Commentary: Incognito On The Internet

(Editor’s note: We all know that people aren’t always who they seem on the World Wide Web. The feminist bulletin boards have men who claim to be women so that they can bait the feminists, the poor claim to be rich, and adult pedophiles pass themselves off as children. However, sometimes our perceptions of others is the result of our own assumptions, as Kaya Casper points out in this essay.)

Upon entry onto the web scene two years ago, I was exposed to a world where judgments could realistically be made not on the color of my skin, but on the content of my character. Was this what Martin Luther King meant in his “I have a dream” speech? Was his dream of https and dial-up connections? I still wonder about that.

As is the case for many of us, one of the first things I did when I started surfing the ‘Net was to begin looking for other people who shared my interests. The first of many places I found this was in the Women Writers’ Club at Yahoo, where I found a group of other women who enjoyed writing as much as I do. I simply browsed the messages for a few days, unsure of how to interact in this atmosphere. After becoming more comfortable, I began to post on a regular basis.

In my almost daily posts, I noticed one thing. I deliberately avoided saying things that might reveal my race to the other members of the club. It was so nice to finally be in a place wherein I could express my ideas, beliefs, and a guarded few experiences without feeling that I was somehow seen differently because of my color. Even more interesting was the ‘fly on the wall’ feeling. I felt like, here I was among a group of white women and none of them had any idea that I was not just the same as them. I felt as if they too would express themselves more freely if they thought they were among their peers, that is, other people just like themselves. I notice that in “real life” conversations are often tainted when there is a racially mixed crowd. Certain things get said purposely, and others get hushed halfway out of people’s mouths. I imagine it is similar to having a mixed sex crowd, as opposed to all men or all women.

The most interesting part of my a-racial experience on the web is that I never denied my culture, only avoided giving it away. This, in itself, made me into a blank canvas onto which people projected variant images of themselves. If the Internet has done nothing else, it has provided us with a way to connect with those whom we normally may never have connected. The basis for Internet relationships is common interests, beliefs, and values, as opposed to common background, ethnicity, or race.

Over time, the Internet will change the face of human interaction even more drastically than it has already. In “real life,” we have the tendency to choose people, whether consciously or unconsciously, based on whether or not they look like us. Our online relationships allow us the freedom to put our prejudices aside and interact with those who are similar to us beyond physicality.

Oftentimes I have had the experience of relating to someone on many levels, only to find that they are not much short of my complete physical opposite. I have learned that this is very likely and grown quite accustomed to it, but I was surprised by it in the beginning, and my e-friends have reacted similarly. Our Internet experiences will affect our offline lives in that this new reality will guide us to put outside differences aside, and let our inner selves, and the inner selves of others, be our guide to relationships.

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