I SEEK YOU? NOT ANYMORE
When I was very young, I liked to write letters. I also liked to write short stories, notes, cards and especially took joy in jotting down my thoughts and feelings in my diary. I still remember what it looked like too: it had a cheap brass lock with a photo of Johnny Depp on the cover, clad in ripped jeans with the ‘21 Jumpstreet’ logo splashed on the brick wall behind him.
As I got older, and finally hit my teenage years, everyone started getting online with the World Wide Web. Everyone I knew was staking their claim at Hotmail with a clever e-mail address, and a few more found their online chat identity at ICQ (if you have to ask what that is, you’re too young to remember). At the time, blogs and online journaling seemed like a hugely “out there” idea, and only a select few moved from the concept of pen and paper to fingers and keyboard.
Photo: stevegarfield on Flickr
In fact, it wasn’t until many years later and I was in my early 20s that I, too, started to blog. This was in addition to the many so-called wonderful ways in which the internet allowed us to stay connected with those we know and reach out to new friends. Geocities, Friendster, Yahoo! Chat, MySpace, Classmates, Blogger, MSN Messenger, Facebook, WAYN - need I go on?
For most of our lives we got on just fine with paper stationary and telephones, so why now are we so heavily dependent on the internet?
With quite literally each passing day, I am starting to see the internet as more of a curse than a blessing. The very thing that makes getting in touch online so simple is also the same thing that exacerbates one of the biggest problems in human relations.
This topic has been cycling through my social circle a great deal as of late.
The online realm, in all its brilliance and downfalls, allows each person who logs on to appear, say, see and be all the things they choose to represent. Our names, e-mail addresses, location, appearance, ethnicity, sex and opinions can all be 100% fabricated. For every person who chooses to use this medium to contact with and express themselves to others in a manner that is entirely genuine, there is someone who exploits the anonymity of the internet to, essentially, act shitty and take zero responsibility for it.
Cyberspace requires absolutely no accountability.
So how can you weed out the gold from the ghastly? In truth, you can’t. Sometimes you just have to take the good with the bad; the pretty with the ugly. I suppose it’s true of all things in life and in relationships with others. As a friend recently wrote, maybe the best thing to do is surround your real life with those who are simply “kind hearted and supportive.” They’re the people who keep you grounded in a twisted world…whichever world that may be.
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7 Comments
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Well said, my friend.
This is a really great post.
In my opinion, the key is exactly what you said: “you just have to take the good with the bad.” I think that we’ve all felt the positive effects of the internet too- as a resource, as a way to meet incredible and like-minded people who we want to spend time with in “real life” etc.
We just have to do the best we can to stay grounded, spend time with positive people, support one another and try not to let the bullshit get us down.
Very interesting thoughts…
I think it’s important to remember that people can be very inauthentic in-person as well. A lot of individuals spend a lot of their lives ‘crafting’ the personality they present.
The only way to meet the good people is to simply MEET people - and keep a few good ones in your life to help you remember what they look like, so you’ll recognize new ones when you stumble upon them.
… at least that’s what I keep telling myself
Pick one of those ” shitty people” online. I bet they dont act that way in real life…scary part is, that’s their true self, and they finally found a forum to share their misory. It’s nothing short of scary.
Interesting post. I’ve been wandering the internet for years…from ICQ (which I miss dearly…I always loved the sounds it made when someone messaged you, or came online) to message boards, to MSN to blogs.
I myself don’t blog, but I read many other blogs. It’s strange how I feel like I know quite a few strangers just from reading and commenting every so often. They dont’ know me at all, which is why I find it strange. Even commenting on this post right now seems odd as I don’t know you, or anyone else who comments here. I’m a social person in the non-internet world, but I enjoy knowing others online as well. Especially those from the city I’m in. Makes me feel a bit more connected.
I love reading others perspectives and just taking in the world from different points of views. I guess the internet is an easy way of doing that.
For me, the internet has opened up a whole slew of possibilities of meeting new wonderful people (yourself included). Would I have been able to meet Phaedra, Rebecca, Jennifer, Pat, Matt, Oana, Ianiv, Arieanna, Duane, John Biehler, John Bollwitt, just to mention a few? Probably not. Most certainly I would say no, because I had never been immersed in the world of social media.
I think that (as others have said) the thing is just to keep yourself grounded and surrounded by the people who love you and care for you. The rest, gets quickly fixed. And sometimes it is good to disconnect yourself from all those media. For all the Twittering, MSN, GTalk and stuff I do, sometimes all I do is open a bottle of wine and watch TV
Which reminds me that I should stop writing this comment and go and watch Grey’s Anatomy’s season finale. McDreamy OR McSteamy? I have fantasized that I am naked with both of them (in the same bed). So, I don’t want to have to vote!
Well, the mean-spirited people make you all the more grateful for the kind-hearted. So I guess you can say they have their use, even if it’s a stretch.