This week, Food For Thought Friday has asked about anonymity online; to what extent do we hide (or indeed show) who we really are.
As those who know me in real life, or have met me at some event will know, I am reasonably open and out there. The person I write about is completely me, since fiction is not really my bag. Stories are often based on me, or my fantasies. Which is probably why they lack excitement and drama.
Julie really is my name, though MPB isn’t. Well it is to one person and he doesn’t need to read anything to know who I am. I wasn’t creative enough to develop my own clever pseudonym and anyway wasn’t all that troubled about people knowing my name is Julie. Of course there are a lot of people, mainly of a similar age with my name and so I can remain relatively anonymous. If you knew my surname, that would be different, I am the only one of me on Facebook and I have never met another. There is no need for anyone on my blog or Twitter to know my surname, unless I am buying something from them. For the Smut Marathon I gave myself the name Jones, which goes reasonably well with Julie.
As I grow older, and as my career comes to something of a close, I am less worried about discovery as a sex and kink blogger. No one is going to sack me now. However I do have people to protect, those who wouldn’t want to know and definitely wouldn’t understand. So, best I retain that final bit of anonymity. After all, it will also serve as protection to me, from myself.
One of the questions asked as part of this was: is your anonymous/pseudonymous online self a secret or more a form of protective “camouflage”?
The answer is probably the latter. I show much of myself on my blog (in words and pictures) and am open about who I am to those who meet me. But still I wish to retain something of a screen. Yes camouflage.
