The Two Yous

I had just finished watching the movie "Catfish", a docomentary about somene's expierence on facebook. I won't give away any spoilers (they say the less you know about the movie, the better the experience is, which was true) but I started thinking about how we live on the internet. When we're on the internet, we voluntarly give information of ourselves to the world. So, my question is: Does the "you" on the internet and the "you" in real life sync up? When I say this, I mean behaviors, attitude, etc.

------

For me, I'd like to beleive that the me on the internet and the me in real life are one in the same person. I try to incoperate my real personality onto here, but I will admit that there are some differences between the two. As I am more timid in real life, I've noticed that I'm more active (and sometimes hyper) on the internet. I also cannot articulate well in real life, as while I'm my computer, my way of speaking somewhat changes.

 

Honestly I would say there are more than just two sides here. People act a bit differently is various environments. I mean EraserRain used to joke with me that I was totally different in a chat room vs. the forum. And I know I'm different in RL if I'm with my friends or any of the four members of my family. Hell some of my more developed RP characters end up in my head in such a way that it feels like they think for themselves at times (if you want to count that). So right there I call tell you 7+ sides of me and I'm sure there are more.

I will admit however that, especially on sites like this where you can remain anonymous if you want to be, there is the oportunity for a more significant jump when you go online. You never have to worry much about this circle overlapping with real life ones, so you could make your personality here whatever you want it to be.

 

Trying to split yourself up is the wrong way to go about it. Even if you appear to people to be two completely different persons online and offline, they are both you. We all wear masks; some people have a mask for every occasion, while some stick to one and just tweak it. People always see that as a bad thing, but we all do it, so it can't be identified with good or evil. It loses meaning in that sense.

I am capable of expressing a range of emotions and behaviors both online and off, though I do tend to have very distinct sets. I don't see it as a bad thing; you only get one life, why shouldn't you choose how you behave around certain people? Granted, there are traits I express online that I wish I could off, and vice-versa, but that just boils down to personal development and doesn't really affect my answer. It just adds a new category to an age-old concept.

 

Plato himself suggested that complete annonomity and lack of consequences leads to antisocial and psychopathic behaviors.

I myself have two sides, but not that related to internet personas.

Rather, i'm a complete different person at home and at school, and i don't even know why myself.
At home i hardly even talk to anyone at the street, people even think it's because i study too much even though i don't at all.
Then at school i can't shut up when i start talking, and i tend to open myself up a whole lot more, even though the people there are mostly the same people i see whenever i'm home.

I also admit though, i do have a desire to lie more on the internet than at real life that i don't understand, but i think too much on pleasing others rather than thinking about myself , which leads me to randomly lie just to please people talking to me, perhaps to make them more friendly towards myself, perhaps to make them feel good, perhaps because in real life i just don't think it's fun to make fun of other due to the fact i tend to ignore people's opinions about me, i don't know.
Things like these are just too hard to understand.

 

I do think that I'm different (to an extent) online than I am in real life, but if I'm honest, I prefer my online self to who I am in person. I think it's a bit truer to who I am (or rather, who I want to be), but that's mostly because I've been struggling for a few years now with a huge disconnect between who I am in my head and who I come off as. But my identity crises are different stories for different times, haha.

However, I don't think I would say that there are two me's. It's all me, just different facets of myself, I guess. And as with anything else, there are sometimes ones that I don't like about myself.

But I do think it's true what everyone has said; no one is exactly the same online as they are in real life. Some might be closer than others, but it's a completely different environment. Just as you (probably) don't act 100% the same around family as you do around friends, or even that you don't act the same around some friends as you do others, no one is completely the same online as they are offline. And if you do, well, good for you I guess. If your personality and state of mind are secure enough to the point where you're amicable in any situation with that personality, then you're lucky. But I'm not sure as many of those sorts of people exist, and many people who think they belong to that may not.

 

Speaking personally here, there's only one me. I only have one face. Why should I present something different because I'm speaking to people in a different environment? I don't feel any differently talking here or anywhere else online than I do in any other environment. I'm still talking to real people living real lives with real problems, it's just here I can express my views and THEN people can choose to ignore them.

I honestly don't think that people necessarily present themselves in a different light online. There's just no reasoning for it. In certain circumstances yes I can understand, such as for the purpose of entertainment or in the case of talking to an unbiased 3rd party, but people's ways of acting change all the time, even on a daily basis depending on changes in mood, environment, situation and the like. I don't think it's sensible to try and bind a particular aspect of a person's social actions to their location.

Well, that's my view on it at least. I think I'm contradicting myself, but whatever, it's midnight. I should probably be asleep...

 

I was about to point that out...

I think you understand the argument but you might be interpretting it stronger than it was meant to be. To expand on my personal example. I've got one friend who's an interesting coktail of cognitive disabilities that his parrents never really knew what to do with and raising him only got worse with a divorce so I act as a mentor to him. My sister is a workaholic and tends to get stressed constantly and to her I flip between the secret keeper she can rant to and the joker to keep her mind off of stuff. My brother fell on hard times and made some bad decisions so I while he was taking crap from everyone else I was the one who would forgive him for nearly anything and love him no matter what happened. With other people I'm the religious nut, others I'm the walking encyclopedia, and so on and so forth. Sure there are trends, and sure all these masks are put on the same face, but what everyone sees in the end becomes a bit different. So I guess a good way to look at this is if you were to gather people who know you from different circles in your life and they were to start talking about you, how would various people react. Would everyone describe you the same way? Would there be any contridictions as everything overlaps? Don't look at this as yourself but as someone else sees you.

Now this is where tummer tells me I missed the point entirely, but w/e

 

When I say "We all wear masks," I don't really mean it to say that we all lie about ourselves or are somehow unfaithful to "who we really are." Like I said, there's a negative stigma with that word, "mask," that really doesn't belong there. When you break it down, on a very fundamental level we all tend to behave and express ourselves in a way that we personally determine. There are people who choose to say whatever their first instinct dictates, and there are people who meditate on what they say and choose their words more deliberately; both are "wearing masks" in the context that I'm putting forth.

So yes, people behave differently on the internet, but is online behavior intrinsically negative? More to the point, is it more "fake" than how we behave offline? Misty says she tends to prefer how she is online to how she is in person. I feel the same way about myself. I think the person I am online is more articulate, more like-able, and less clumsy in word and in deed than who I am in person, to name a few qualities. It represents an ideal and is as much a part of who I am as anything else. But then, I am working towards becoming in person the personality that I express online, because I just like it more; and the two have been known to overlap. There aren't "multiple mes:" There's just the one, who expresses himself through many outlets and filters. I have many masks, and you'll rarely catch me without one.

 

I am going to like you quite a bit, I think.

I have found that I act very differently around certain people, both online and off, and that usually has something to do with tension. Where I feel that people are tense, I am tense. Where they are not, I am not. But this is more true online than offline. On the other hand, I tend to balance things out. Where they are tense, I am calm, and vice versa. That is only in arguments, though. I handle conflicts in a very different manner from all other interactions.

On all other things and in all other ways, like my speaking style and various other quirks, I agree with Sforzato here. On whether or not masks are a good thing, I would like to offer up what Oscar Wilde had to say on the issue.

"Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth." ~ Oscar Wilde

 

As far as acting differently, everyone feels different in different situations and places, whether that be uncomfortable or relaxed.

As for myself, I try to act the same online as I do around my friends in real life. Since it is interaction through words and almost nothing more, it's hard to do that. Sometimes talking to other people on chat, I feel obliged not to do anything unless I'm "in" or my words will matter. I do this a lot on forums, because older members know each other so well, and then me, coming in as a new person, I don't know how uptight or loose the place is. That's how it is with Zelda-Infinite; we're a tight-nit message board and are very offensive to new members if they don't fit our "bill".

It's easier to do and say what I want in real life because I know the people, and even if I don't, I can see their face and instead of arguing with them on YouTube or somewhere like that, where they could be some thirteen-year-old who thinks he's cool and clever, I can actually say what I want and put some force or actual feeling behind it.

Anyone can offend on the internet, some people are just not who they pretend to be.

 

Well, that makes some sense until the last part there. If they are not who they pretend to be, then who are they at that point? Who is this person that they pretend to be? It sounds like you are arguing for multiple users there, and that makes little sense. They are the same person in both instances. It is up to you to mix the two together and discern the full nature of the person at that point. By definition, you cannot 'pretend to be' anyone but yourself. You can take on certain traits on purpose, but those traits still define you as a person, and they do not make into something other than yourself. You are the sum of your component parts, after all, and not one of them in particular.

 

Well, there are people who create different personas on the internet to make themselves seem important or "cooler", I guess. While it's true that you are only yourself, sometimes you try to be someone else on the internet. [sorry for the lack of an unrefined response, i'm not very good with these kinds of things. ;-;]

 

Oh, no problem. I use them as experiments. People are like any other machine. If you give an input, you will get an output. I test the waters with different inputs and learn about the machine in general through the various outputs that I get back. All of them are pieces of me, though. No replica is perfect, and most people do not try exact replicas, anyway. Each piece represents the person in some way. If you only see one, your view will not be as full, no matter which one you see. Trying to label one as real and another as fake is folly, because there is really no way to tell. No one is fully themselves at one time. They are more faceted than that.

 

I've been thinking about this theory, ever since I came on here.



In real life, believe it or not, Im actually the quiet type, and really kind. Yeah, think what you want, but that's who I am. In fact, I think Im more caring than the other people in my school, excluding the teachers. In here, I can be who I want, and act how I want. The reason I come here is to let myself be wild, which is why sometimes some of you find me funny, mean, or whatever, but know one thing. I don't mean anything I say when Im being an idiot, but if I say something nice while being like that, yeah. I like making people feel good about themselves.

Real life self: Quiet, easy going, kind, shy, funny (when Im not trying to be. In a good way.)

Online self: Crazy, stupid, loud. I dunno lol.

Yeah, I believe that some people out there have two selves when it comes to real life and online.

 

I'm only answering the initial question.

Yes, we do tend to act differently on the internet than in real life. I actually do the same; I'm more brave here than I am in real life. But here's the thing; I gradually changed to who I was on the net (and perhaps vice versa). I slowly began to become more brave. I began to be more confident in myself and began sharing my own two cents like I sometimes do in Fanfiction.net.

So in all, there never really is "two yous" because those "two yous" are simply you. Those "two yous" make you.

/smart ass.