One frequent­ly brought out point about onli­ne discus­sions, most recent­ly in O’Reil­ly’s sug­ges­tion for a code of con­duct (via Kari), is that you shouldn’t say anyt­hing onli­ne that you wouldn’t say in per­son. Though I disagree to some extent with most of what O’Reil­ly suggests[alaviite]The code has been dis­sec­ted pret­ty well elsew­he­re, for example over at ars tech­nica and TNL.net (via Boing Boing).[/alaviite], this is the rule that I have the big­gest beef with.

It is no sec­ret to people who know me (eit­her by my wri­tings or IRL) that I have some serious issues with face to face social inte­rac­tions. Call it shy­ness or call it by some other, more cli­nical name, I am not what you would call a nor­mal per­son in my inte­rac­tions with people, not even by Fin­nish stan­dards. I am qui­et to the extent that people tend to notice and com­ment upon it vir­tual­ly eve­ry time I’m in a situa­tion with others around me. They usual­ly think I am deeply troubled by somet­hing in my life when in fact the only thing troubling me is the cur­rent situa­tion of being around them. #

Now, even if you knew the way I was, it is pos­sible you didn’t know the way I feel in such situa­tions. #

The most pro­mi­nent fee­ling I have around people is usual­ly fear. Most of the time I have to keep my hands clin­ged to some other part of my body just to hide the fact that I’m sha­king. It’s as if I was in a cons­tant fear of being phy­sical­ly attac­ked by tho­se around me, simply because of my own being phy­sical­ly around them. (Such an inci­dent has never occu­red, mind you. I’m just making an ana­lo­gy, because the true causes of my fear are pret­ty abstract and not ful­ly known even to myself at this time.) #

If you are what would pro­bably be cal­led a nor­mal per­son in this res­pect, you might feel the same way about making a pre­sen­ta­tion to a room full of stran­ge people. By ima­gi­ning this you may see that for me, saying most things in per­son is usual­ly just out of the pic­tu­re enti­re­ly. It’s not that I didn’t have things to say (though my head is usual­ly just emp­ty, as might hap­pen to you whi­le making a pre­sen­ta­tion - a night­ma­re come true, isn’t it?), it’s just that I’m way too frigh­te­ned to say them. #

Pro­bably the last obs­tacle for me is that whi­le all this is hap­pe­ning, I’m ful­ly awa­re of how abnor­mal my beha­viour must seem. I know that I’m not expec­ted to be making a pre­sen­ta­tion to a room full of stran­gers, I just feel like I am, and I can­not accept my own ina­dequacy and so deem it bet­ter to just not open my mouth at all. #

But onli­ne it’s dif­fe­rent. #

Out here, no one can see the phy­sical symp­toms of how ner­vous I am about saying somet­hing. My heart may be poun­ding like I was run­ning the marat­hon, I may be sha­king like I had Par­kin­son’s - and nobo­dy knows about it! In other words, the final obs­tacle for my being able to say things has sud­den­ly disap­pea­red enti­re­ly. #

You can pro­bably see whe­re I’m get­ting at with this: to me, saying I should limit the things I should say to what I would say in per­son is like saying I should shut up enti­re­ly. Obvious­ly, I won’t accept that. Obvious­ly, I find it even hurt­ful to be sug­ges­ted that. This onli­ne world to me and others like me is a place whe­re we’­ve found free­dom from our worst fears, a place whe­re we can beha­ve the way other people find natu­ral to beha­ve in face to face situa­tions. And now you’­re tel­ling us we should go back to the way we are out­si­de this world? No way Jose. #

Now, you may be thin­king that “oh, but you’­re just an excep­tion, not accoun­ted for by the rule.” Wrong. Though I pro­bably do repre­sent an ext­re­me case, I’m hard­ly alo­ne in my situa­tion. But what’s more impor­tant is that we’­re all on the same sca­le here. We’­re all limi­ted to some extent in what we dare to say in per­son, and it’s not due to what you might want to think: that wit­hout such reser­va­tions, anarc­hy would reign. If your thin­king real­ly went down that path just now, I have news for you: you’­re foo­ling your­self in order to keep your over­ly posi­ti­ve self-ima­ge intact. #

Some of the things you nor­mal­ly lea­ve unsaid and undo­ne, would undoub­ted­ly cont­ri­bu­te to col­lap­sing of your exis­ting social struc­tu­res when said and done. Howe­ver, I argue that each moment a vast num­ber of things are left unsaid out of unfoun­ded and irra­tio­nal fear - the kind so fami­liar to me as a social incom­pe­tent - also by the so-cal­led nor­mal people in the world. May­be somet­hing the other per­son just said made you feel a litt­le uncer­tain, may­be the meal you just had made you tem­po­ra­ri­ly pre­fer the nice and cosy ins­tead of cont­ro­ver­sy - such minuscu­le rea­sons play a part in our inte­rac­tions, and most of us are wired to help our social struc­tu­res at the cost of expres­sing our own views to a variable extent. And it is this cost which the onli­ne world enti­re­ly eli­mi­na­tes. #

This also allows you to play the part of a total dick­head, agreed, but I argue that it is also an ext­re­me case and not the rule. It is a mino­ri­ty that total­ly loses it and beco­mes a so-cal­led cyber­bul­ly when given a litt­le more free­dom than face to face inte­rac­tions do. Otherwi­se anarc­hy real­ly would reign, in the onli­ne world. The fact that it doesn’t, to me is a proof that people alrea­dy know how to be civil enough to allow for social struc­tu­res in cybers­pace. Because the­re is less anxie­ty resul­ting from face to face inte­rac­tion, the­se struc­tu­res are bound to be dif­fe­rent from their real-world coun­ter­parts. This is why I see attempts to impo­se real-world rules onto onli­ne discus­sions as deeply troubling, vio­lent attempts to rip apart its natu­ral flow of things, and my own safe haven from my fears. #