this post was submitted on 04 Feb 2026
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Do you think anonymous online existence leads to the development of an unhealthy mindset? (lemmygrad.ml)
submitted 1 week ago by Богданова@lemmygrad.ml to c/comradeship@lemmygrad.ml
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Unlike the material world where we only have one life, on the internet you can live many lives quite easily, try out multiple paths, until one of them sticks.

When we run into issues, do we resolve them or do we merely replace them?

Are we educating people to think better or are they being taught to follow instructions?

Like let's use me as an example. I struggle with a lot of things and I would like assistance, but that means it would be better if I act the way you like, so that I become popular and have a better chance at securing aid.

If I see a post that has lots of upvotes and I think differently, that discourages me from speaking my mind, it means if I ever run into big trouble, people are less to help me.

And as we all know everyone is precarious worker under Capitalism, that means even if I'm independent now and don't need your help, what about next year? I can act tough now, but say I have a medical emergency happen in the future and I'm known to be a critic, what's going to happen?

At least what I think would happen is people would put on their smug face and say: FOFO

That's something often neglected by the Imperial Core IMO. Cultural assimilation is taken for granted and is seen as willing participation, how many of us are just clowns trying to entertain you for scraps?

I suppose we'll never find out, until our ties are severed and we become sovereign, only then our true selves can really exist.

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[–] Valarie@lemmygrad.ml 9 points 1 week ago (2 children)

I dont think that the anonymity or the not being tied down are really that bad

The getting to try on a new face online with no judgement or ties to my in person life have if anything led me into becoming the person I am today

If I hadn't made a new set of accounts when I started thinking I could be trans I wouldn't have survived this long because I would have kept all that dysphoria bottled up until my life would have ended far before the point I am at now

If i hadn't been able to make new accounts for asking political questions about things I didnt want people to know I was questioning I wouldn't have been able to form the views I have today because I would have stayed stuck in the free market capitalist bubble I was in for most of my life.

The anonymity allows for new connections and growth just as much if not more than the amount of issues it caused and at least in my opinion showcases the kindness of people because even with that non personal connection my life has been saved several times by people whose names I will never know and faces I will never see just like they won't ever see my face and most won't know my name

[–] Valarie@lemmygrad.ml 7 points 1 week ago

Sorry I'd that didn't make much sense, it got into an emotional topic and I am not good with staying composed or structuring things while emotional

[–] gnuthing@lemmygrad.ml 3 points 1 week ago

Similar experience as a non-binary person. I feel safer with anonymity for sure.

I don't think it's the anonymity that's an issue, I think it's the bots and rich ppl manipulating social media

[–] MasterDeeLuke@lemmygrad.ml 9 points 1 week ago

I think Facebook is proof that an online existence doesn't necessarily need to be anonymous in order to be unhealthy.

[–] queermunist@lemmy.ml 9 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

Not only can you switch out masks to live different online lives, but also, it's an inherently alienated form of social interaction where no one has a face or physical body to empathize with. We're dehumanized floating text in the chat/forum/comments.

I don't know if this is inherently unhealthy, or if it just requires proper training to live in this very different form of social existence, but I do think it's to blame for online arguments being so fruitless. When I try to explain to someone that they're wrong about a historical fact, I'm not actually doing it as a equal human being. Again, I'm just floating text - a random encounter in the posting RPG.

[–] Богданова@lemmygrad.ml 7 points 1 week ago

Yeah. I think the best we can do is not to become luddites and declare a war on social media, that's like the traditional conservative talking point. That historical advancement can be stopped by sheer force of will and ideology.

We should acknowledge that Netizenship is inherently separate from your being and as Marxism, by extension Dialectical-Materialism becomes more popular and more practiced that we will be able to develop the most healthy version of the internet. In the meantime we should be using it as a force for good, however we can, but to make sure we don't let it hamper us either, inevitably mistakes will be made, but nothing is perfect.

There are lots of positive things about the internet and it can be useful tool for learning, positively mentally stimulating etc. Even if this does turn into just floating text on screen, in some ways it's liberating, what ruins it is Capitalism.

[–] ArcticFoxSmiles@lemmygrad.ml 7 points 1 week ago

Internet interactions can not beat real life interactions, but not everyone is able to have those real life interactions and if they are, they are not always frequent. Internet interactions can help fill the void if a person is chatting with good people.

[–] VladimirLimeMint@lemmygrad.ml 7 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

I spent half of my life being anonymous and the other half with my personal name attached to organizing. The results are interesting because apparently I get more shit done anonymously than physically due to my ability to communicate better online than in person despite I'm good at building rapport IRL as union organizer. A lot of people to this day disbelieve that I had real impacts on organizations like SRA, Vegan Hacktivists, Workers Strike Back as an anonymous comrade because in their mindset they genuinely believe that you have to be physically presented among real people, whereas they underestimate the importance of solidarity doesn't require knowing who you really are. I am who I was on the street organizing with Wobblies, various trade/service unions and now the comparty, we recently founded several worker organizations locally and I being the few only at-large members. As long as you put in real solidarity work, no one really mind you're anonymous.

[–] senseamidmadness@lemmygrad.ml 4 points 1 week ago

Nice to see a fellow worker out here on Lemmy.

[–] amemorablename@lemmygrad.ml 3 points 1 week ago

What you described sounds like the same kind of social pressures that can happen in person. Some people mask a lot in RL (not in the meaning of trying to be deceptive, but more like trying to hold back on the parts that may put off others, or feel embarrassing or shameful to display). Some people show up differently at work than they do at home. Things like that. I do think the internet makes it easier to mask and easier to "reinvent" yourself, but even in text alone, patterns still show through and surface level changes in ideology don't immediately change the underlying behavior of a person.

Either way, I do still think it's a valid point about culture and social pressures in general, and about how actualization as an individual cannot be achieved while people don't have basic needs met. I'm just not sure the internet is all that different from RL in this way. If anything, I'd say the internet applies less social pressure because of the anonymity and as a result, people are more able to be unfiltered (for better or worse). Some people would argue the internet can be nastier than RL words because people feel safe behind the anonymity to get away with it, but I suspect it's more like, people living in a brutal imperial core kind of culture are already socialized to think in brutal ways. In RL, the mask of liberalism shames you for showing this socializing overtly. But online, it's easier to be mask off without consequences. It's just that mask off doesn't always mean such reactionary things. For some people, mask off might be relaxing a constrained way of speaking and infodumping on whatever topic comes to mind.