Understanding People: A Virtual Journey

"Download Snapchat or Kik, man, it'll be fun," she said.
"I don't think I'm made for it. I mean, who the fuck will want to talk to a guy that looks like a hobo?" I replied.
"It's up to you, I guess but look at it this way: It might help you break out of your little antisocial misanthropic shell."

I thought of what she said and I decided to go with it. What harm could possibly come from a little bit of experimentation, I thought. So I reached for my phone, swiped and tapped and swiped some more. A minute later, I had the application installed.

A month has passed and here I am, writing about what I thought could not be a memorable occurrence. As I am sitting here pondering on how to coif up my sentences to make it presentable and interesting (All for you cunts, obviously) my thoughts are constantly distracted by the intermittent vibrations emitted by my phone. Notifications from people living all around the world, in different time zones; all channeled into my phone. It is a beautiful thing.

After installing the application, I was immediately faced with a conundrum. What username should I use? Should I use my real name? No, no, this is the internet, God knows what people might do with my real name. And people I know will be able to find me and worse; talk to me. That will not do. So I went ahead and picked a random name which was rejected under the pretense of it being unavailable. This went on for awhile until eventually, I used the name of a skill from a game that I used to play. It was accepted. I lied about the date of my birthday but not the year. When my misplaced paranoia was sufficiently suppressed, I moved on.

Next was finding people to talk to. This became such a burden because:

1) I have forgotten how to ask people to talk to me without sounding like a serial killer.
2) I had no idea how the application worked and my ego demanded that I figure it out by myself.
3) I was very nervous.

So I decided that when everything else fails, the internet will always act as a safety net. Unfortunately, my browsing preferences were not... conventional, to say the least and thus began my journey into virtual hell.

I picked out a few names I saw on these shady forums. I'll be honest, they were all women, or claimed to be women. See, the first thing that Snapchat/Kik brought out in me was a raging desire for virtual intimacy. I agree, it is quite a silly sentiment but my logic was blurred by the blinding allure of women in various states of undress. I will not lie; it was probably the only thing that I really wanted out of it.

So I sent them a message, with an awkward 'Hey' or 'How's it going?'. Out of the 20 or so, one or two responded with an even more awkward 'Hey'. Where do I go from here? Another 'Hey' is out of the fucking question, how do people even do this?! The conversation ended right there.

I thought about uninstalling Snapchat and Kik and burying the memory of a failed expedition deep beneath the putrid soil of my mind. Right then, a message popped up that read: "Sorry for the late reply, I've been swamped recently. How's things going?"

Hope returned with a beastly roar. Something clicked in my mind and I became the smoothest, friendliest motherfucker on the internet. I complimented her, I freely gave advice, I told her what she wanted to hear because god damn it, I am a deceptive cunt!

We talked for a few hours. She told me she did not expect a good conversation and was glad that she replied. I reciprocated and asked her where she hailed from. The Philippines, she said and asked me the same question. I answered and then all of the sudden, this:

"Hey, man, I don't want to come off as racist or whatever but I'm looking for a Caucasian. No offense, yeah, I'm not going to reply anymore."

It came as a bit of a surprise. I totally understood the idea of having an ideal mate (In her case, being Caucasian is criteria number one) but I was very disturbed over the fact that one could ignore endearing qualities in another person on the basis of one projected flaw. It confused me to no end.

However, I kept this to myself and shrugged, left her to scour the virtual planet for a soulmate and carried onward. While the conversation yielded nothing of value, it served to spur me forward. It was then I decided to advertise.

I went back to the shady dungeon of the Internet and posted my username. Just a name and nothing else. It was a test to see if people really paid attention and if they did, what they would do with it. I got my answer three minutes after posting in the form of 34 pictures of penises in various states of arousal, 8 pictures of anuses and 3 pictures that I couldn't identify. I concluded that they pictured the bowels of hell itself.

Clearly, it was a mistake. I wasn't unnerved by the extreme portrayal of male genitalia; I've seen enough while handling patients in the wards to be partially desensitised by them. What bothered me was that these people did not give a shit about who you are. They saw a chance and they took it, consequences (Which does not exist) be damned. I shook my head and was disgusted...

Until I realised that I was exactly the same. Perhaps I wasn't so daring to the point where I'd expose myself to complete strangers but the fact remained that I favoured women in hopes that they'd expose themselves to me. I might talk to them and be genuinely interested but let's face it, it's all foreplay. With that realisation intact, I had to reevaluate my purpose.

I'd like to say that once I gave up on the promise of nudity, it got better but it didn't. Without it, people who I tolerated solely for the golden prize at the end became so fucking infuriating. I was reminded time and time again about the reason why I stopped talking to people. It was mainly because they rarely had anything interesting to talk about. I do not claim to be the most interesting person in the universe but there must be something better to talk about than what you had for breakfast. If I wanted to listen to you ramble about food, I'd have a much better time reading a menu.

One day, a girl added me. She told me that we were going to be the best of friends and while I was quite annoyed at her seemingly sickening positivism, I played along. Then she told me she was very mature for her age. Understandably, I took that with a bucket of salt. Then she told me she was 14. I heard the faint tolling of alarm bells.

This isn't going in the direction of Lolita, I assure you. We talked; I was curious on why she believed she was mature for her age. At first, I was impressed. She was already working part time waiting tables. Then she proceeded to tell me how her life was hell. She had little money. She had to take care of her brother. She has no friends. She hasn't slept in a month. My inner medical student choked on his coffee.

Typical teenage girl bullshit. I read her messages and I remember telling myself that I usually tell these people off for being fucking annoying. Then I wondered why I wasn't doing so. In my attempt to be more sociable, I unknowingly suppressed my usual honest self to please others. I became a yes-man, something that I've always feared and worst of all, I did it simply because I wanted to see naked girls. I was ashamed. With that shame came anger of which I unleashed fully upon this self-professed 'mature' 14 year old.

She was confused and for some reason, she sent me photos of the non-explicit kind (Thank the lords). The faint alarm bells gained power and became a full blown air raid siren. I asked her if she really believed that sending me photos of herself would make me like her even more. She defended her cause by saying that she only wanted to be friends. I challenged her logic.

"You're a fucking big cunt," she said and I never heard from her again.

The nudes came, eventually but there was no cause to celebrate. I clearly understood that people no longer regarded them as something that was meant to be shared privately. There was a girl who sent me teaser videos every day without fail. One day I shaved my beard and she sent me a 'snap' with a caption 'Omg, you look like a twelve year old' before blocking me.

The human race is made up of such fickle creatures.

However, there were people who I truly enjoyed talking to. There was a guy who, I swear to fucking God, was the Renaissance Man. He was studying to be a physicist but at the same time could draw some amazing shit. One girl tried teaching me Danish but for the life of me it was such a difficult language to grasp. But then again, these are the jewels in the midst of an avalanche of filth.

I think about it and it didn't really help when it came to the aspect of 'curing' my social anxiety. However, it was largely beneficial. In a way, I caught a glimpse of what was plaguing our generation nowadays.

Somehow, there is a belief that one's worth lies in how much attention one could garner. Look at me, look at me, please just look. If you don't, then I'll make you look. I'll take off my clothes, tell me how bad you want to fuck me, et cetera. And it's strange to see how in this day and age, people could complain about boredom. That, I believe, is the core of so much of what is perceived as our generation's problems. There are literally limitless activities that could be done nowadays with the help of the internet. Free books are everywhere. Free games. Free everything. Yet their attention span is limited to the course of a few hours and that's being very liberal. The time they take to be desensitised is truly alarming. Everything becomes a superficial tango, nothing has consequence.

Loneliness is another issue. It's astounding how many of them complain about being lonely and to be honest, I can relate.

Where do we put the blame? Upbringing? Education? The media? All of them? Or none of them? I don't know. I have pondered upon this question, trying to find the root of the problem but to no avail. If we blame the upbringing, then what caused the parents to do such a sloppy job? If we blame the education, there're hundreds of questions that can be asked about it. It never ends.

Then again, I don't think I care enough to find out. Will I still sieve through the filth for the promise of one gem? I have a feeling that I will but not with the same ideals that I first started with. Who knows, perhaps I might turn into one of them eventually.

God fucking forbid.