The Facebook Thing (part 2)
Now that we have uncovered your deep-seeded need to be liked (or loved), let's now turn to your other need - to passive/aggressively face people on the Internet. Oh - now. The ease at which we confront each other on these posts and comments is of great sociological interest to me. The distance and anonymity of the interaction leads to all sorts of interesting (and, dare I say, honest) commentary over what is proposed. Here, one can be CrazyGuy99 and post a comment about what a jackass the poster is, and live to tell about it. Chances are, the poster isn't aware of who CrazyGuy99 is, and even if he did know, the probability of retribution is minimized by the proximity of the commenter. It's simple social math. On the Facebook, however, the commenter is generally one of your (so-called) friends, and as such, their identity is known. Even if your profile photo is that of a flower or a cat, your name is attached to the comment, ...