Image by gregoryperez
Can anyone honestly say that the self they project online, in blogs, on forums, etc. is truly 100% their real self? I know lots of people put on a persona on purpose, either because they want to hide their true selves or just as a gimmick, but I’m talking about those of us who don’t try any of that. Those of us who would tell anyone that we’re the same person in real life as we are online.
I’ve been thinking about this a lot recently. I am definitely in the latter category, I feel that keeping up an online persona must be so exhausting, I can’t imagine having to adopt a totally different, forced personality when writing or posting on a forum, it must be quite difficult to remain consistant. At least if inconsistancies come through when I write here, I know they’re quirks of my own personality, not made-up traits I’ll then have to make a conscious effort to replicate in the future.
Still, can any of us really say, particularly when writing a blog, that everything we write depicts our personality accurately? I think the moment the editing process starts, the moment a blog post turns from a stream-of-consciousness to a thought-out piece that’s meant for an audience, a small part of the real personality of the writer, which may have existed in the words, is lost. I don’t believe this is necessarily a bad thing, people are unpredictable, flawed beings and I know I often say stupid things in the moment that I wish I could take back. As long as a conversation isn’t recorded however, then the odd slip-up us unlikely to permanantly damage one’s reputation or relationships. A mistake like that on a blog post, even if later deleted, may be archived and one day when the writer is rich and famous (I wish) it may well come back to haunt them. Or in a more likely turn of events, someone with good Google-fu and a grudge can use it to cause trouble long after the writer has forgotten the comment completely. If there’s even the smallest chance that a blogger will ever find his or herself working in the corporate world, for example, then there is no point in taking the risk and posting unedited comments that could later cost them a job.
More “real-time” services of course are a different matter. Chatrooms and IRC channels don’t make headlines anymore, but there, although the capacity to edit still existed, people were far less likely to do so as they strove to make their comments within a conversational timeframe. I’ve made some very good friends through IRC channels that I regularly see in “real life” now, because when you remove everything but words, I think as long as the person you are talking to isn’t putting on an act, you can really get to know their personality without factors such as looks or fashion sense clouding your judgement.
I don’t know about you, but the most real-time method of online communication I use now is probably Twitter, and since tweets tend to me more like announcements than parts of a natural conversation, they tend to be very considered and edited, particulary since they have to be within 140 characters. Everywhere (online) that I write, I edit, and I wouldn’t have it any other way – I’m terrible for making typos! On my blog, and I’m sure on many others, I believe readers get a genuine dose of my personality, but it’s controlled. Free from hasty, stupid comments I may later regret, words I over-use replaced with similes, it’s still my voice, but prepared for public consumption.
This post was written entirely without editing. I haven’t spell-checked it, I haven’t gone back to change things that don’t “sound” right. How real do you think you are when you post online?
I find that in some sites I am my complete self and in some I try to water myself down, either make myself a little more interesting or change some things about myself. I am working on being me, and not worrying so much about it, I want to just be me now, I am sick of lies and cover ups, pleasing people all of the time.
I think I’m real all the time, but the thing is: I don’t spend every second online, meaning that people who know me only by my posts [blog, forum, whatever] don’t really know me at all.Those are just bits of real me, of my current state of mind. I don’t edit my posts unless I’m writing about something really important, but I always turn spell check on – just in case!
It’s so much easier just to be yourself. But the internet is also handy for being able to omit the bits you don’t like, and play up the bits you do. So you’re still yourself, but just the most awesome version of yourself. lol.
I don’t tone myself down online. But I am A LOT more narcissistic online than I am in real life. It gives me an opportunity to tell lots of people all at once what I’m doing and maybe act more fabulous than I am in real life. It’s easy to edit out the lazy habits, messy house, crying kids, pooping dog etc if you want to.
It must be so hard to pretend to be someone you’re not online. I’d give myself away all the time.
I recently made the decision to be a lot more honest online. I used to try blogging only about fun things–fashion, food, productivity–but I realized that the blogs I keep going back to are the ones where the writers are able to make themselves vulnerable and be honest. Since then I’ve written posts about debt, anxiety, and breakups, and gotten a pretty powerful, supportive response. Of course, my core topics haven’t changed, but I feel like writing about all the things that are relevant to me, rather than relevant to the arbitrary topics that I chose for my blog, makes me a better writer.
Twitter and Tumblr, however, have always been that way. Both of those are the most unfiltered versions of myself that you can find anywhere.
I write under a pseudonym because you never know in the internet. However, I’m very honest with what I write and what I portray in Twitter, Flickr and my blog (I doon’t use Facebook a lot). I think that the more honest you are and the more you show that you are a “real” person, the more others will try to connect with you.
For example, there is this adorable 14 year old from the UK who sends me tweets everyday and she keeps doing it because I answer truthfully and honestly. Plus, she’s mad cute :3.
When I feel positive I write in my blog, when I feel sad or depressed and have had a bad day then I write in my LJ. I tweet both in English and Spanish because my IRL friends are there too and we share jokes and stuff both in English and in Spanish. Twitter and my LJ is where you see the real me, unedited and unmasked, even though both of them are under the pseudonym.
Ooh, interesting topic! To be honest, I think it’s usually glaringly obvious when a writer is perhaps not portraying themselves in the most accurate of lights – you can usually sniff the insincerity a blog away!
Personally, I agree wholeheartedly with how you’ve summed up your own online presence – my writing voice is 100% genuine (and my own), albeit the edited version that doesn’t say ”um”, ”you know?” and ”far out!” quite so much in conversation..
I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately. I have had a post sitting in my draft folder for weeks which I was not sure about publishing, but you’ve given me the push I needed. When I first started blogging, fear of being identified made me hold back, and now I fear that holding back makes me lose my identity. Really need to balance this more!
I think I am pretty much me when I write,except I don’t swear as much as I would like to because my mother-in-law reads it, and has a thing about my swearing.
BTW, I gave you an award today. I hope you’ll come on over and check it out.
.. ALSO! (I just remembered something else, sorry to comment twice!) I think it’s practically impossible to be anything other than your loony self when you know that your nearest and dearest are reading.. my friends, parents, extended family, study classmates and (some!) work colleagues all read/have read at some point my blog, which makes it a lot easier to be authentic for fear of one of them smacking me senseless and asking what the heck I’m writing about..
Wow, thanks for all your fascinating responses! As you might have guessed, this is a subject I find really interesting, so it’s great hearing everyones’ thoughts
This is so ironic, but I think I’m more of myself online than in real life! I say out loud how I feel about myself, and about my opinions that I usually keep in a shell. I wonder what would go wrong if i start being open generally in life too?
Btw, I think it would help if your font color was a bit brighter! Light grey on white makes me squint. Lovely blog, otherwise
Wow, I actually didn’t mean it to be that light, I’m glad you noticed! That’s the colour I type in when I’m writing a post at work (as I hate people being able to read over my shoulder before I get the chance to edit things) I’ve made it a little darker now!