Anonymity
Something that’s come up more often of late is the idea of maintaining an anonymous, or pseudonymous, presence on the ‘net. Largely, my awareness of this has been driven by the spike of activity in the Lutheran blogosphere generated by the Issues, Etc. contretemps.
Rather than deal with the wide-ranging implications of anonymity on the Internet, let me preface my comments by putting them within a slightly more limited context - i.e., that of anonymity within religious communities (e.g., discussion forums, email lists, & the blogosphere).
Beginning with the secondary arena — anonymity & the use of pseudonyms in discussion forums & email lists — I’ll just say that I’m against it. Why? Well, in a nutshell, these forums & lists are largely known & controlled environments. They are not free-for-alls. Take, for example, the CAT41 family of email lists, or the ALPB forum. The CAT41 lists are unmoderated, but do not (with very limited exception) allow anonymous participation. The ALPB forum is moderated, and discourages, but ultimately allows, anonymous participation. Both allow “lurking”, whereby you can read all you want & never let anyone know you were there.
I prefer the CAT41 approach, as difficult as it can be to enforce. If you really want to be anon/pseudonymous, you’re gonna be, especially if you’re willing to skirt the edges of honesty. And being online, who’s to know, right? It’s just that being on religious sites, especially controlled and/or moderated communities, you’d hope that such skirting wouldn’t need to happen. These communities should be safe places to engage in discussions.
I know, there’s that “S” word — should. It’s a loaded word, isn’t it? But if we can’t model good discussion practices in our online communities, doing so in an honest, upfront, and non-anonymous fashion, then do we really have a chance at doing them in our face-to-face communities?
Thus, whenever possible, and with only rare exceptions, I think that anonymous/pseudonymous participation in email lists & discussion forums should be avoided, if not outright banned.
Now on to anonymity in the blogosphere…
I have a little softer line about certain anonymous/pseudonymous blogs. Much like anonymous pamphleteers during Revolutionary War days, and other gadflies throughout history, the anonymous purveyor of objective fact — facts that can be inconvenient to the-powers-that-be — can serve a valuable purpose via the cloak of their anonymity. That cloak need not diminish the import of the facts they provide us. This type of anonymity, then can, and does, serve a good & beneficial purpose, despite the indigestion stirred up in those who would prefer that certain facts not come to light.
Two other types of anonymity in the blogosphere, however, do not escape equally unscathed. Many folks equate anonymity with cowardice. In the previous paragraph, I hope that I showed that for whistleblowers, such is not the case. For another class of anonymous bloggers, however, it most definitely is the case. Many anonymous bloggers are cowards. They hide behind their keyboards & their lack of discernible identity, while they lob grenades at other people. They hurl invective. They weave lies out of whole cloth. They say things with impunity, because, after all, on the Internet, no one knows you’re a dog!
A sub-category of the cowardly anonymous blogger is the anonymous commenter. I know folks are hyper concerned about identity theft & all that, and that’s well & good. But that doesn’t really excuse you from lobbing anonymous blog comment bombs. There are acceptable, ethical ways around it. Worrying about email spam isn’t that much of a worry, because many/most blogs (like mine, or say, WorldMagBlog) don’t publish the email address. What they will publish with your name is a link to a website. So, either man up & put your full name, or (do what I do most of the time) put your initials & link to your website/non-anon-blog — then you can truly stand up & let you yes be your yes & your no be your no!
These last two categories of anonymous blog posters/commenters I would like to see gone, both in the limited scope I laid out at the start of this post, as well as from the larger blogosphere. There’s just not that much discernible value that they bring to the table, as far as I’m concerned, not compared to the amount of hurt & negativity that they routinely inject into the festivities.
As far as the recent Issues, Etc. discussions are concerned, I certainly understand the emotion driving much of the posting & commenting. Frankly, the posting (i.e., that being posted by the bloggers themselves) hasn’t been the biggest problem for me. No, the more worrisome stuff, from a “what were they thinking?” standpoint, has come from the comments to some of those excellent posts. Some of the most out-there, conspiracy-minded, damaging-to-the-cause stuff has been from anonymous commenters.
Being angry is ok. Being stupid isn’t. Clicking send/ok without thinking isn’t.
Anonymity lends itself to all of that, which is why it’s not ok.
-ghp
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