Anonymity in Our Society

Since the creation of the internet, we have seen a growing problem amongst our youth and also amongst adults. Anonymity is causing the nation's (and world's) youth to become careless and selfish people. Anonymity is not solely attached to the interment and places such as Myspace and youtube, but we can see its problems elsewhere.

In concerts large groups of people are huddled together often in dark lit rooms or arenas. When people are gathered together as such in darkness the "mob mentality" begins. They may begin fighting or damaging the structure or stage, etc. The key to calming everyone down is actually quite simple. Quiet everything down and turn on the lights. Doing so individualizes everyone again, and so people begin to think for themselves. Mobs are much the same, they often occur at night, and, of course, are in groups. When most people are in groups we tend to give in to the "whole", or, we don't want to be simgled out. Thus, the person with the strongest will takes over and makes decisions for the entire group. Once the people have been seperated by the police or just disbanded in time, many are in disbelief with the crimes they have committed. Not knowing as to why they committed them in the first place.

We are starting to see more of this everyday online, usually done by younger and younger youths. The comment and blog sites allow people to place their opinions or just make comments without anyone ever knowing their name. Often times, these people make ridiculously rude, hateful, spiteful, or rascist remarks that they would never say face-to-face to another person. I am sure that many if not all of you reading this have seen these remarks at one point.

While usually these remarks and comments are left in a childish and idiotic manner, they do make the internet a dangerous place. Often these teenagers do not know that future employeers may look for their myspace or youtube profile and see the things they have written or the things people have written about them. Also, some may become the victims of internet stalkers, although these teens and kids may not place their name and phone numbers online, the stalkers that really know what they're doing can find people using their IP addresses and other info. Also, as time goes by kids (and adults) may become (and often do) bolder, and they begin saying hateful words in front of others, and if they say it to the wrong person it could cost them their life. Now yes, them dying because of it might be the extreme case, but a few punches at least is not.

Who has the respnsibility to fix this? First and foremost, the parents do. They must be the ones watching over their children. The majority of these offenders are very young. The parents must teasch their kids about respect, the proper use of the internet, and how to interact with people. The more time spent online, and not with actual people, the harder time these kids will have as adults when they MUST interact with others. And olso, it is everyones responibility to not indulge these people and add to the "mentality" we must think for ourselves and when we begin to ignore these comments, and to block them they will begin to disappear. It will take time, but if we wish for the quality of internet to get better, and to protect our young from things we don't want them to read or see, we must work together.

Also, we must begin to contact these sites that allow for such comments and remarks. These are much more than just stupid remarks, often they lead to email harrasmments or infringing upon others rights to not be mocked or scorned every time they place an article or want to have a friendly debate online.