Internet Friends

I was asked on my post http://weareone-ruth.blogspot.com/2013/07/friends-help-clean-up.html if Internet friends are real.  I believe they are as real as any other relationship....depends on what you put into it.   My sister was involved with internet connections long before I was.  My first encounter with internet relationships was cyber stalking and bullying by a junior high student where I worked.  An 8th grade boy terrorized a 6th grade girl in another state.  When he was found and questioned,

he glibly stated it was just the computer never thinking about the fact there was a human being at the other end of the connection.  I waited years before my children dragged me into the 20th Century and cyber connections.  The first cyber connection that became real to me and I never met was Upsi.  She used her blog to explore her relationship with her narcissistic mother. From her blog, I connected with an online community of people that I started building relationships with.  Then in a two month period a whole lot of pain was caused by a person that was emotionally hurting and used Upsi as a target.  The words that flew were hard to read and just as complicated to sort through as any other community divided.  Words were said that hurt and people took sides.  You know, that all felt very real.  I figure it this way, if we can hurt each other online, we can also build each other up online.  We get to be friends just like real life by connecting and communicating over time.  I have several amazing friends that I never met in person but feel concern when they are not online for awhile.  I felt sad at the disruption caused by one person treating others online without regard to how it would effect them.  My favorite internet friendship story comes from my sister.  Her internet friend's husband kept telling her that my sister wasn't "real."  Then my sister sent him a gift for his birthday...He decided that 'imaginary friends' did not send birthday presents.  Therefor, my sister must be real.  I think friendships online are as real or fake as how honest people are with each other.  You know, that sounds a lot like "real" life to me.  People have lied to me in person as well as online.  People have built me up in person as well as online.  I feel the internet allows connections all over the world that just wouldn't be possible in person.  I don't know in 'real' time most of the people that read my blog but I know that real people are reading.  Thanks readers for being out there and taking time to share my thoughts.  May all of you have a beautiful and blessed day.  :)

Munching Crops - a different view doesn't make something less real.