I recently realized something oddly amusing: people are incredibly forgiving toward strangers, but switch into an entirely different judgment mode with familiar faces.

When I post something on my blog, in an anonymous space, I don’t care at all. I can write things that are biased, strange, mischievous and I’ll think, “Ahhh. Freedom. That’s what it tastes like.”

But post the same thing to my personal social feed? My mindset instantly turns into border control. I start questioning everything: Will someone misunderstand this line? Will someone take that sentence personally? Will this paragraph make someone think I’m talking about them?

I haven’t done anything wrong, yet the gaze of familiar people feels like a row of invisible inspectors, standing outside my words, scoring them silently.

Anonymity gives freedom to evil but it also gives freedom to goodness. It lets bad people act without restraint, and lets good people finally stop performing.

What exactly is a “persona”? Isn’t it just the layer of plastic we wrap ourselves in when we’re afraid of losing the approval of people we know?

The absurd part of life is this: strangers don’t care about your plastic shell, and familiar people might not care about your naked sincerity either.

So in the end, the issue isn’t the platform. It’s not anonymity. It’s not familiar people.

The real question is: do I actually want the world to see the real me? Or do I prefer maintaining the safe version that exists in other people’s minds?

Freedom isn’t granted by the internet. Anonymity isn’t camouflage.

Freedom is this— whether I’m willing to stop acting.



—— XC Scribbles · 參拾壹 XXXI 🎭