“Giving the illusion of an exemplary family”: the weariness of family WhatsApp groups

From constant pranks to worries about being forced to reply, family WhatsApp groups, which multiplied during the first lockdown, can quickly become cumbersome. Between the clash of generations and misunderstandings, some have fun while others prefer to leave.

In the spring of 2020, when the Covid-19 pandemic forced the French into lockdown, Léa, a 26-year-old engineer, and her family found themselves in the family home in Brittany. “Since we couldn’t invite the whole family to our house, we created a WhatsApp group with the extended family, a total of thirty people,” she testifies.

At the time of the first messages, he remembers the generation gap between the words of the little cousins ​​and those of the grandparents. “He was a good boy.” After the pandemic, this group also allowed them to host family lunches.

So far everything is going well.

Until January 2022 when one of his cousins ​​sends the family group a photo of his belonging to Generation Z, a group of young activists who support Eric Zemmour’s candidacy for the presidential elections. “She was really shocked by her position, but also that she displayed it so proudly in our family group,” recalls Léa. Previously, the family did not discuss politics on WhatsApp. “There are a few in the family who congratulated him, others got angry.”

“I ended up leaving the group”

Since this episode, the group has taken a completely different turn. “My parents kept sending invitations to organize family vacations, for example, but little by little their messages were drowning in an avalanche of political content and pointless debates,” the young woman continues.

“I come from a right-wing Catholic family, the debates during meals are usually lively, but always nuanced and respectful of everyone’s opinion,” he says. On WhatsApp, the hue seems to fade.

Marie also ended up leaving her family’s WhatsApp group. Tired of the notifications, of the pressure of having to constantly respond… she left quickly. “At the beginning we created this WhatsApp group to send each other nonsense or to find out who came to eat at home.” Much of his family lives in Dijon and the group has about thirty cousins ​​”not counting uncles and aunts.”

Punctuated by birthdays and some news, the discussion often remains superficial. “There’s a kind of pressure where you have to respond and post things. As soon as there’s a birthday, everyone responds right away, like I have to. I’m not going to want a distant cousin’s birthday if I have nothing to say to him.” , carried away.

“If I want to hear from you, I call the person directly and I don’t need a group to do it.” Marie points to a kind of falsehood: “give the illusion that we are an exemplary family.” One of her uncles and her mother asked her why she left the group. “There is a lot of litigation in my family in real life, and in this group it seems that none of it exists.”

“Saturation and Hyperconnection”

For Catherine Lejealle, sociologist and researcher at ISC Paris, there is “a kind of saturation and this affects both adults and the youngest”, she explains to Tech&Co. Like this American father who clearly expressed his displeasure with his family by saying that there was nothing interesting in these discussions. “And many people, young and old, recognized themselves in that discourse,” underlines the sociologist.

Catherine Lejealle defines these practices as hyperconnection. “In these groups, users are quickly bombarded with information that isn’t really important, that doesn’t add much.” From then on, a double constraint appears: “at the same time we can’t really leave the group since it’s still our family and at the same time we don’t want to answer.”

And the tool itself, namely WhatsApp, can create misunderstandings between generations: “on the one hand, WhatsApp is a great tool for older people, as it allows them to maintain a daily link with their family, especially since today a large part of them already know how to use it, “deciphers the researcher. “On the other hand, young people are so busy with messages and notifications during the day that they no longer even look at what is happening there.”

From a sociological point of view, these WhatsApp groups are totally opposed to what the linguist Roman Jakobson calls the phatic function: one of the functions of communication is to deliver information and reaffirm the link “unless the opposite happens,” he stresses. . Catherine Lejealle. With these groups you have to show your interest, constantly react, announce that you have understood the information. The family circle can become heavy.

Close your eyes… and block notifications

This is what Adrien was able to experience. “I understood that my family was homophobic thanks to WhatsApp.” The 24-year-old comes from Lyon. Five years ago he told his parents, “it was hard for them to accept it but now it’s going very well,” he says, smiling.

The rest of his family like his cousins ​​or uncles and aunts are not aware. “In the family’s WhatsApp group, many share content they see on social networks, including Facebook. They are mostly my uncles who are sixty years old.”

Among this shared content, “sometimes there are racist and homophobic posts. At first, Adrien does not react, very rarely responds to messages in the family conversation. “Only for birthdays or happy new year.”

After coming out to your parents, nothing changes, “and I didn’t want to create a controversy in the conversation by telling them that they were homophobic. But what hurt me the most was seeing that my parents did not react and sometimes even responded to these insulting messages.” . For now, you have disabled notifications without leaving the group.

He remains attached to this group now that he lives in Rennes. “It makes me laugh when I see my grandparents putting four smiley faces on a message, my parents don’t understand why GIFs are now out of date and when my cousins ​​still in their teens use words I don’t understand, I feel old.” he says he with a smile.

When seniors try their hand at voicemail

In Louise’s family, it’s a bit of this same laid-back attitude that defines her WhatsApp group. Her family is scattered all over France “so it helps to keep in touch. I’m fine that this group exists, it’s just that the generations above don’t know how to use it at all,” she amused herself by clarifying. . Incomprehensible voice messages from grandparents, poorly framed selfies from uncles… The conversation is carried out mainly by the elderly. And automatic proofreaders can fail them.

Louise’s family WhatsApp group has 59 members and includes all distant cousins ​​and all generations. “The younger generation of cousins, we have silenced notifications and sent almost nothing.” Louise goes there from time to time to see what is being said. It is especially birthdays that are wished for, births and marriages that are announced.

However, this group makes it possible to strengthen family ties: “if family members go somewhere for the weekend, they can meet other family members. Another anecdote, we have a family home in Lorraine and every time we a member of our family goes there, they have to report it so that we always receive the same photo, at different times of the year, of the path that leads to the house”, says Louise a little tired.

Recently, an aunt sent a Crit’air scam SMS and asked about the group how she should proceed to pay. “Obviously everyone responded that it was above all necessary to do nothing!” To communicate with her cousins, she uses other channels. “It is rather the parents who give me essential and interesting family news,” she concludes.