After the horrible events in Paris on Friday the 13th, my Facebook feed is buzzing with heated discussions mixed up with heart felt posts.

We are grieving for people, who died in Paris attacks, but, thanks to Facebook, we’re grieving in a trendy way. With just a click, it’s so easy to cover your profile photo with a French flag. This didn’t feel right to me, not that people grieve for the victims of attacks, no, I also find that horrifying, but the way it was directed.

A couple of days ago 40 people died and more than 200 were injured in Beirut. Did we get an easy option to put up a Lebanese flag?

A couple of weeks ago a plane with 224 Russians crashed flying from Egypt to St. Petersburg above Sinai, terrorists taking responsibility for this crash. I understand that media often portrays Russians as evil villains nowadays, but there were 24 children on board, who clearly could not be connected with any kind of evil. Did Facebook offer a button to put up a Russian flag?

A couple of months ago more than 30 Brits were shot by a crazy psycho on a beach in Tunisia. British flag? Or Tunisian, perhaps?

There’s war in Syria, military conflict in Ukraine, uprisings in Egypt. Any of those flag by any chance?

Oh, we did have another clickable option – LGBT flag. I’m all up for their rights, but that’s not the point I’m trying to make here.

Media’s directing our grief, staging our protest or support, making it easy to show compassion in certain cases only, making it a trend. I did not use a French flag, although I was shocked just like everyone else. The same way I was shocked hearing about a plain crash or suicide bombings or shootings. I prefer to grieve in my own way, not following mass media trend. I don’t agree with the notion that media knows best when and what we should feel.

P.S. Here’s a picture I’m using now as my profile photo on Facebook.