Mr. Tea
Let's Talk About Ceps
Hmm, I like the idea of a virtual quasi-Turing 'Gek-bot' in my brain...
Hmm, I like the idea of a virtual quasi-Turing 'Gek-bot' in my brain...
Hahaha... is that meant to be a dig at me or HMLT? I would hope that I never get aggressive or rude, and I don't believe I do, (or reach for the ad hominems). Though borderline mentally ill and dabbling in psychobabble I can't disagree with... (though I'd add HMLT's theory was waay more onpoint than my own desultory attempts) But at the same time I strongly suspect personas on the internet can be entirely different to the everyday.
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IdleRich
IdleRich
It's certainly not a dig at you - and anyway, who said it was a dig at anyone, I said it was hypothetical didn't I?
Anyway, I want to hear some knob jokes.
Of course, they could be, IdleRich could be nothing at all like me in reality although I suspect that most people would find me disappointingly similar. One could create a totally fictional persona (Ian Town was it?) but I suspect that most dissensians don't do that. It would be possible (although more difficult) to present such a fictional persona to someone you meet in real life though right? You normally assume that that's not the case and in general I tend to do the same on the internet, I realise in each case that there is room for doubt but it's never hurt me yet.
noel emits
a wonderful wooden reason
All personae are fictional. They are usually 'based on truth', but still. It makes sense to be adaptable too - we are not, maybe can not be the same people in all situations.
I think I've tried going to parties in a persona, but inevitably it rapidly collapses under the influence of the booze. Obviously I think it would be easier to maintain an online persona, because of the mono-dimensional nature of the information that others perceive about you, but perhaps its not so much a determined effort to conceal or project online, rather a question of the use to which you put this particular tool (here a message board)...?
The deliberately tiresome knob jokes only really work with my brother whose annoyance at them creates the actual humour... well, for me at least!
I've never met up with people I know only from the internet (no personal objection to it, just never done it) -- but those of you who have, how does that compare to the persona they exteriorized themselves as via the internet?
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IdleRich
IdleRich
Yes, agreed to the first bit and also regarding the way it might arise without a determined effort (which is unlikely to happen so much in real life) but I tend to think that most people on boards will be unable to avoid putting at least some of their personality into it.
Interesting question.
On this board, I knew Mr Tea before he joined - does his online personality reflect the reality? - quite hard to say because I see him as himself firstly. I would ventue to say it's not a million miles away anyway.
I have also met a number of people from this because of this board, but only on one occasion, for a short time and through a haze of alcohol so it's hard to evaluate. I certainly don't think that any of them gave me any nasty surprises (except for spilling a drink on me, cheers Martin) but then again they wouldn't in such a short time would they? On the other hand, they probably weren't much like the idea I may have subconsciously had of them physically but that's not exactly surprising either.
I frequent the vinylvulture board as well and I've met loads and loads of people off that, several of whom I would definitely consider friends now. However, I still find it hard to say how similar they are to their board personalities because I hadn't been on the board long enough to form viewpoints of them before I met them. I reckon that, now I think about it, there are some differences that I've noticed so point taken I suppose.
mistersloane
heavy heavy monster sound
I don't really see it - online business - other than as any other form of entertainment, of which I would include conversations, I really don't see any of it as real at all, and don't see the point in seeing it as real, it's just a way of passing time. I'm cold like that though, and generally on message boards try and write in a voice as authentic to my own as possible, but that's my own kick, I wouldn't ever presume anyone else was doing that.
There was a great case a while back of a UK teenager creating multiple personas in order to kill - I think - one of his classmates, which I thought was interesting. If anyone can remember the case I'd be grateful.
I've also met lots of people off of the net - though not off here - and they're always the same as the vibe I get from their online persona. I'd say it's much easier to judge that in one-on-one conversations over the net, rather than message board postings, you can eeeeek in easier to a person that way. Having said that, one of the reasons I like - and presume have kept coming back to this board (aside from the people and info) is that the ability to go 'one to one' isn't there, so all you have to go on is their online persona. I think it's fun.
There was a great case a while back of a UK teenager creating multiple personas in order to kill - I think - one of his classmates, which I thought was interesting. If anyone can remember the case I'd be grateful.
I've also met lots of people off of the net - though not off here - and they're always the same as the vibe I get from their online persona. I'd say it's much easier to judge that in one-on-one conversations over the net, rather than message board postings, you can eeeeek in easier to a person that way. Having said that, one of the reasons I like - and presume have kept coming back to this board (aside from the people and info) is that the ability to go 'one to one' isn't there, so all you have to go on is their online persona. I think it's fun.
Mr. Tea
Let's Talk About Ceps
Shit, you reckon?
**not really
I initially read 'spilling' as spiking - gave me a shock for a second.
I know IRL quite a lot of people from a messageboard (not this one), and I have to say there's generally a pretty good agreement between online and offline personas (personae? Those who know me will verify that I really *am* this pedantic) with the exception that some people who are a bit shy naturally find it easier to type than talk.
Interestingly, there's one guy (from the other messageboard) who consistently comes across as a vindictive, cowardly, bigoted bully, but who is defended by many who've met him as being "really nice in person". Now I just don't buy this at all - if anything, I think the persona put across in the semi-anonymity of a messageboard just encourages people to say things they really want to, that they might be inhibited from saying when in a real-life social situation.
mistersloane
heavy heavy monster sound
Nah, I don't agree with that, I've met nuff artists in their time who are meant to be horrible wankers who, aside from their work, are totally lovely sweet human beings, it just depends how you see representation of self, I think. I guess it depends whether you think people who are drunk are speaking 'the truth' or whether you just think they're drunk, y'know?
Mr. Tea
Let's Talk About Ceps
Yeah, I guess. But if you'd 'known' this guy as long as I have, you'd probably think differently about it, or at least be prepared to make an exception!
One way to look at is: if someone who is "basically really nice" feels the need to come across as a total wanker almost all the time in a certain social situation, doesn't that in itself qualify him as being at least a bit of a wanker? Like if a sane person decided to pretend to be mad without good reason, that'd be a fairly mad thing to do...
One way to look at is: if someone who is "basically really nice" feels the need to come across as a total wanker almost all the time in a certain social situation, doesn't that in itself qualify him as being at least a bit of a wanker? Like if a sane person decided to pretend to be mad without good reason, that'd be a fairly mad thing to do...
swears
preppy-kei
And swears has gone all Cold Rationalist recently.
lol, probably 'cause I've been reading some of this guy's stuff recently:
http://www.historyguide.org/europe/gasset.html
Though basically I would add that judging anyone's mental health from internet postings is going to be pretty difficult, and often amounts to either an ad hominem assault or total disengagement from the argument at hand "don't listen to him he's fucking maaaad..."-- or the re-assertion of dull normalcy and good ole "common sense"...
N
nomadologist
Guest
a) I do not, nor did I ever, work for "big pharma". I worked for a medical education/medical publishing company as a program manager and writer. I no longer work there, because I didn't like dealing with big pharma to the extent I was called upon to do so. Way to make ridiculous assumptions about someone's life based on gross misreadings of their posts, though. Bravo.
b) I only ever brought up how much money I made in the context of an argument where Vimothy tried to claim (you know, the old Social Darwinist fallacy) that in a free market economy, people get paid according to their intelligence level--that intelligence and skill are rewarded by capitalism, rather than privilege and already-held social capital. He seriously tried to claim that the poor are poor because they are not as intelligent as the wealthy. This is patently absurd, as I'm sure you know. I knew that I probably made far more than Vimothy did, so according to his own ideas, I thought it would be funny to point out that a loony leftist like me is far smarter than he is. Of course, I disagree with this line of reasoning and find it absurd.
THE WHOLE POINT of the things I said in these discussions was to make fun of how ABSURD Vimothy's way of thinking is by being INTENTIONALLY ABSURD. Unfortunately, the irony seems to have been lost on some of the dimmer ones among us. Shrug.
Vimothy also tried to argue along with the racist Saletan in the thread about the Bell Curve that white people have higher IQs than black people. (And that Ashkenazi Jews are "more intelligent" than other whites, a claim that any biologist would treat with the utmost scorn and find repulsive in the extreme.) He also correlated (along with others in the thread) high IQ scores with later wealth and success in life. This is also patently absurd.
Our friend Vimothy may be a stoner, but he has been far from amiable for a long long time around here, spewing some of the most hateful views I've read on the internet by someone who fancies themselves knowledgeable about economics and international relations.
N
nomadologist
Guest
Common sense and appeal to the status quo as the yardstick by which we're to measure reason. Good times!
N
nomadologist
Guest
Now this is just another example of IdleRich trying to lay claim to being the arbiter of who "understands" psychoanalysis and critical theory when it is very obvious that he himself has read none of it. HMLT might have had an over-the-top rhetorical style, but he is well-versed in Lacanian psychoanalysis and a certain sort of Zizekian hermeneutics that, while I didn't always agree with it, was fully based in a firm grasp of the texts in question.
People may disagree with HMTL, Gavin, me, or any number of people of the critical theory readers here for political reasons, but I have never once seen *anyone* with the sole exceptions of Tate, K-punk or dHarry properly or successfully refute any of their arguments about theory using the authority of the texts themselves and with a solid understanding of the subject matter at hand.
As for mental illness, what's more ridiculous and unhealthy--going on the internet and blowing off steam, going over-the-top in attacking political beliefs that really get you going in the abstract in a completely safe and UNreal/consequence-free environment, then leaving and forgetting all about it, or sitting and fucking pouring over internet interactions and trying to make pronouncements about what so-and-so must be like in "real life" (as if that matters) and make yourself look like a moron for not being able to differentiate between the boundaries that exist in a real life social setting and the ones that exist on the goddamned internet? Three words: Get. a. life.
I've met plenty of people from Dissensus and I doubt any of them would say I am "insane" because I'm on the far left of the political spectrum when it comes to academic pursuits.
N
nomadologist
Guest
If "rudeness" on the internet is *that* unbearably traumatic for you, then I think it's probably YOU who has the problem, not the person who's going to forget two hours later that they even posted something.
Personally, I like the fact that the "rules" of interaction are different on the internet than they are in everyday social situations. If I wanted to chit-chat about the fucking weather, I'd go get tea with my grandmother.
Personally, I like the fact that the "rules" of interaction are different on the internet than they are in everyday social situations. If I wanted to chit-chat about the fucking weather, I'd go get tea with my grandmother.
N
nomadologist
Guest
Yup.
I have a feeling people here who are positing some sort of "persona" based on internet message board rhetorical style have not met very many people with whom they've interacted on message boards.
Yes, it is certainly possible for a shy quiet person in "real life" to use the internet as a a sort of sounding board or soapbox. In fact, I think it's especially likely that some people (in particular repressed ones) find the internet "freeing" and use it to compensate for the limitations they face in their everyday lives.
N
nomadologist
Guest
Yeah, the same general vibe is usually there under it all. But I just don't think there's much comparison between interactions that are based on arborescent sort of virtual, typed-out "conversations" and the way people speak to one another in a normal social situation. It's the same way that a writer's prose style could be in stark contrast to the way they behave or speak in public.