Using your real name on the internet

(idea) by CaptainSpam (4.9 y) (print) ? (I like it!) Thu Apr 20 2000 at 2:38:18

There are many instances in which using your real name on the internet is either A) Stupid or B) Unneccessary. The internet IS a fantasy alternate world, in fact. It might be digital, you might not have a body, you might only be able to access this world via the monitor on your desktop, but does that make it any less a world?

And to provide a writeup that's not just an argument...

The act of using your real name on the internet is one practiced by people who A) feel they have nothing to hide, or B) don't have the imagination to come up with a good username. This is the converse of using an assumed name (An Alan Smithee, if you will), used by people who A) just think it's a cool name to use, or B) are paranoid. Either form is acceptable under certain circumstances.

(idea) by getzburg (2.3 y) (print) ? (I like it!) Mon Aug 28 2000 at 16:14:57

Using an assumed name is, for some, a safety measure. They worry about stalkers, psychos, and the like. I worry about neither of these. I'm not terribly stalkable, and I'm not a small guy, either, so I have very little to fear.

But getzburg isn't my real name.

I like the feeling that comes with having multiple identities. I like having a score of other people I can be at different times, in different situations. Those of you who have read any Eddings are probably thinking about Silk right now, and you're right on the money. He was always my favorite character for that reason.

It's difficult to (legally) have several identities in the real world, but on the net it's easy as all hell. So I revel in my multiple-ness, and to hell with my real name. :-)

(idea) by icicle (2.7 wk) (print) ? (I like it!) 2 C!s Tue Aug 29 2000 at 6:49:58

The other day I was walking home alone (I'd gone out alone, just to take few summery breaths) at circa midnight, maybe one. I was the only woman I saw on my entire walk, and while I remained conscious of the little I know of self-defense (stay in lighted areas, make eye contact and project confidence, etc.) I didn't sense among any of the men I saw a desire to kill or maim me. Some of 'em sought conversation: there's a pubs about a block from my building where college kids go for Bud and burgers (the neon sign says; I consume neither, but the red-blooded American in me loves those places and the people who patronize them with an obsessive, if distant, devotion).

Anyway, I was on the last leg of my walk, eating a fruit pie from Circle K, and this guy was standing out in the middle of the street in front of that bar, and he asked me my name.

I had to get him to repeat the question for the drink was running his words together. My name. My name. I get it. My name.

I said, "Josie," and I continued walking home, to make it clear I wasn't interested. He said, "Nice meeting you, Josie," and it took too long to register he was talking to me (rather, my back) to say, "Thank you. Nice meeting you, Mark" in return.

Listen. People have the right not just to privacy, but to anonymity; they also have a right to free expression and celebrity if they want it. And look at how many noders are in their late teens and early 20s - a stage often associated both with destruction and development, and I think an essence to this is the reinvention of oneself for whatever purposes. One of my friends (who I consider a sister, though I really only know her through e-mail) took up with a man she met on the world's lamest "Internet" service, and don't pretend you know what I'm talking about, and he hurt her in ways no person should ever be hurt, and since then, has been all over in the New York press - in connection with what he seems to have done to someone else. Whom he also met online.

A person will choose a nick or handle as a means of protecting himself or herself; she might be protecting her body, and he might be protecting his soul. Sometimes the fantasy life we lead online (go read all the nodes about E2 culture and you'll know exactly what I mean) can supplant the life we lead in the physical world, or upset it, or supplement and enrich it. And sometimes we do it out of whimsy; I took the nickname Molli around the same time I became a geek, not because I was afraid of stalkers, but because I hated my given name (Christen; everybody either spells or pronounces it incorrectly) and because I was young enough (and still am young enough) to feel my identity was fluid and evolving. I've grown fonder of my real name in recent years (I was told Christen *******, in all its clickety-clack alliteratedness, was a great reporter name, and nearly swooned for my delusions of Lois Lane), and while I'm not averse to Molli, or being called Molli, I very rarely introduce myself as such.

In short, identity is a fluid and ambiguous thing; you are free to hide underneath layers and layers of abstraction, and just as free (if you're legal, and so so inclined) to put in a webcam and never wear clothes.

For myself, I know I'll never have a black-and-white answer. As a writer - one whose habits have largely been shaped by online culture - I swing (like a pendulum do) between a desire to hide and sink myself in the world of words, and that to use words for purposes of connecting with other people. The issue has been complicated greatly by the lack of safe spaces in the world, especially for women, and my desire to reclaim every space as safe, because so many really are and can be.

Most of us are adults here; all of us have tough choices to make about these issues. My advice for choosing a nick, though, is to be conscious of the fact that people are very easily manipulated, and most of us are not immune either to becoming predators or prey, on whatever scale, if we spend too much time doing something that is not fundmental to us as humans (writing, staring at a computer screen, has got to be the least natural and least healthy fixation in the world). Blah blah blah blah blah. Hiding and laying yourself on the line are equally valid options, each with their own unique consequences. You know: Be cool. Participate in your own manipulation. Everything is what you make of it.

Also, realize that if you name yourself after something even vaguely phallic, or post your photo or node your bra size, you're bound to get some undue and very bizarre attention in IRC and Chatterbox. Not that I mind a bit of it. I'm gonna marry thefez and you're ALL invited, after all; it's only fair.

printable version
chaos

I'm embarrassed that I know this	Why I am going to pretend I am a girl online from now on	Names have power	I got married on E2, and all I got was this lousy t-shirt and a husband
Alan Smithee	SCA	Participate in your own manipulation.	I'm a Chicken-Hawk, and I'm gonna eat me some chickens
Freya	Bra Size 45	silk	The Definitive Penis Size Survey
Sounds cool and means nothing	A modem is better than nothing	Your radical ideas about taking candy from thefez have already occurred to others	David Eddings
What E2 is all about	pussy-whipped	bra size	I signed up for the carpool for all the wrong reasons and now I'm bitter as Hell
Prayer Changes Things	The Limited Edition "Participate in Your Own Manipulation" Poster	Things I've learned about lesbians from porn	You're laughing now, but I'm voting this sucka down

No more writeups are being accepted for this node. Ah smayls GTKY. Just try and convince an editor to unlock this node! If you feel you have something to add to this node, post it on your Scratch Pad and contact an editor.

Login
Password

remember me
password reminder
register

Everything2 Help

Drink up!
The die is cast, you will cut the mustard or face the music
After a six-month diet of blues and greys I was back to white. I was an empty plate.
Node for the Ages
Confederate States of America
Mussel
Mad Magazine
Psychiatric Disorders
Things I had not seen before coming to America
Thanksgiving, suicide, and the breakdown of an already dysfunctional family
8-ball as a metaphor for genocide
Art has an actual purpose
Chicken pox
Texas

SwimmingMonkey
Conversations with Fo Fo- the Loneliest dog in Purgatory	(fiction)
locke baron
lynx	(thing)
Simulacron3
Reality, Dimensions and the Natural Ontology	(essay)
SubSane
Making Love to a 9-Foot Woman	(person)
Ouzo
Thoughts	(idea)
antigravpussy
I fall silent, listening. The breadcrumbs are talking about us	(person)
calgon
Buffalo Bill by the pool	(poetry)
gate
Anarchy is Order	(idea)
ushdfgakjasgh
Scribeling	(thing)
XWiz
Trism	(review)
artman2003
Briefcase Full of Souls - Part I	(fiction)
Dreamvirus
Alan Ladd	(person)
waverider37
Harold Holt	(person)
The Debutante
Until death do us part	(fiction)
Ysardo
a brother to a sister	(personal)

E2 is a by-product of the existence of The Everything Development Company