Wednesday, 18 June 2008

• LOL, Are You More Honest Online?

  By Miss Double Shot
  
  I love talking to people online. There's a rhythm to the whole online conversation that's completely different from normal face-to-face speaking, and I love being able to think instead of having to speak right away - you can always say someone called you, you went to brush your teeth or take your pet dingo for a walk, whatever. There's also my beloved backspace key, which lets you say anything you want, erase it and try again.
  
  I live for the backspace key.
  
  And, being a completely nonconfrontational person, talking online can cause you to let your guard down and be more honest than you'd ever be otherwise. We chatters don't have to deal with the consequences of what we say directly . . . at least not right away.
  
  In college, I met a guy through a mutual friend, and we talked online before we ever met in person.
  
  This guy and I had particularly revelatory IM conversations every couple days and had a burgeoning relationship that never ended up going anywhere . . . but we aired out all of our grievances online and never talked about any of the issues we had in person. Here's the aftermath of a lengthy "are we friends or more?" chat.
  

  him: and... are things going to be awkward?
  me: have they been?
  him: ...no? I mean will anything that I just said make it more awkward?
  me: then no
  him: good. see, we had a good example of expressing oneself
  me: we are making progress
  him: we are. I actually feel better now
  me: good
  him: I mean, we are still where we were, but at least stuff is more out in the air
  

  Even now, if I go home and see him, we never talk as candidly as we did online; we're still friends, but the honesty and closeness we had before is completely gone.
  

  Are you more honest when you talk to people online?
  

  • 10:00 AM
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