Zeke Spier In Real Life

I am not sure if we were supposed to, but today I watched the IRL dvd that we bought. I couldn't really get on board with the find love online although I am trying to, but as I watched this I thought, well this is something I can relate to. I am willing to admit that I have belonged to a message board, and no I will not admit to which specific one. However, I joined for the same reason most of the people in the video did, I didn't know anyone who liked this as much as I did. I would talk to my friends about it and they would be like, why do you like it so much? So just surfing the net I stumbled across the message board. At first I thought, I am not going to join because it's silly and what not. But as I read the posts I found I had things to say and that I felt the same way that a lot of the people there did, so I said alright I'll give it a shot. At first it became all about talking about this thing, what we liked about it, what we didn't, and I thought wow there are a lot of people who feel the same way I do and they are from all over the world. Then something happened, as what happened to the people in the video. I started to make friends and not just friends to talk about what the message board was about, but friends I could talk to about normal everyday things. The message board became a community and not just a web site. As time went on, I started going to events for this thing and I started to meet some of them. Some of them where exactly how I thought they'd be and some were so much different then who they were online. A lot of them I ended up not liking, but over time there are a few that became good friends of mine. Although I don't go to the boards that much anymore, we still get together like once a month and I have even traveled a lot of the country with them. They have become more than just people from a board, they have become my friends. Friends I don't think I would have ever met otherwise.

I also think that this relates a lot to the reading about Zeke Spier. The protest groups that he and so many other people were a part of online were much like the boards that the people from the dvd and I were a part of. In the article, he states that "the internet was an excellent way to connect people with similar beliefs who were separated by time and space." He made this evident in the way he used it to connect with the other students at Brown as well as the way he used it to find out how the protests were going and where people were. On his way to Philadelphia for the protest he says that " he's only contact with the Philadelphia protest organizers was by Internet and if it wasn't for the internet he doesn't know how he would have found anyone." In this sort of way, the internet became like a community for him. A place where he could connect and express his beliefs to people who felt the same way he did.

Now I know some people are thinking, okay so you don't believe in finding love online and yet you did this and found friends through the internet?? Isn't that like almost the same thing? And I have to say for me it isn't, maybe it is the way I view love or how I care for my heart, which I wish was something I could explain. But I'm very old fashioned when it comes to love. I love the first date, nervous smiles and the awkward silences. I like to learn about someone by the way they react to things as well as what they have to say. I love the little smiles or glances at each other that make your stomach flutter. All of those things that I feel can't be really experienced over the internet. However, maybe I need to fall into that the way I fell into the message board. However, when someone messages me on my myspace with the name "Rick Hotness" and says "You are so deliciously attractive," I can't help but feel weirded out...just a bit. The internet makes it easy for guys like Mr. Hotness to use lines like that. I fully believe that in real life a guy would not walk up to a girl he never met and use that line, not being serious anyway, but over the internet it's okay. Where is the magic in that? (And yes that happened to me today haha).