Friends: IRL vs Internet

[dunlop]

Originally Posted by YungYung

However I really do like having a group of internet friends that I can talk to on msn afterschool while I do homework. I know it sounds bad when I say this, but it's easier to let out everything that's on your mind to "just some guy on the internet". I mean that in a sense that.. it's not like they're going to make fun of you if you've both taken the time to get to know eachother on the internet. And if they do decide to act like a jackass, then there's always the block button. You can't exactly "block" people in real life out of your lives.

Like you and Jewpin said, I agree with this aswell.

Also, out of all of my RL friends, I would say I'm online the most. Some of my friends don't even have AIM, so it's nice to have internet friends to talk to.

[evilbutterfly]

For one, friends in reality... you know who they are, what they look like, where they live, their phone numbers, their family, their pets, their habits, everything. You visit their houses, they visit yours, etc.

I can honestly say I do not have this kind of relationship with anyone on FFR. There's only one person within an acceptable driving distance to me who I'd ever want to meet, and I've already seen him in-person, so I wouldn't have a problem with it.

There's no way that you can achieve reaistic friendship with text being transmitted across a server between other people without meeting in reality. If you think there's a way, prove me wrong.

You know this is not the kind of thing that can be proven, Squeek. I don't see why you bother saying something like that. I swear, you're so hardheaded sometimes. And as for the things you said, I don't know the family/phone numbers/addresses/pets of some IRL friends, but I do know these things about some internet buddies. I also don't visit friends' houses and they don't visit mine very much. To be honest, most of my real life friends I talk to online more than I do over the phone (I hate phones XD) or anything. Only time I ever hang out in person much is when I'm on campus at school.

But I suppose that's just how I am. I don't have to see somebody to get the value of friendship. Sure, there are things that can't be done with internet friends, but mostly these are things I wouldn't really crave doing with RL friends anyway, so I'm just fine with internet buddies.

Also, you guys keep talking about how people are different. But think about this: many people change depending on location. Whether this means they're different at home vs at school or different online vs in-person, most people can't help but change how they act depending on the crowd. There are perfectly logical reasons for this, most of it being that people want to be accepted. For me, there are basically two Noahs. There is the shy Noah that doesn't talk much because he doesn't know you and feels uncomfortable, and there's the loud talkative Noah that you get online/when you really know me. Really, internet friends have the advantage cuz they see my real side right away, so when they meet me in person I wouldn't feel like I have to hold back to not scare them away or something. If I wasn't shy, I'd be the same all the time, and I'd be like I am online.

Oh, and like that one kid said, age doesn't matter online. I love that. Jake is really cool, but he's younger than my lil sister, and she's....not so cool. I never would have guessed his age just by knowing him online, and that's awesome. Really, I'm older than most of you, and if we all lived in the same town I doubt any of us would ever have talked (except maybe Afro, he's only a year off and we might have met at school if we had gone to the same place). I think it's cool that the internet knocked down the age barrier so we can all be friends. =)

I like to complain about my problems to buttfly a lot. He usually tries to help.

I like to help. Actually, the funny thing is that some people I knew just barely at school would get ahold of my screenname and vent their frustrations to me. We wouldn't talk except when they had some sort of a problem, and when people do this to me solely over the internet I think it's funny because IRL people do it too. XD

Also, about the whole "they might be lying and be somebody else" thing. There was a time or two, while talking to mom about something one of you said (yes, I talk to mom about what people on FFR say. All my friends IRL know I have internet buddies. Jurs has even called my dorm and gotten buddy buddy with my roommate. I don't think he was too bothered by it. If a person I know in person would think badly of me just because I have internet buddies, I don't want to be friends with them. XD) that mom asked "well how do you know these people are really who they say they are?" I explained to her that I've seen most of the regulars in photos (and enough that they couldn't just be pulling from Google or something) and several of them on live-camera, I've talked to several of you on the phone (or Skype), and the things you guys say just add up and I know you're not lying. I told her about the EoD thing and how we all knew she was lying and that it was really easy to see, and once I started paying attention for things I found real evidence of lying.

Honestly, though, I'm surprised by how many of you nerdy so-and-sos say that internet friends are pointless or infinitely worse than RL friends. I figured I'd get more of a bias for internet friends here. XD

[QreepyBORIS]

I personally resent the stigma against people having online friends. I feel that a friend is a friends, no matter who they are or how far away they live. Even if you never get to see them in person. The only real difference is in fact that you don't get to see them every day, like your friends in school or at work.

I'm definitely not the only person who feels that talking to people online about things (that is, problems) is much easier than talking to your friends that you know in person. Sometimes there are things you feel that you just can't tell your friends, or maybe it's even about them, and so it's far better to blow off steam to people you know on the Internet.

I'm not a big fan of these Internet boyfriend/girlfriend things, though. I feel that it makes far more sense to be able to see your relationship-partner-type-person in the flesh, and get to see them more often than say, a couple of times a year.

I had a much more long and thoughtful (and cohesive) post, but my power flickered and the computer turned off. For Christ sake, it's not even stormy right now. It's not raining. This shit happened yesterday, for God's sake. No more outages!

[jewpinthethird]

I do agree. There are things one cannot talk about with real life friends. Which is why it is good to have friends who are unbiased to the feelings of the individuals which I talk about. A sort of confessional of sorts. Someone who you can rant on and on to without the fear of them telling anyone who would care because they live on the other side of the planet.

I lied...kind of. There are a few people who do know a lot more about me than my friends in real life do. And I am grateful that I have someone who I can turn to about such matters. But internet friends and real life friends are still in seperate categories for me.

[Mindfields]

I'm hotter irl

[dAnceguy117]

Originally Posted by hydrojakep

You're a great example. You're outgoing and funny and stupid on the internet, but you're a little less irl.

Not trying to be mean or anything.

Believe me, i'm always going to remember you for what we did at bens house with the firecrackers over when we played twg.

No, believe me. You never even saw me that much IRL, now that I think about it. You should see me at school. I didn't really know anyone at that party so it was kind of wtf. Those firecrackers were awesome.

It didn't matter what we did with TWG, though, because you didn't believe me anyway, you stupid bitch.