Facebook's Metaverse is a new way to lie to yourself

Three years ago, Steven Spielberg released a futuristic movie about a young man whose daily life revolves around playing an alternative reality gaming world called "the OASIS." This movie, Ready Player One, portrayed how Earth's entire culture lived and breathed inside of that game. Players created alternative versions of themselves where they could be and do anything they wanted.

If they wanted to drive the Delorean time machine from Back to the Future or be a sword-wielding Samurai, they could do it or become it. It was implied that everyone on Earth played this game and made it their entire existence. Even though Ready Player One was a very fun movie to watch, especially if you're a Gen-Xer or early Millennial who loves 80's nostalgia, it also painted a very true and dark picture of where Big Tech is taking our culture and our future.

Several weeks ago Facebook announced that they were rebranding themselves with a new name and logo: Meta. Along with this new name, Facebook introduced their Ready Play One-world as the next stage of their company's evolution, the "Metaverse." The Metaverse is an alternative reality world that is planned and positioned to replace the current reality we live in. Users can be whatever and whomever they want without regard to truth or actual reality.

This new reality will change the way we look at relationships, society, information sharing and commerce. It's all but expected that other Big Tech giants like Google, Samsung and Apple will also join in on this new digital fantasyland. In fact, Apple is already working on their next big product, Apple Glass. Apple Glass is rumored to be Apple's way into the Alternative Reality world with their "smart glasses" technology.

I find it interesting that both the Hebrew and Arabic translation for "Meta" is "Death" because this new path they are taking will lead to the death of truth and reality. It is in the Metaverse that users will end up truly losing themselves as well as their sense of what's real and what isn't. Think about the adverse effects of what the average user will see in their daily life. They will first create an avatar to represent themselves. This avatar can be anything they want.

If the user is obese in the real world, they can be fit and flawless in the Metaverse. If the user wants to pretend to be another gender or even fantasy character, they can do that as well. Friendships and relationships will change as well as users build their new following in this world. They will only be known by the fake version they portray, creating a false sense of being and ignoring the truth. It's all but certain that Facebook will introduce China's Communist social scoring into this world as user activities are tracked, rated and points are assigned. Credit will also be affected by this as well since commerce will see a massive shift to take part in this new world.

One of the main issues that no one is really talking about yet is how sex traffickers and pedophiles will take advantage of this digital playground. Children and teenagers who participate in the Metaverse will become easy targets for grooming and trafficking. They won't be able to tell fact from fiction when it comes to the relationships they will form and thus will fall victim to their evil.

Facebook has done nothing to actually stop pedophiles and trafficking from targeting kids on their platform. Earlier this year it was revealed by a Facebook whistleblower how Facebook clearly knows that their platform promoted trafficking and human servitude and did nothing to stop it. Just imagine how the Metaverse will assist this vial acts and how many innocent youth will be preyed upon by these evil predators.

Facebook has a real problem with actual truth and we as a society have a real problem that they've never been held accountable. Alternative reality is fake and harmful. Being someone you are not a lie, and it will destroy your self-esteem and your identity. The only way that Facebook will be stopped is if we take a stand and leave them once and for all. There are plenty of alternatives out there. We created FreeSpace Social to be a platform where you can "Just Be You." Fred Rogers said it best "it is You I like," and we agree.

Jon Willis is the Co-Founder and CEO of FreeSpace Social, a new social media platform geared as an alternative to Facebook and Twitter. His professional background includes over 22 years experience in Commercial Real Estate Development as well as Digital Marketing. He is the proud father of 4 children and currently resides in Mesa, Arizona.