Terminally Online: You Can't Put the Genie Back in the Bottle

[Midwest]

This is something I've been meaning to write about for a while. That is what we're living through right now, the conditions, environment, whatever you want to call it - is something I don't think we've ever seen before. A while ago, I had this thought while at work: "How many people actually are aware of or use Internet terminology?" Mind you, most of the people I work with are fairly young - but their Internet presence is limited to phone apps such as Snapchat or Wordle. I had to explain to one of my co-workers what a forum/messageboard was, and she didn't understand it nor did she get the appeal because it didn't seem "fun." This got me thinking about the various distinctions and words we've come up with to separate ourselves from others. "Normie," "normalfag," "NPC," are all words no one in their right mind would use in the "real world." The fact that I had to explain in detail what a forum was and how it functions to my co-worker, shows she lives in a separate reality from where I am. The Internet for people like her, is just an extension of her interests (namely her friends, her family - her social life). If she uses an phone app to play a game, she is not using it to waste time or to gain points on another app like Fetch or Freecash, she is just using it as another means to communicate and share a fun activity with her friends.

One thing I've come to realize as I've gotten older is just how terminally online I really am. This isn't something that happens overnight, this develops over a very long period of time. My own childhood, for instance had a lot of exposure to video games and the Internet at the age of five. I look back on my own past and see a lot of wasted time and potential - a number of kids were in clubs or in sports, plenty of them had large friend groups. I used to think that children had "natural inclinations" for certain subjects until I learned just how important the parents are in the child's life. I didn't get to have that "idealic childhood" because I did not have a very stable family and so I would retreat to where I felt safe - which was my bedroom playing video games or exploring the Internet. Even in high school where I met my best friends, I had one foot in reality and another in the Online Space. My real self was timid and socially awkward, but with the Internet I was able to ignore my anxieties of talking to girls by instead choosing to watch pornography in my room, not having to think about the consequences of my actions for a long time.

The reason I'm giving this lengthy backstory is because my co-worker and I live in completely different worlds. With the "Wild West" of the Internet, there are things I've seen, typed, read about that no one 30 years ago would think to do. What kind of person honestly even thinks about "incels" or being "blackpilled"? Can you imagine having a normal conversation with someone at the checkout counter at your local grocery and you use a phrase like "beta male soyboy" to describe someone?
"See that beta over there? He needs to start looksmaxing, going to the gym, start mewing, stop listening to cringe leftoid podcasts and then he can start pulling Stacies!"
Now imagine the only thoughts you have throughout your day are not about what's in front of you, not about any observation about the world around you - but the only thoughts you have are what's reflected back at you from your social media feed, from those YouTube videos you watch, and from the Discord community you frequent. And if you've lived like this for a very long time, what are the consequences?

This is where it gets even more troubling in terms of psychology/spirituality. I have not done any in-depth research on the psychology of paraphilias, however - I am speaking from my own experience as someone who had a terrible pornography addiction in my teen and young adult years which is only now starting to improve. Just for a moment, think about very specific paraphilias that would not have existed without the Internet. Think about how many people are exposed to something they likely would never have even thought about - now, that thought - that idea - becomes an extremely strong desire that they cannot let go of. Vore - a paraphilia that only exists because of the Internet - is not real. It cannot happen to you and you have never experienced anything like it. The only thing that happened (if you do have a vore fetish) is that you saw a simulation of it on the Internet. My best guess as to what the person with the vore fetish is trying to simulate ("being swallowed") is an experience or feeling of returning to the comfort of their mother's womb. Here's Desmond Morris explaining the tactile experience of the infant in the womb from his book "Intimate Behavior"

My main concern with all of this is - does anyone want this? Did that friend of yours really want to be an otaku with a wall of unfinished manga and a collection of FOTM waifu figures on his self? Don't you think it's weird that that 47 year old neighbor hosts six hour livestreams talking about Disney Star Wars and the MCU all day? The real problem is that once you've adapted yourself to being terminally online - there is no going back. You've had those thoughts, shared those posts, downloaded those videos. It's a part of your DNA now. You did not consent to see that violent, disgusting image that was posted on 4chan - but it was posted by that anon who intentionally derailed the thread "for the lulz". Now that is with you forever and you've either become so desensitized you don't even think about it or you actively become a participant to "troll" someone else in another anonymous thread.

So what do we do? What's the response? For me at least (or at least what I've been doing) is a type of self-evaluation. Taking a big step back and taking a long time to reflect on my own experiences and genuinely asking myself: "Am I okay with this?" I have access to so much information that has helped me in recent years, some in a very positive way, but others in a very negative way as demonstrated above. I'm not going to say "touch grass" because I know why I'm terminally online (it is a choice I make) and I know why people prefer the Internet to the real world. But I'm not going to delude myself into thinking that living my life entirely online and building my "online persona" will in any way be a substitute for a real life and a genuine personality. I can't give advice to end this post because there is no success story here, this is something to think about from someone who would like to live a normal life but who realizes it's too late and is unsure just how difficult is will be to become "normal" again.

 

[Digital Cheese]

I could say "touch grass" all I want, although even if I followed it whenever I'm not forced to, it would be hard for me to say it would change much quickly. Sure, you can quit the internet entirely, but it takes a while to undo degeneracy and retardation. I can notice this as well within myself to an extent too, although (hopefully) not to the same extent.

Rather than quitting entirely or using online personality IRL, I'd rather just keep the two seperate. The online DC I see more as an extension of the IRL me, one of which that's able to be more honest and/or edgy, depending on how I feel within that moment, rather than seperate entirely or a 1-to-1 version of my IRL self as the normies. It's almost impossible to avoid tech entirely unless you're well-established (land+house, terminally offline, etc) and never interact with society again, which while the latter I'd love to do for the most part, the former is unlikely and it's pretty much a requirement to do the latter.

I think it's best to master this technology instead, use it to your advantage rather than detriment. Sure, you can jack off to big boobed goth girls 5 times a day, but you can also use the internet for something more useful (God, programming, etc). Block yourself off from unholy things, most notably pornography as that is an extreme drain on sanity. You'll be horny for a bit, especially if you have a ton of testosterone, but it'll save you SO much trouble. Even if you jack off again a month later, you'll probably not have as strong of an addiction nor as strong of a liking for fetishes.

Take everything you can offline. Email, document-writing, etc. And avoid anything proprietary like social-media, and even some FOSS things if they aren't exactly a benefit (for example, fedi is basically non-tracking social-media, doomscrolling is easy there too). I've been on the journey to spending most of my time actually offline, just connecting real quickly when necessary then going right back off. Still have some things to do though. Outside of 3DSPaint, I could actually do everything I need to via RSS+Email (which i can just quickly check) and everything else offline, only going online when i want to publish or view something i dont have downloaded. A bit annoying to get used to, but certainly possible. Forums are probably fine due to discussions being longer, but it depends on the forum so I'd just watch out there.

Hard to say what to exactly do of course, it really just depends on the person. But to sum it up:
- Do What You Can Offline
- Do What Needs Internet Via The Most Efficient Means Possible
- Barricade Yourself From Pornography, Gore, Etc
- Drink Water, Eat Healthy
- Read The Holy Bible

3 makes you pretty sane by default, 4 I'd highly recommend as well. 1+2 make your little usage of the internet actually enjoyable, 5 I'd recommend for all but I doubt all would do it. If you're still wanting to get vored in a maid outfit no matter what you try to do, for however long you do so, then try to avoid thinking about it entirely but if that doesn't work, you're screwed.

Touch grass can be said over and over, but I don't think it will actually work for many. Although it's worth a shot, so if you don't want to be online, try it.

 

[Midwest]

Rather than quitting entirely or using online personality IRL, I'd rather just keep the two seperate. The online DC I see more as an extension of the IRL me, one of which that's able to be more honest and/or edgy, depending on how I feel within that moment, rather than seperate entirely or a 1-to-1 version of my IRL self as the normies. It's almost impossible to avoid tech entirely unless you're well-established (land+house, terminally offline, etc) and never interact with society again, which while the latter I'd love to do for the most part, the former is unlikely and it's pretty much a requirement to do the latter.

This is something very strange I've noticed about myself I'm sure others have noticed. Online, I'm able to be more "genuine" with complete strangers and with my own expression (thoughts/feelings, art, writing) than I am in the real world. When this realization hit me, as well as reading about my own loneliness and the multiple problems associated with it - I went through a very painful grief period. My short stories for instance are very personal reflections of the type of world I'd like to live in - societies and nations with their own lore, tribes, and rituals. It's my own fantasy in which I can find comfort in because I can withdraw into that world anytime and not think about just how awful this reality is. The problem is that because these stories are so personal - I just can't see myself sharing them with someone like a family member who might get the wrong impression or someone who already has a negative opinion about me. So the Internet gives me the option to write, create, and post under a pseudonym. A pseudonym I'm in complete control of and can delete anytime I want without a trace (so to speak).

I think it's best to master this technology instead, use it to your advantage rather than detriment. Sure, you can jack off to big boobed goth girls 5 times a day, but you can also use the internet for something more useful (God, programming, etc). Block yourself off from unholy things, most notably pornography as that is an extreme drain on sanity. You'll be horny for a bit, especially if you have a ton of testosterone, but it'll save you SO much trouble. Even if you jack off again a month later, you'll probably not have as strong of an addiction nor as strong of a liking for fetishes.

This is also true. It's why I'm so thankful for having the sacrament of confession where I can be open with my priest and say: "I know why I looked at porn last week, it didn't make me happy, and I am sorry." I don't think anyone in their right mind would actually want a niche fetish that is tied to the Internet. Or any paraphilia for that matter. So in terms of blocking unholy content - I think it's important we think about what that means. It means not just using a filter that blocks pornographic websites, but also monitoring our own speech as well as who we associate with. If I'm trying my best to maintain some semblance of normalcy - why on earth would I ever talk to someone who frequently uses a word like "boykisser"? I didn't mention that word in the OP - but that word in particular is repulsive and those who use it in a "comedic" or "humorously erotic" tone are the most vile people I've had the misfortune of coming into contact with because of Twitter (another reason to leave social media).

 

[Digital Cheese]

This is something very strange I've noticed about myself I'm sure others have noticed. Online, I'm able to be more "genuine" with complete strangers and with my own expression (thoughts/feelings, art, writing) than I am in the real world. When this realization hit me, as well as reading about my own loneliness and the multiple problems associated with it - I went through a very painful grief period. My short stories for instance are very personal reflections of the type of world I'd like to live in - societies and nations with their own lore, tribes, and rituals. It's my own fantasy in which I can find comfort in because I can withdraw into that world anytime and not think about just how awful this reality is. The problem is that because these stories are so personal - I just can't see myself sharing them with someone like a family member who might get the wrong impression or someone who already has a negative opinion about me. So the Internet gives me the option to write, create, and post under a pseudonym. A pseudonym I'm in complete control of and can delete anytime I want without a trace (so to speak).

Indeed.

I don't see too much of a problem with only using the internet for certain discussions depending on the extent of it, although it's obvious that after a certain point, it can be a pretty major issue. In my case, I don't really care about what others think about me, although I'd prefer to have a good 95% of what I have said not read out to me one day in the future lmao. I'm far from full-anon under this pseudonym, but it's better than having my full-name behind the posts. Not too concerned about job-applications with it, although still nice to not have to "run in circles" per se, in order to post what I want.

This is also true. It's why I'm so thankful for having the sacrament of confession where I can be open with my priest and say: "I know why I looked at porn last week, it didn't make me happy, and I am sorry." I don't think anyone in their right mind would actually want a niche fetish that is tied to the Internet. Or any paraphilia for that matter. So in terms of blocking unholy content - I think it's important we think about what that means. It means not just using a filter that blocks pornographic websites, but also monitoring our own speech as well as who we associate with. If I'm trying my best to maintain some semblance of normalcy - why on earth would I ever talk to someone who frequently uses a word like "boykisser"? I didn't mention that word in the OP - but that word in particular is repulsive and those who use it in a "comedic" or "humorously erotic" tone are the most vile people I've had the misfortune of coming into contact with because of Twitter (another reason to leave social media).

Ye, that is something pretty helpful from what I can tell. Almost all crazy fetishes seem to come from the internet, or at the very least pornography in general, however most people access it via the internet exclusively.

I would argue to an extent "blocking unholy content" includes "not saying things that are unholy", although I will say that blocking holy content may actually help with your speech as well, assuming you try to avoid thinking about unholy things. You will have less (unholy) influence to affect your thinking, thus it's not as hard to avoid it. Still will infect your mind for a while, but it's better than nothing.

Also I fucking hate "boykisser", i hope people who say "boykisser" unironically face the wall.

 

[SaturnianWarlock]

Isn't the blackpill/incel stuff going mainstream nowadays on sites like tiktok? I find it hard to believe that there are people that haven't heard of forums and imageboards. Browsing the internet, I've been exposed to many things and ideas that I may not have thought about, as well as seeing unusual videos on 4chan, but I don't really think it as a bad thing. Some of those ideas can expand your thinking can change the way you see things. I do talk to my friends about the weird stuff I see, but it's never the extremely unusual things, I just keep those to myself. But I think it has made me seem weird to others

 

[Mamisu]

I used to be a normal kid until around 15, when a friend showed me 4chan. Then I just became obsessed with it for some reason, and anime. But even so, I managed to have friends, play sports, get a girlfriend, go to concerts etc. I think it's pretty easy to put a mask on and pretend to be "normal" if there is such a thing. Trust me man, everyone is weird in their own ways. Most people are way more critical of themselves than others I think.

 

[NW_Cryptid]

I'll just go ahead and toss my two cents in here, I think about this very differently but I mean no disrespect so please don't take what I'm about to say as being argumentative.

It sounds like you're unhappy with your time spent on the internet, or like you're unhappy with the virtual/digital world and it's culture. That's honestly fine, it's not going to be for everyone. I'm not a religious person myself, but I understand how to someone who is; the rampant availability of things like porn might be an issue. I understand that to someone who feels alienated by society but doesn't enjoy internet culture might have this weird sense of not belonging to either, but finding comfort here.

I don't want to take up too much time on this, but I do want to say that as someone born during the sort of real birth of household internet, who grew up with it. I consider there to be 2 selves, you have the you that exists in physical reality; when you walk away from the computer, when you're not on your phone, when you're offline you are one version of yourself. That version of yourself is likely a very intimate existence, not in the sense of physical intimacy, but in the sense that you feel very close to it being the real you. This is likely because you can't just delete yourself and make a new you whenever you want. You can end it all, but then it's over; you get one shot with this. You "made your account" and now you have to deal with it. Sure you can move, you can change your name, you can get plastic surgery, you can change your religion. You can do whatever you want, you still only have the one body, you are constantly on a ticking clock, growing older; trying to stay in the loop with a certain group of friends, trying to stay connected at work; etc. The other you exists exclusively in the virtual/digital reality, which I know sounds like some insane cult talk but trust me when I say I mean this in the most mundane sense. When I say Virtual/Digital reality all I mean is the space we as a human race have collectively created that exists exclusively accessible through the internet.

Take Agora Road for example, this website is real right? We're accessing it right now to type this out or to read it, so sure; the website is real. However I cannot physically go here, I can't exist within Agora Road. I can ACCESS it, and it exists SOMEWHERE. But it exists in a form of data strings, code, 1's and 0's my computer can translate into patterns of light that I can read in a way that makes sense to my brain. If reality is defined as "the state or quality of having existence or substance." Then I'd argue it fits that bill fairly well, it exists; it has substance, however it exists in a different place. If you've ever looked up the map of the internet you'll sort of get an idea of what I mean. We have created an entire reality online, one in which we were able to recreate ourselves; give ourselves a totally anonymous identity. We can identify ourselves however we want to here.

If I don't want you to know anything about my personal life outside of this website; I simply don't divulge that information to you. I can create an identity around my interests, you know my voice only through my posts; you have no way of knowing who I am, what my sex, race, height, etc actually is. You know me as I tell you of me, you know me by my screen name. This is my second self, who exists only in the virtual/digital reality created online.

I believe that there comes a point, where someone crosses over a line, they don't do it intentionally per se; rather they sort of accidentally stumble into it. Once that line is crossed you become someone who exists online and offline, and that is very much a ratio. Think of it like this, there's only 24 hours in a day, if I spend 14 hours offline, and 14 online (without accounting for sleep and such, come on it's an example let's not get too technical here.) Then you could argue my ratio is split perfectly 50/50 right? Someone in my mind becomes sort of chronically online when 2 things happen, the first is that their ratio is split with the majority being online to offline, say at least 75|25 online to offline or worse. The second is that they adopt the culture of their online space OVER the culture of their offline space.

A lot of people on this thread are saying that it's easy to mask as a sort of "normal" person, and I think this comes from these people experiencing more of an even split. I can't say for sure, by nature of this all; I don't know their personal lives. However it would stand to reason in my mind that their split is more balanced, and they likely still use the culture of their offline living space when offline, and as a result of that more balanced split; can still tap into their online culture when online.

I think for a lot of people there is this sort of guilt, we don't get to choose how we're born. We don't pick our sex, we don't get to pick our race; our financial situation, or even our geographical location. All of which can effect our lives in some major ways. However, internet is the great equalizer on that front. Say you're a woman but you're really into a lot of shit guys are into? If you walk into a discussion on the topic in real life and everyone immediately pegs you as a woman who doesn't fit the vibe, they're not likely going to give you the time of day. However on a forum where you're allowed to have whatever pfp you want and you can just leave your sex out of it entirely, you can discuss whatever with people and they'll judge you based on your words. I don't think it's always a matter of sex or race issues, but I use this as an example of how the internet's anonymity factor likely lead to the accidental creation of the second self, this online proxy persona with which you access online spaces.

It sounds to me like this sense of guilt comes from confiding in this second self to get us through rough times. We can be whoever we want here, and if it doesn't work out we can just hop sites; keep checking out different sites, servers, or communities until we find one who will accept us for even our darkest thoughts. Once we do, it's not hard to then explore those parts of our mind we would otherwise keep buried. It's the quick momentary pleasure that helps us get through the stress or isolation, it's the feeling that we belong somewhere when we didn't belong anywhere else. Except the guilt comes back when we try to adjust that ratio back to being balanced. Now we see that we have spent so much time online, become so used to the culture in our online spaces; that going back feels unnatural and wrong.

So now we're racked with this sort of guilt over having indulged in the first place, because as OP put it; "you can't put the genie back in the bottle" now that you know this self exists, and you can return to it whenever you want, it's hard to invest time in the physical self. Especially because again you're working with what you were given. Perhaps you were given a self that doesn't reflect you, but you can't do anything about it. How many times have you thought "I wish my life was different" only to return to the internet where your life is different.

I will say that while I can't personally understand the experience as someone who's religious; I can understand where it might be harder for someone with a religious background as I'm fairly sure there's not a lot of teaching related to the internet. However I'm sure the teachings that do exist are likely not favorable towards the degeneracy that has become the norm online. I don't want to get too into it, as while I may not be religious myself; believe it or not I really don't have anything against people who are. I sort of have that "live and let live" mentality about it; so long as you're not at my throat for not being religious; I won't be at yours for your religion.

At the end of the day I have come to terms with my guilt, I have finally found balance in my life between my online self and my physical self. It was easy for me because of the fact I'm content with both my physical identity and my online identity; but I get where it's not so easy for everyone. I had to tell myself you only get one shot at life, or at least only one that you can remember; so there's no point in me feeling bad about how I'm living. If I feel I'm spending too much time online, then I set goals for myself, stick to a routine and find ways to keep myself from always going back to it. I also make a point to not beat myself up over if I do go back to it sooner than I'd like. The internet is a comfort, I may not fit in at work or whatever, but online I can just go find a community where I do; and that's a nice feeling. There's no shame in wanting to be accepted and belong somewhere. That's a very human instinct, we aren't all cut out to be isolated all the time. Though sometimes that does help, I tend to do my best to isolate online every so often. Go listen to music, do something on my computer but not online. Games have been a help for that, because my brain has an easier time differentiating fantasy from reality. If I find myself feeling like my online to offline ratio is getting bad I'll boot up some old elder scrolls or something, play through a bit of Oblivion and it helps to remind myself "that's my character, that's not ME; I'm ME." I know that might sound stupid, but you likely still identify with your online handle, your second self is as much you as your physical self. That's not inherently a bad thing, but it can lend itself to sort of forgetting just how much time you spend here, it can make it easy to pick up the culture and carry it with you away from the computer. In Oblivion I have a clear and distinct understanding of what is happening in the game, and what's happening in real life. I can play the game where I might steal, and murder. Then I can turn off my computer and go to the store with the understanding that no one else here likely knows about the jokes or memes I've been laughing at in Oblivion, if I just blurt out "stop right there criminal scum" no one is going to laugh, they might just get offended or be scared that an insane man is in the Walmart. It's easy for me to think this way because my brain can make the clear distinction of "you're not going to go in there and steal or murder, this is a Walmart. How stupid would I have to be to confuse this with a game?" It makes the understanding of that online|offline ratio a part of my everyday decision. It makes it known to me how much time and energy I'm spending online vs offline, and it helps me to keep track even if I'm not enjoying the results I'm now understanding. Sure I might be spending too much time online, but if I'm at least aware of that; I can then take steps necessary to making me realize that this conversation is happening on a web forum, and when I get off the computer and go have dinner with my wife and talk about work or whatever, THAT conversation is happening in physical reality and I need to transition to that culture.

Anyways hopefully this sort of makes sense. I think there's absolutely ways to co-exist with both selves, even if you're religious as I don't think the second self or the self-created identity is anything spiritual or anti-religious per se. However I understand where you're coming from, it sounds like just being exposed to the internet has off-handedly made you aware of parts of yourself you're unhappy with, which is entirely fine. Being aware of those things is necessary if you want to actually correct those thoughts. It may not be easy to do so; but you can't do it at all if you don't even know they exist within you. A part of coming to terms with the self is understanding the self.

Feel free to disregard all of this if I just sound insane to you, I'm not going to be offended or anything lol.

 

[Member]

Damn, that's a lot of words (although I read every single one). You could've trimmed the thread to just the last two paragraphs alone.

Being an annoying cunt aside, yeah being chronically online isn't something you can just sweep away, I can speak for myself. But what if you weren't meant to be normal? I can already make the assumption for everyone here, by virtue of being in a niche forum alone, that they stood out from their peers at one point or another. Maybe the real factor is who you personally are. The fact that you chose to write a long-winded essay on things you have observed, in such a detailed and impersonal way, tells me that you are an intellectual person. If the internet weren't here, you would probably be doing something else like reading books, which is what people like us used to do and still do. That's not to say that fitness isn't important, or that your childhood couldn't have been better (it definitely could've), but that perhaps this retrospection is too narrow.

If you already have a good diet and stay fit, which I presume apply to you, then there isn't any reason to forsake the internet as if it were the devil. If you think you use it to an unhealthy degree, it is possible to simply fill up your day to day time with other activities. What I think is most important thing to understand is this: if you feel that you have to actively try to be normal, then it is too late. It's time to read the writing on the wall and appreciate your fate. Society's view that what is good is what is normal is very tragic, which is why I hate retards on the internet who unironically virtue signal their "normality" as if it's something inherently good. I would say you should strive for what is good, rather than what is normal.

 

[Akenshi]

Fun fact... people who say or know the term "touch grass" are terminally online already.

 

[Haus444]

I think the issue is overstimulation and not the internet itself. Of course the internet is designed to be stimulating as possible. I wouldn't be so fatalistic if I were you though. There are heroin addicts and brain trauma victims that are able to rewire their brains back to being normal, thinking that its >over because you've been staring at a screen too long is unlikely. Just like with any other addiction, it takes work and time to kick but it's doable.

 

[Midwest]

I think for a lot of people there is this sort of guilt, we don't get to choose how we're born. We don't pick our sex, we don't get to pick our race; our financial situation, or even our geographical location. All of which can effect our lives in some major ways. However, internet is the great equalizer on that front. Say you're a woman but you're really into a lot of shit guys are into? If you walk into a discussion on the topic in real life and everyone immediately pegs you as a woman who doesn't fit the vibe, they're not likely going to give you the time of day. However on a forum where you're allowed to have whatever pfp you want and you can just leave your sex out of it entirely, you can discuss whatever with people and they'll judge you based on your words. I don't think it's always a matter of sex or race issues, but I use this as an example of how the internet's anonymity factor likely lead to the accidental creation of the second self, this online proxy persona with which you access online spaces.

So this is where I think we're going to differ a little bit. I want people to be more aware that when we're communicating with each other over the Internet, especially in a spiritual sense, that there is another person - another soul - across that Online Space. You mentioned how the Internet can open you up to your "second self" as it were, especially with regards to anonymity (i.e. anyone can be anyone). Yes, you are reading this right now and know me as "Midwest" and not as my real name. But when I talk to people on here or anywhere else, I really am trying to best communicate to others how I really would talk to them in real life. You brought up a scenario of a woman who happens to be into "guy things" and how that person may feel safer expressing her interests anonymously rather than outing herself as a woman. But my question is - what does this lead to, exactly? Who is she talking to, who does she confide in, how deep does this rabbit hole go? Someone out there may convince her that she is actually a transgender "FtM" all along and her inclination to like guy things is really just her "true self" coming out. Tomboys can't exist, after all! Just think about how horrible the discourse around women right now is; "girlboss" this, "feminist" that. I can only imagine how awful it is for fairly normal woman, having to explain again and again how they're not like those crazies you see on TikTok that make them look absolutely horrendous.

It sounds to me like this sense of guilt comes from confiding in this second self to get us through rough times. We can be whoever we want here, and if it doesn't work out we can just hop sites; keep checking out different sites, servers, or communities until we find one who will accept us for even our darkest thoughts. Once we do, it's not hard to then explore those parts of our mind we would otherwise keep buried. It's the quick momentary pleasure that helps us get through the stress or isolation, it's the feeling that we belong somewhere when we didn't belong anywhere else. Except the guilt comes back when we try to adjust that ratio back to being balanced. Now we see that we have spent so much time online, become so used to the culture in our online spaces; that going back feels unnatural and wrong.

This is something I didn't touch on in the OP. I've only done some light reading on topics somewhat related to this subject - so my thoughts aren't fully formulated quite yet - but here's what really fascinates me about this whole thing. Ask anyone here - ask me if you want. Do we really want to neglect the world and confide in the Online Space to access our true self? As a relatively trusting person - I really have no qualms sharing my own personal experiences with people, even those I haven't met. Again, this goes back to the theology of seeing the human dignity of the other person behind the screen. What is troubling, however, is that at times - this feels like my only option. Shouldn't that bother us? Biologically, psychologically, spiritually, whichever way you look at it - we were meant to be with people. I was born to look into my mother's eyes when I was an infant. Our parents taught us to speak, we learned how to listen, we slowly learned the subtleties of body language. I am a person born to talk, listen, share secrets, experiences, laughter, with other people. I can't do this through a device, a machine that barely feels human. I should be able to be my full self with another person, and the fact that we're not doing that is what is leading us right now to the loneliness epidemic.

I think you brought up a lot of interesting points in your post. Yes, it is true that the Online Space does allow a significant amount of people to feel comfortable and to be more open and to express themselves in a way only they know how. That's fine and I don't have any plans to control the behavior of people. What I do take issue with is how unregulated it all is. In the past there were standards for social behavior, whether that be by a Church or through general norms of that society you lived in. Break the moral law and you were punished. Nowadays we're seemingly comfortable with the Internet and Internet Culture to our own detriment. As I mentioned earlier, thoughts that you never had, words you never uttered or heard in your life, horrific Liveleak videos you should never have seen - are now a part of you. There is no factory reset in your internal Operating System to clean you of that filth - once it is there it is there forever - it's a part of your identity. The longer you stay and let "Internet Culture" become a part of you, the more susceptible you become to becoming anyone or anything the Internet wants you to be.

 

[Ardea]

People here have already made most of the points I would have made, so I'd just like to add that viewing this

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mfMrVKnGzwg


in current year is almost chilling in a way.

 

[Akenshi]

People here have already made most of the points I would have made, so I'd just like to add that viewing this

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mfMrVKnGzwg


in current year is almost chilling in a way.

It certainly is fitting that due to YouTube Kids, there are no comments anymore. So many who told about their memories and experiences with the things they grew up with just got silenced. Sad.

 

[Ardea]

It certainly is fitting that due to YouTube Kids, there are no comments anymore. So many who told about their memories and experiences with the things they grew up with just got silenced. Sad.

It's something the boy said at the beginning. "Now that I've gotten on the internet, I'd rather be on my computer than doing just about anything!"

I've effectively lost many friends to internet escapism. I wonder what would have become of them if they hadn't had that ever-present, artificial dopamine source. Perhaps they've have been incentivized to improve themselves/their circumstances. Perhaps not. But now we'll never know. They can self medicate and vegetate in front of their computers nearly every hour of every day.

 

[Ross_Я]

I constantly wonder if I belong to the "terminally online" crowd. I've been exposed to the internet at the young age as well, and I have spent a lot of times with video games rather than talking to girls or whatever... and I had a severe porn addiction as well - fuck, I probably still do have some of that left, even though I fight it somewhat successfully in my own humble opinion.
That being said...

Point one:
In general, I'm not socially awkward. Never have been. Talk to people, random people, people you know, people you don't know, people with different kind of skin, people who do not know your language - whatever, been there, done that. It's not that hard, interesting even. It's just, talking with most people is absolute boredom, you cannot tell them about the recent movie from the 80's you dug out or even translated yourself, cannot talk to them about the old Star Wars or Rogue Trader-era Warhammer, cannot talk to them about history of ancient cultures, cannot talk to them even about music properly, and don't even ask me about trying to talk to people about technical things, like nuances of a car engine or python coding or the ways you can fix a piece of electronics or something. Why? Most of them simply don't care! Their hobbies are fucking primitive and boring - if they even have one in the first place.
And of those who care ot who have hobbies - well, a lot of them invite nothing but pity, because their life is work 5/2, plus beer and football or whatever on the weekends. Working class heroes, as John Lennon said - all their willpower spent on nothing but work and supporting their existence, and all their life spent onto nothing. I know what I'm talking about - I have friends like that. They are good people, often really skilled in their areas, but trying to hold a conversation with them - oh, fuck... It's nearly impossible. It's good if we connect on some topic for half an hour or so, but that's about the best time I can make out of that...

Point two:

I look back on my own past and see a lot of wasted time and potential - a number of kids were in clubs or in sports, plenty of them had large friend groups.

And where are they now?
I had friends like that as well, going places while I was trying to anderstand how Action Replay works on my PS2, and so? I ended up just about as good as most of them - heck, I'd even say better than about half of them. The only potential you can really get out of stuff like clubs or whatever are social connections, which is a huge issue in this country - you barely can get a good job without connections. Even I get most of my part-time earnings through connections and nothing but connections. It's not right, really, but you barely can amount that to "potential" of some kind.
The fact that in order to live right you have to kiss the right ass at the right time has barely anything to do with any kind of potential. You can probably draw a line to charisma and, I don't know, your abilities to talk to people in some kind of a special, right way, but that's a fleeting thin thread. If anything, it kind of sounds like "if you went to clubs and understood people, you could've probably start a cult right now, make people sell their houses in your name and be on easy street". Sounds just about as far-fetched.
Anyway, the point is that the society that distributes its wealth and workplaces based on personal connections and charisma rather than actual skills and dedications obviously does something wrong. And if you actually learn something while sitting at home - you can get just as much potential as you can get in clubs, if not more.

Point three:

What kind of person honestly even thinks about "incels" or being "blackpilled"? Can you imagine having a normal conversation with someone at the checkout counter at your local grocery and you use a phrase like "beta male soyboy" to describe someone?
"See that beta over there? He needs to start looksmaxing, going to the gym, start mewing, stop listening to cringe leftoid podcasts and then he can start pulling Stacies!"

Fuck me if I'll ever talk like that in the internet either. Ever since those pills appeared, I never quite fucking understood which color ammounts to which qualities. Well, alright, blue and red are kind of easy, because I watched The Matrix, but the rest of them - I don't know what they mean. Furthermore, I refuse to allocate any amount of my memory to learn that kind of information.
Less or more the same goes for all those incels, betas, alphas and whatever other bollocks are going around in the modern web.
Which actually leads me to an interesting idea. Check this out:
What if the bad part in being "terminally online" is not "terminally" but "online"? And what I mean is, what if the problem lies in the kind of online you are hooked to? Being terminally online with geeks and nerds in the 90's is definitely a different thing from being constantly connected to the 4chan and/or R*ddit of today.
And I do not want to say my usual mantra of "old-good-new-bad", so I'll put the following theory separately from the previous sentence: what if being terminally online in a good kind of online is, well, actually accordingly good to you, while being terminally online in an online that is a massive pile of waste is nothing but stuffing yourself with trash?

Vore - a paraphilia that only exists because of the Internet - is not real. It cannot happen to you and you have never experienced anything like it.

Interesting point, by the way. I guess, I never really noticed it because I just prefer to shut my brain down and completely ignore stuff when I stumble upon words like "vore", but truly... quite peculiar.

 

[Akenshi]

It's something the boy said at the beginning. "Now that I've gotten on the internet, I'd rather be on my computer than doing just about anything!"

I've effectively lost many friends to internet escapism. I wonder what would have become of them if they hadn't had that ever-present, artificial dopamine source. Perhaps they've have been incentivized to improve themselves/their circumstances. Perhaps not. But now we'll never know. They can self medicate and vegetate in front of their computers nearly every hour of every day.

The internet drove people mad. The whole thing is a monkey's paw wish at this point. You can find whatever preference, taste or interest you have, but if you are engaging with it too much you will just grow more and more extreme and deformed. The worst thing is that the Internet has become a two party system. You either have the normie web or the 4chan/SA/R‎eddit monoculture. Whichever you get into, it sucks.

 

[AnHero]

Vore - a paraphilia that only exists because of the Internet - is not real. It cannot happen to you and you have never experienced anything like it. The only thing that happened (if you do have a vore fetish) is that you saw a simulation of it on the Internet.

This isn't exactly true. It's kind of a meme in fetish communities that people probably got their fetish from weird scenes on kids tv and cartoons back in the 90s, before internet use was widespread. Assuming the mere exposure effect still applies, a certain amount of people would still have gotten these fetishes thanks to TV.

 

[Midwest]

Which actually leads me to an interesting idea. Check this out:
What if the bad part in being "terminally online" is not "terminally" but "online"? And what I mean is, what if the problem lies in the kind of online you are hooked to? Being terminally online with geeks and nerds in the 90's is definitely a different thing from being constantly connected to the 4chan and/or R*ddit of today.
And I do not want to say my usual mantra of "old-good-new-bad", so I'll put the following theory separately from the previous sentence: what if being terminally online in a good kind of online is, well, actually accordingly good to you, while being terminally online in an online that is a massive pile of waste is nothing but stuffing yourself with trash?

I think something like is worthy of more discussion. Without the Internet, I wouldn't have developed in interest in drawing and the fine arts, my interests in reading wouldn't have developed further into history, politics, religion, and anthropology/sociobiology. Without the Internet, I probably wouldn't have met good Catholic people online who helped me understand the faith and through continual dialogue - led me to my conversion in 2020. I should mention that it was almost pure chance that I was able to find myself in good communities with like-minded people who shared similar interests. You did mention the struggles of talking to average people about python coding or Warhammer. I agree obviously, what kind of person wants to talk about Japanese carpentry for instance? On the Internet you can seemingly find a community for any niche subject.
Playing devil's advocate for a second - while it is all well and good to have these communities to talk about whatever, is there not a danger in talking about something that breaks the community guidelines? Say I'm a huge Pokémon fan (I'm not) - but I'd like to talk about how Digimon has better games over Pokémon in the current gen. Will my speech be considered acceptable? Will I be "cancelled"? These are all things to consider as the Internet gets increasingly more insular and people begin to think with a hivemind mentality to fit in with their in-group. I see this a lot on current 4chan threads - anons arguing back and forth calling each other "newfags," accusing each other of "trying too hard" to fit in, even going as far to say that using common insults is "tryhard." It's hilarious actually.

 

[BlackControlBoxer]

Do this once and never again.
Problem solved, genie trapped.

Spoiler

No because you have nothing else to do, that is your real problem, you do nothing else.

 

[Midwest]

This isn't exactly true. It's kind of a meme in fetish communities that people probably got their fetish from weird scenes on kids tv and cartoons back in the 90s, before internet use was widespread. Assuming the mere exposure effect still applies, a certain amount of people would still have gotten these fetishes thanks to TV.

Fair point. "Vore" being first exposed through television make sense since it is children that are watching cartoons and something vaguely fetishistic can leave in imprint on that particular child's sexual subconscious which doesn't awaken until puberty (i.e. "Blueberry Violet" from Willy Wonka). If that's the case then then I would advocate stronger regulations on all media that chooses to portray sexuality (openly or suggestively) by returning to the Hays Code.

The internet drove people mad. The whole thing is a monkey's paw wish at this point. You can find whatever preference, taste or interest you have, but if you are engaging with it too much you will just grow more and more extreme and deformed. The worst thing is that the Internet has become a two party system. You either have the normie web or the 4chan/SA/R‎eddit monoculture. Whichever you get into, it sucks.

And if you try to have a conversation from someone from the Facebook/Instagram monoculture as a 4channer, you're the odd one out. Likewise our automatic perception of that person that still uses Facebook/Instagram is to label them as a "normalfag." It's degrading and really hurts our chances of genuine connection with other people.