27/04/2008

The Multiself

Who am I when I go online? Do I change my behavior, my appearance, my gender? Am I even human? All of this depends quite a bit on who you are, and what patterns you follow while at your computer. Some play games where they turn themselves into great heroes, cunning thieves, powerful and wise wizards, and so on. Others might alter their personality, for instance you might be more outspoken than normally when debating something, or you might just go around and troll and flame, just because you never do when you're being you. I have several different personality's when I go online. When I blog for instance, a certain aspect of me tend to dominate. The thing with blogging though, it that (in my case) you shift from subject to subject. And even if one part of my personality dominate, I incorporate several other parts of my mind into one. Though this makes me wonder, are all these parts me? For instance, one of my persona's belongs to the Urban Dead universe. (I have several I might add.) She is a short, blond girl, a bit older than my real self. This is all just appearance though. Her personality is that of a mental patient. Her vast imagination, and tendency to create stories, imagining all kinds of places, persona's and adventures, did with time become as real as the real world. Reality became another extension for her mind, and in a sense, reality didn't exist for her. Because of this, she has killed several people, none of them deserving to be killed, and is now regarded as Kill on Sight by one of the games largest groups. The thing is, how much do I have in common with the characters I create? What does it mean that 2 of my 3 characters in this game are mad, for instance? Maybe I just wanted to explore madness for a while, but I also believe that every person have the potential for any kind of emotion, any kind of change in personality. So maybe what I explored was not the topic of madness, but my own madness? And than we have the fact that all 3 of my characters are in some way on the wrong side of the law. First we have the crazy killer girl, then we have the pirate who, after having been adrift in a lifeboat for some time, got his brain fried by the sun. And third we have the former mafia boss. The mafia boss is actually the only of my characters who likes to take part in planing, tactics, and those kinda things. So, am I a latent criminal lunatic? Well, I'm not much for order, I believe laws are often flawed and ineffective, but I haven't really found a reason to brake any major once. Maybe there is actually some things I have in common with my characters? My blond psycho-killer girl, for instance, we both like suits and stories. I have quite the imagination I've been told, and I like to write a bit from time to time. All theses things are similar with the character, so maybe it isn't just a made up character, maybe it's an exaggeration of my own personality? Which makes we wonder even more, if the characters I create are, or maybe become a part of me, who am I? Can I say that these traits are something that defines me as a person? Or would that only be one part of me? Sure, most of us have a way the tend to act towards friends, towards family, and so on. This is of course all part of us, so why wouldn't these other's be?

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