On Anonymity

📅 2024-09-06

I have talked about the dangers of social media before, and one of the reasons I don’t like them is because of “hyper-identity”; Everyone thinks that they have everyone else’s attention, which conditions them to think that every single little thing is of extreme importance, and demands a reaction of some kind. But there’s also a flipside to that concept, that I think is of equal danger: “Non-identity”, or more commonly known as “anonymity”.

There seems to be a wide-spread notion in imageboards and anonymity-focused spaces that having an identity equals attention whoring, i.e. if you have an identity, you must be a narcissist that wants all of the attention to yourself, and don’t care about having “intellectual”, “serious”, “unbiased”, “scientific” discussions. It differs from space to space, but at the very least, there is a consensus that having an identity is bad in some level. There’s even a derogatory word for it: tripfag, combining “tripcode” (a unique code that prove someone’s identity on imageboards) and the f-word.

Of course there will be attention whores out there, but that doesn’t make having an identity inherently bad. In fact, here’s an exercise: Leave your house. In the real world, you have things like face, hair, clothing, the way you walk, talk, etc. All of these do make you “identifiable”, but more importantly, by having an identity, you have a purpose in the world and in your community, and people can rely on you because you have a reliable identity.

My problem with anonymity is two-fold: Darknet-induced, or digital privacy-induced paranoia, and the idea that having an identity enables people to rely on personal attacks when talking to each other.

First one is obvious: You learn about all of these governmental and corporate forces out there trying to spy on you and collect as much data on you as they legally (and illegally, sometimes) can, and you build up anxiety from that. Built up anxiety leads you to extinguishing your identity online, trying to stay as unindentifiable as possible, so you can feel safe from data brokers and spyware. Basically, you threw away such a core part of who you are based purely on anxiety. You do not need to throw away your identity to stay safe from spyware. That’s just a myth; There’s plenty of people out there to prove that, just look up any privacy-focused blog or spokesperson and you’ll see.

But the second one is a little more complicated, and actually came before digital privacy-induced paranoia as an argument for anonymity, and the people that became anonymous through the former, came to use the latter as an excuse for staying anonymous.

And to talk about that, we must talk about the origin of imageboards: Japanese anonymous textboards.

“Serious” debates

Imageboards aren’t a US-ian invention, of course: The imageboard that inspired 4chan, Futaba Channel (ふたば☆ちゃんねる), is japanese, and the platforms that inspired Futaba Channel (2channel, among others) are also japanese. And the initial argument for anonymity in those spaces seems to be that having an identity prevents “serious” and “accurate” discussions, due to how people can feel upset with one another (they can point fingers), and how enabling emotions can derail conversations to “criticizing [games]”¹.

I don’t know (and don’t really care to know) how it works in Japan nowadays, but here in the West, the relationship imageboard users have with anonymity is quite different: Because there is no identity, there cannot be accountability (who is this person that offended me?). Because there is no accountability, people are free to be hateful, troll, annoy others, swim in their delusions, casually use slurs, etc.

That is what “anonymous” means here. It has nothing to do with preventing personal attacks; In fact, it enables them. And since they require very little thinking to pull off, it is no surprise that they have become so widespread.

So, even if people use this elaborate argument about “serious discussions” when defending anonymity², there is no doubt that anonymity has shaped the narrative in the complete opposite way. Just like there is no incentive to use personal attacks because no one has an identity, there is also nothing that would punish you for doing so, because you don’t have an identity.

And this is leaving aside the fact that this idea of personal attacks being more common in non-anonymous spaces is completely bogus. That depends largely on culture too, just like with imageboards, but because people have an identity in non-anonymous spaces, they are both inclined and encouraged to tweak their behavior from time to time (grow up, essentially). They change, like you know, humans do. When you’re “Anonymous”, you are part of this monolithic, inert hivemind that provides only one identity for everyone. You are stationary.

As “Anonymous”, you’re purposefully letting go of your humanity because you’re insecure about it. You’re ashamed of it.

Shame

Yes, shame. It applies both to those who are insecure about themselves, and to those that just wanna hurt others, which is the focus of what I’m talking about.

It is a powerful and very useful tool that prevents us from stepping over each other’s boundaries, and not making others feel uncomfortable. Without an identity, you cannot be held accountable. Without accountability, you are incapable of feeling shame for what you say or do. Without shame, you turn into a vile person, a more distorted version of yourself that would never exist, had you not lost your identity. In summary, you’re not yourself anymore: You are “Anonymous”. You are part of the hivemind now, and everything you say loses weight and meaning, both because of the lack of accountability, and because everyone in the hivemind you’re in says the same thing. Would you like to live as if everything you say is not taken seriously?

Oh, that reminds me of something: If you go to 4chan’s /b/ “(Random)” board, you’ll see this subtitle, near the top of the page:

The stories and information posted here are artistic works of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact.

AKA, “Everything we say has no meaning whatsoever. Do not hold us accountable for it. In fact, you can’t.”

So they know about everything I just said, but take the wrong conclusions from it. And sidenote, they call you a “fool” if you take anything seriously, or perhaps from a different perspective, call you a “fool” if you think too much about the consequences of anonymity. So, do not think! Just say whatever you wanna say, regardless of how evil it is! Yay! /s

Anyone that has spent any considerable amount of time posting on imageboards, and that have also done some self-reflection, will relate to this. Your identity is literally what makes you, you. If you lose that, you lose your purpose in life and in your community³. Everything loses its value and meaning.

Exceptions to the rule

Hiding certain aspects of yourself from others can be useful, however. People that are hacktivists, anarchists, journalists, minorities of some kind, and everyone in between use it all the time to protect themselves. Not because they are harming others and want to get away with it, but because knowing what they do or stand for can be very dangerous to them. But pay attention to not doing harm. If you harm others, you should be held accountable for that.

What is considered “harmful” or not warrants its own separate discussion, but what I’m saying is that there are legitimate uses for anonymity. But the problem that I’m referring to, is that anonymity is most often, either used to get away with hurting others, or it becomes someone’s default state of being, which should both be avoided. Nothing is more important than having an identity, and throwing it away entirely for any reason simply cannot be beneficial.

To put it shortly, anonymity is a tool that is so often both misused and overused, to the point where the misuse became the way it should be used. You are not “Anonymous”; You are you. And it’s nice to meet you.

How to recover

I don’t even know who I’m writing this section to. Maybe for myself mainly, but it could also help other people in my situation. Here’s some things you could do to build your identity back:

• Starting a blog (like this one!);
• Joining forums, IRC groupchats, etc;
• Putting a nickname in the “name” section when posting on imageboards;
• Using the same nickname on more than one online space;
• Leavin’ yo damn house, yo;

Starting a blog specifically forces you to be unique, and build an identity, since you can’t just write about whatever everyone is also writing about. Otherwise it would be booooooring. Also take the time to customize your website, and not just have a “brutalist” layout. Keep it lightweight, but also keep it fun, both for your sake and your reader’s sake.

The idea is to form a centralized, condensed, reliable identity, that you can use as a way to guide yourself towards changing, growing and healing, and also to communicate to others that you are trustworthy. Both of these things are extremely important to us humans, as social animals. Please do not forget that.