Now that I got your attention, lest talk about Privacy.
I have a Facebook page, I have a Twitter page, I have a blog with a sidebar that has all my other "Internet profile" stuff. My name is Caleb Rascon, and if you google me, you'll probably know all you need to know about me.
It has come as a knuckle in the face to many thirty-something-year-old users the fact that they can know more about their children through their Facebook statuses then knocking on their door and talking about the birds and the bees. Also, that same knuckle has given a black eye to many teenagers bragging about their crazy nights and having their mothers and teachers know about it. And the knuckle has come full circle to me, as these groups of people have become very vocal about it and I just don't get what the problem is.
I keep reading about them "being forced into" a situation in which everybody will know things about them that they didn't want disclosed, and that "privacy is a right that is being violated". However, I always come back to "Were you really forced into it? Or did you just click without reading?" and "If you didn't want somebody else to know about your dildo fascination, why did you put it in your Facebook page?"
A borderline conspiracy theory is being woven: the government is tapping into your Twitter feed to know about your behavior and... well, that's where I get stumped. Why is it considered so gruesome the fact that people can know about my behavior? It's not like I don't tell people about it, and they tell their friends, and so forth.
I read the following in the comment section of an article about privacy:
If you don't mind being Facebook friends with Obama, consider what happens when future President George Z. Bush gets to read every anti-conservative comment that is on your wall. Be afraid.
Afraid of what? Of the government knowing I don't support them? I don't. If they knew about it and forced me into a van, I won't be thinking "I shouldn't have put that anti-government piece in my blog". It would be more in the lines of "This government is crap!", and I'll be yelling it through the van windows.
If people are concerned of what other people might do or think if they knew what they do or think regarding controversial topics, they're wusses that shouldn't be posting it in the web in the first place. Yeah, you read right, wusses.
Here is a small sample of my "dirty laundry". Enjoy:
- I watch porn (sometimes gay, depends on my mood).
- I proud myself of being woman-like. I even get mood swings in a monthly basis.
- I want consistency in legalizing drugs: either all should be illegal, or all legal. It's stupid that alcohol is legal and pot isn't, while both are hazardous in the hands of a doctor during surgery.
- If I ever got the chance, I may hesitate saying no to water-boarding George W. Bush.
- When people tell me that God spoke to them or that God wants them to do something, I usually give them the number of a psychologist.
- Legalizing gay marriage is an idea as stupid as legalizing heterosexual marriage, and I think we should be focusing on other things. If two persons (of any sex) want to get married because they love each other, why get the government involved?
- I like Belanova.
- [I'm putting an extra one here just to give all my metalhead friends time to soak in that last one]
- When people say "this tastes like dick", I always answer "tastes good, doesn't it?"
- If a slutty-dressed girl is allowed to slap me in the face when I look at her cleavage, I should be able to slap her in the face if I dress slutty and she keeps staring at my junk, even more so if she laughs after.
- If blacks "are allowed" to say nigger to each other without care, they have reduced the meaning of the word irrelevant of its history. Having it as an "insider word" only provokes confusion and awkwardness when a person from another ethnicity wants to carry out a conversation with them. Tell you what, they can call me beaner, if I can call them nigger.
- Ethnic pride and patriotism are an insane state of mind when used to put down another ethnicity or country; they're based on the accomplishments of people that aren't alive anymore. "You enslaved me," or "You would be speaking German if it wasn't for us" are idiotic: you weren't even alive when that happened?!
- I find endearing the relationship between persons and their dildoes. It really does show how shared memories between two entities is what really makes a friendship grow. This goes also for toilets.
There. If a future employer googles my name and finds all these things about me, and denies me a job because of it, then I don't want to work for that employer. He's a douche that thinks gay porn is relevant in my work.
There are legitimate reasons for the right to privacy, and most are life-preserving and preventive of identity theft. I will only disclose my home address, my credit card numbers, my current geographical position, etc. to a very exclusive group of people. And Facebook, Twitter, and Google give you the option to do just that, or even to not disclose any information at all. I don't know where this "forced me into it" deal we are so worried about came from (read before you click, damn it!). Oh, and of course, there's always the option of not posting it.
But if you don't want people to know about you because of "what will they think of me?" then you're a wuss. A flat out coward that has gone through life showing different masks to different groups of people, to make everybody like you. Unfortunately for you, the Internet has come, and what you say in one site is transferred to another, with which people get to know you better. And you're scared of that, of somebody not liking something about you. Well, guess what? That's why we're here: to dislike, to bitch about things that we don't like. However, while talking about it, we get to know you, the real you. And based on that, we decide if we still don't like you.
It can be so liberating, though: no more hidden curtains, no more masks. The people that stick with you do so because of the real you, and you stick with them because of the real them. It becomes real, more so than it has ever been. Why would you opt out of that? Privacy is important, but using it as a shield for hiding a part of you that you feel ashamed of is just wasteful, and counterproductive of what the Internet can do for you. There's a whole world out there of people with your same afflictions, in which they congregate in forums to talk and chat openly about those afflictions. Where you can feel connected to people that truly see the person that you are: a weirdo, just like everybody else there. If your mom, teacher, and/or employer doesn't like what they find about you, google their names and point out how they are weirdoes too.
Being "normal" is for wusses. Embrace your weirdness, be the person that you are, and let the Internet help you be that person in an international level. Go to forums around the web, and type with all caps "I LIKE DILDOS, AND AM PROUD OF IT!" You'll see that it will make you feel much better, and get you a lot of interesting friends.
