have access to that information. 150 of them might notice it. 100 of them would mentally notice it and discuss it amongst our mutual friends the next time they met. 50 of that 100 might even go so far as to send me a message about it, and there would be at least ten people inconsiderate enough to post on my wall about it, and the fact is that in that 237 people there are maybe only 20 anyway who I think would have any selfless interest in my love life as something other than fodder for gossip, and I probably would have told them in person anyway.

This is not: a rail against Facebook, or against the concept of Complicated Relationships, or against the concept for Relationships. Mainly I was just perturbed that Ohsa was obviously getting some, and she's a total pain in the ass.