Disturbing Trends

One of the interesting things that was pointed out is that terms and concepts like IRL (In Real Life) are heavily used, and can have a potentially damaging affect on the way a person things. It creates a tangable seperation from ones actions online, as if they are not part of the -real- world. Which, of course, they are. If you are doning something online, chatting with someone say, you are doing that in real life.

Here on the MOO, we have even more terms that cause seperation from what we as individuals are doing. We have OOC, IRL, IC, OffMoo, OnMoo and more. I noticed that Aikao made a post saying that Finn was busy in his OOC-life. This is…troubling to me. It is saying that Finn's excistance off the MOO, and outside of the Sindome community isn't real. It is 'Out of Character.' Which is...strange. It is odd to think of ones day to day living realities as artificial, and the artificial reality of the MOO as more 'real.'

Just...kinda scary to think that even in a subtle,  unintentional manner as Aikao used the term OOC-life to denote a seperation or split in the realities of self and moo, as if to say that one isn't real, and the two are not directly connected... More troublesome is the manner in which computers and the internet will affect the developement of a child's brain...

-Kevlar

But on a larger scale, if you look at the things kids are doing and saying, I mean the ones between 4 and 12 or so, they have a completely differant view of reality that I do. Which is a given, different generations always do. But the troubling part is that there is this tinge of 'unreality' that seems to run through online relationships. An idea that things online are less a part of 'your life' or 'reality' than things you do at school and work. Part of it is the primarily text based medium, part of it isthe disconnection from the self, part of it is just…well, that it is so easy to mold the online reality as compaired to the physical reality that we all sit in.

Ones and Zeros.

*shrugs*

Just random thinking.

It's doubly difficult for people who live alone…because you live inside your head most of the time.  I know that when i spend more time away from the PC and with actual people I am much healthier and happier.  And not to say that as a GM hanging with all the other Admin i didn't consider them real...but you can't gather from them inMOO what you can from direct interaction.  

Things that have always helped me is when you connect with online people in multiple mediums...MOO, IM and then finally like some of you i'm sure have, meeting outside the Grid at MOObashes or sumthin' similar.  I think the biggest problem is when you create friendships that are solely in one area, then your experience with them is singular and is distorted.  Same way with anyone though, if you only interact with someone in one circumstance (like an EQ meeting) they're not really a friend until you go out for lunch or whatnot and get to know them in multiple settings.  Hehe.

Anyway, I think it's important to distinguish some Online and Offline distinction only to be able to say that people need direct interaction to be healthy.  

if a baby at birth was given everything normally thought needed to survive (warmth, nutrients, water), if human touch was taken away the baby would not survive very long.  Same is true throughout life.

So think about that you dark place livin, catheter wearin', atrophy feelin, ebola cola drinkin' Deckers livin' in the bowls of Red.

-SM