I understand the argument that Waskul is trying to make with this article. It could basically be boiled down to the fact that the Internet is a scary, scary place and you have no idea who you're talking to, nor does anyone know who you are. Waskul explains the fluidity of identity of the internet and the basic ways in which individuals present their perceived identities online. However, I find that this article has a negative bias and I can think of one important reason why this is so. Waskul was hanging out in chat rooms for hours doing research. In the current Internet culture, chat rooms are comparable to strip clubs. While strip clubs are entertaining, not everyone spends all of their time watching daughters and mothers remove their clothing for the sexual stimulation of others. There a millions of people on the Internet who are finding ways to genuinely communicate with others, despite the fluidity of online identities.
An example of a counter to the Internet's deceptive nature is the YouTube phenomenon. Thousands of people have flocked to YouTube to do away with the anonymity and bear the realities of their lives through a diary method called "vlogging". My favorite example of vlogging stems from a duo that identify themselves under the screen name of The Vlog Brothers. (I will admit, their screen name is important and helps to identify their purpose, so that's something that I agree with Waskul on.) This brother duo began creating daily videos as a way to communicate with each other and then created an entire subculture called Nerdfighteria. While the main goal of the community is to "decrease world suck", a large component of the community's communications are perceived acceptance and portrayals of the characteristics that actually belong to an individual through their online persona. In fact, it is encouraged for members of this Internet based group to engage in "real life" activities with one another, thus fighting the online identity issue.
Of course, this isn't a perfect counter example and Waskul's arguments are applicable in certain settings. However, I think it is vital to note that the fluidity of chat rooms is not completely applicable to all online interactions. The cyberself is not the scary entity it is made out to be.
I would be lying if I said I wasn't being completely judgmental when reading this article. There appears to be something about writing on the subject of "self" that draws out some strange, strange things. The problem I have with this article comes down to the way in which the author chose to approach writing about the subject. Normally, my dissection of another person's literary pursuits wouldn't be relevant, but I think it applies this time. Please, bear with me while I attempt to connect the dots.
The author of this article, who happens to have the middle name of Horton, discusses the social self, but is careful to explain that he does not believe that there is a non-social self, it's just that all those other, lesser, people call it something else and he had to find a way to distinguish his topic. Cooley (the author) then spends several pages using perceivably unique phrasing to describe the phenomenon by which individuals build their concepts of self based on the way an individual relates to others. This can mean that we define our sense of self based on how we relate to other beings through our interactions or the way we think and perceive situations. A decent example of this, which was included in the article, was the description of how an item is only able to be described as "mine" because it relates to other beings as not belonging to them.
While the points Cooley makes are interesting and it is possible to walk away from this article with a general understanding, I found myself looking down at the pages and thinking, "Wait, what?" Cooly's sense of self is doused like bad cologne all over this article. It is apparent that Cooley wanted to be seen in a certain light and is willing to write in a unique style, so as to put off a very specific sense of self. In order to project this sense of self Cooley uses "unique" writing techniques to explain his thought processes. For example, phrases like "fondling it in seclusion" are used with strange metaphors that really don't help support Cooley's case. Why does he do this? Part of me is completely baffled and unable to explain why anyone would want to present scholarly material in such a way, but it could be argued that Cooley is attempting to project his sense of self by writing in such an unexpected manner.
Or maybe people are just weird. That's a completely reasonable possibility at this point.
My grandmother, the most wonderful woman to ever live, passed away at the beginning of this school year. Her funeral was the first time I had sung "Mansion Over A Hilltop" since I was in my mid teens. It used to be a hymn that I would sing every Sunday. Even though it had been half a decade since I had heard this song, I still knew every note and lyric. It was just something that was ingrained into you.
Now, the difference between when I used to sing this hymn and when Elvis sings it is pretty big. The church I attended from birth to 17 was a Church of Christ. The CoC does not believe in the use of instruments in musical prayer. This is because if the Bible doesn't specifically say that you should do something, then you just shouldn't do it at all. This was one of my church's practices that I just could not wrap my head around. Jesus never said, "Come forward and feed thine cat!", but I still choose to put food in my cat's bowl every morning.
There are a few observations and memories I can discuss in regards to my religious experience. Most of this will be boring. One of these things is awesome. The boring facts will tell you that my mother was Catholic and my father was a heathen. Alright, he wasn't a heather, he went to a Church of Christ with his family growing up. He then hit a wild rebellious streak, met my mom, got married, and now wears sweater vests to work every day and swears he never did anything improper a day in his life. Neither of my parents were very satisfied with their early religious upbringing, so my mother started taking us to Church of Christ services and my father started working on Sundays. Our church was (and still is) a congregation of educated, middle class, white people, with traditional families. Services include very monotone readings out of the Bible, sermons that are mild mannered, and singing with no instrumental background.
Here's the awesome part. The clearest memories of my religious upbringing are of what took place after church services were over. Sundays meant Kentucky Fried Chicken and Car Talk. After service we would turn on Car Talk, a fantastic NPR show, and drive-thru order some disgusting fried chicken. It was the best part of Sundays. (Sidenote: I became a vegetarian after I stopped attending church regularly. I'll let you figure out how those things are related.)
My religious upbringing was boring and miserable. There was absolutely no liveliness to keep a teenage engaged. I would say this had a wooly mammoth sized impact on my current non-identity when it comes to religion. However, I get the feeling that had I attended The Church of Jesus with Signs Following, I would probably be more connected to my religion; or I would be dead.
Snake handeling services with The Church of Jesus with Signs Following could not be more different from my religious experience. Where The Church of Jesus with Signs Following encourages its members to yell, make prophecies, and do absolutely unsafe things, my church was putting people to sleep. It is unreal to me that people would gather together in a religious space and behave that way. Mumble out a "hallelujah" in a Church of Christ in Missouri and you will be shushed. While there are millions of ways in which to contrast my religious upbringing with The Church of Jesus with Signs Following, I am more impressed by the similarities.
Our church, too, was rocked by a scandal. While we prayed for resolution and believed in the rightness of our leadership, we, the congregation, suffered. I see this with The Church of Jesus with Signs Following, as well. Their numbers dwindled and their reputation was shot. They had to seek outside of their congregation to find someone to lead services or had members not well versed in public speaking leading services. This, also, happened in my experience. In fact, the way in which The Church of Jesus with Signs Following reacted to its scandal reminds me all too well of the way in which I witnessed adults behaving and structural changes in my own experience. In fact, it wouldn't surprise me if after their church services, Uncle Ully Lynn and Sister Bobbie Sue picked up some fried chicken while listening to Car Talk.
I first learned about the Stanford Prison Experiment when I was in high school. My Advance Placement Psychology teacher shared the video, "Revisiting The Standford Prison Experiment" and then challenged our teenage brains to think about how our school experience was linked to this experiment. In hindsight this was probably not the best idea. The last thing an overflowing school needs is a student uprising based off of an over zealous teacher's lesson plans. Regardless, it is an experiment that tends to stick with you.
I remember thinking then, as I do now, that I was so entirely repulsed by the behavior of the experimenters. I wondered why they let these students engage in violent behavior or be tortured and no one stopped for a second to question if they were causing harm. Zimbardo describes when he realized that he was causing others to suffer as a moment that could only occur when someone from the outside, in this case his current lady friend, related their perspective. I have always found this to be completely unacceptable.
I understand that this study is supposed to be used as a key example of how people can become so engrossed in a certain reality or situation that they are unable to see past their current circumstances. However, I have an extremely difficult time applying this principle to Zimbardo and the other experimenters. It is expected that researches and, especially, teachers are able to remove themselves from situations in order to be effective leaders. This is not a new concept and I find it hard to believe that Zimbardo had never been taught to remove himself from bias and convolution, especially in the process of research.
Is Zimbardo's explanation of his inability to address the safety of his subjects acceptable? I would have to argue that Zimbardo deserves to be knocked down a peg on the experimental recognition scale. Other studies that traumatized subjects and put them in a lot less physical danger, like Milgram's shock tests, and are villainized. Why do we praise Zimbardo as being a genius for recognizing his own inhumanity? Personally, I'd like to see the teaching of the Standford Prison Experiment altered to show fault on all levels. Recognizing his inability to effectively lead does not excuse Zimbardo for his behavior.
Arlie Russell Hochschild discusses emotional work and deep acting in the article "Emotion Work and Feeling Rules". Emotion work, according to Hochschild is "the act of trying to change in degree or quality an emotion of feeling." Let me tell you about a woman who is a stellar example of emotional work. Her name is Betty Draper. Betty is a fictional character on a completely ridiculous television show. Betty Draper is a a horrible shrew on the inside and as the show goes on more and more of her inner wicked witch starts to come out. On this particular occasion Betty has found herself unable to deal with her multitudes of problems. (Children who act out, a cheating husband who also secretly conspires with her therapist about what Betty is saying, and neighbors with loud birds.) Betty's attempts to deep act, or force herself to feel as if she is happy in her soul-sucking role as a housewife, have failed. Despite how hard Betty worked at her emotional work of keeping up with the way people expect her to feel and behave, she's going to just lose it and start shooting the neighbor's stupid stinkin' birds.
Some days I want to be like Betty Draper, even though she's a miserable woman. Betty Draper is a character who is so genuinely unable to continue the emotional work of being a standard housewife that she does things like, oh, shooting the neighbor's stupid birds. Betty Draper has been deep acting for so long that her brain just can't take it anymore. All the times she's tried to convince herself that she should feel a certain way has just eaten away at her little brain.
While this may seem like an unstable thing to aspire to, I envy her in this moment. I think everyone has the deep desire, every now and then, to pull a Betty Draper and just do exactly what their urges tell them to do, even though the consequences could be dire. I mean, wouldn't it be just fantastic to just unleash your inner "crazy"? Wouldn't it be nice to just shoot the neighbor's stupid birds?
I play roller derby. Derby is often times associated with symbols of violence, aggression, physical harm, sexual deviance, inappropriateness, and debauchery. Derby is a sport that symbolizes chaos and disorder in the view of general society. In my constructed reality derby symbolizes athleticism, friendship, diversity, and community. I often times have to explain how derby “really is” to others. I feel as if I have to convert them to my version of reality. The example given in the article of walking back to your dorm (I hate that word, by the way) and being unsure of who is behind you applies here. Derby is perceived to be a mugger, when in reality it’s just a good friend trying to catch up with you.
I also feel that my dislike of the word “dorm” applies to this concept of symbols, language, and perception. A dorm is perceived as being a building where college students live. A dorm is probably dirty, a dorm is rarely loved, a dorm is just for sleeping. A residence hall, however, is a place where communities are built, friendships are made, and people look out for your academics and general health. That’s why you’ll never find someone from Student Affairs calling a hall a “dorm”. In general realities “dorm” is just a term, in our reality it’s a dirty, dirty little word.
Doesn’t everyone have words that are equally misinterpreted according to their social reality?
