Modesty and fear are the main factors that make us behave the way we do. We control our expressions of anger, hatred, disgust, lust etc. because of them. Anonymity provides the opportunity to be free from the need to be modest or feared to express their true opinions. It also shows the true character of a person. Most of the anonymous comments we see in blogs are expressions of such depressed opinions.
When the anonymity of those people is lost, they get hyper defensive of their acts as they know in the back of their minds that their true tarnished personalities are being exposed.
People who present themselves with screen names are often just being defensive of their opinions than being guilty conscious about it. They represent their personality with grace unlike the anonymous. These people wouldn’t mind exposing their true identities to those they trust.
Well, Mahasen thanks for this post. You appear to be a matured guy.
ReplyDeleteHowever, I do not agree that modesty and fear are the only factors that prevent us writing whatever we want under our own names. We do jobs, we have positions in society and we do not want to risk our job or our position by saying everything what we have in our mind. (So many bloggers have learnt that lesson in the hard way)
Anyway, anonymous posts and blogs (just like anonymous letters) are here to stay. They constitute an important section of the online community.
I am glad that you still allow anonymous blogging unlike those who are dead scared of it. Please keep it up.
Thanks.
So isn't it fear of facing trouble or loosing the position at the workplace or the society?
ReplyDeleteWhat you choose to express as anonymous are your opinions you keep depressed in your society, isn't it true? If not, you should be able to express the same in your true identity.
Anonymity is an absolute necessity for people to express their opinions freely. There's nothing wrong in doing so. We can not disregard the fact that there would always be people with different opinions and those wouldn’t be generally accepted in the society we live in.
But there are people who abuse that freedom as well. Once I had some offensive anonymous comments, I had to start comment moderation. Prabath also had a similar issue. Most of the time those anonymous comments are offensive towards the blogger by people well known. But I decided to keep anonymous comments because other wise it would constrain the free expressions of others.
I agree with you completely. If you're afraid to give out your identity while stating your opinion, your obviously a bit guilty about what you're expressing. By signing off as "Anonymous", you're not standing by what your saying. Hey, if it's your opinion, you should state it and be proud of it!
ReplyDeletei think its about time where we should be proud of our own true identity and express it freely..how many days can we voice our opinions anonymously? and by doing that making your opinions go in the ditch? society should change to be able to accept all sorts of opinions because thats what makes mankind richer..the fear of expressing true opinions should go away...for that to happen the society should have an open mind..thats my opinion
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand there are some people who used both, true identity and anonymous identity for showing up two side of their characteristics...
ReplyDeleteI think these individuals are the most dangerous, they pretend to be a hero and at the same time being the rascal leading to hell.
If u have nothing to say that could be mis-construde as offensive then using your true identity should never be a problem - Anon.A
ReplyDeleteMahasen, I totally I agree with your analysis.
ReplyDeleteThere are two sides to this. Bad side is that some people use anonymous comments to attack others personally. Some might use it as a media to release their life frustrations at the expense of others. Another thing I've noticed is some people annonymously post false comments and statements on behalf of certain groups where they actually dont belong to that group. If you dont know the person, you really can't trust the ideas either.
However, every dark cloud has a silver lining. It has allowed people to express their opinions which they are normally feared to express. So, it creates dialogs which would have been impossible otherwise. A good example is the discussion Mahasen created between Tamils and SInhalese. Most people spoke their inner hearts out due to the luxury of anonymity.
In an ideal world, everyone should express and stand-by their views and opinions and express them directly at right forums. But in a world where people have too many bonds to society, work etc., allowing for annonimous comments for now is the best way to create fruitful discussions. Irony is that some people use anonymity for even this discussion!
I have views on some matters that may seem to be radical. Normally I would share these only with close associates.
ReplyDeleteCommenting under a pseudonym allows me to express some of these to the wider community.
I try to avoid using the pseudonym to mount personal attacks on people or to cause mischief.
I am in other words, what bloggers call a Troll - someone who keeps commenting on blogs but does not have one of his own.
I did start a blog, mostly because I did'nt like being called a troll, but abandoned it a short while later.
It is still available here:
http://jestforkicks.blogspot.com/
Now I'm pretty comfortable with my troll identity and don't intend to blog.
Jack Point, your comments have always been valuable and you have built up a strong personality for your screen name. I don’t see much difference in it from using you actual name. Having a name, be it real or not, to represent your views is sufficient for credibility in blogsphere. One negative thing that could happen is that any one else could just post comments as Jack Point because there’s no authentication.
ReplyDeletethanks Mahasen.
ReplyDeleteYes I believe some people have had a problem of posts being made under their pseudonyms, but so far I have been lucky.