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Invented personae?

post #1 of 36
7/7/05 at 12:17pm
Thread Starter 
As most of us don't restrict our Internet use to TCS, I have a question: How many members have encountered posters on boards/in chat rooms (No specific TCS examples, please!) whom they really suspect make up their biographies in an attempt to stroke their own egos, compensate for feelings of inadequacy, or whatever? Is that one way of "getting a life"?
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post #2 of 36
7/7/05 at 1:18pm
Well I don't know about at TCS, but at a few other sites I go to there are a couple of people I kind of wonder about. All in all I tend to take people at face (or computer screen) value. Since I rarely if ever agree to meet anyone off line if they want to have a fantasy life on-line more power to them.
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post #3 of 36
7/7/05 at 1:45pm
One guy I know posed as a female to procure "favors" from others online. This was mainly on techy forums, but they would help him write code, help him with tricks and tips to soup up his computer, show him where to find drivers, bios, etc. He doesn't need to do it now, but as he was starting out learning about this stuff, it did come in handy. Instead of being shouted down like they did to other newbies, they helped "her" all they could.

There have been a few who I've seen that have very questionable "facts" of their lives. They usually aren't too hard to spot, as most of them aren't very good at keeping their stories straight. Especially if you happen to know them (or know someone else who knows them) on another board, and they say something completely different on that other site... These are also usually the total drama queens (male or female) who always have a crisis or always have the answer (even if you didn't ask the question).
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post #4 of 36
7/7/05 at 1:54pm
On a different regular board I am on a man posed as a single mother of two...
She regularly pm'ed me and "her" stories didn't always jive.
She had 3 jobs but all but one was a different job each time and her name was different at the bottom of three different posts..
She regularly asked posters for any old home videos or photos they might have.

We found "her" out later when she was disruptive on another board.
The IP address and other things were investigated and "she" turned out to be a guy living 1000's of miles away from where he stated he was..

Very odd.

You have to be cautious of course.
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post #5 of 36
7/7/05 at 2:14pm
On an another board there was a person who had like 3 different accounts, would post as a guy, as a woman who has a teenage son, as a woman... She would make up these different characters and somehow somebody noticed the similarities. Towards the end she or he(god knows which one it really was) couldn't keep the stories straight either.
And the bad thing is that so many on that board trusted this person, in the end he/she came up with a story about this whole thing and there were still some who believed it.
I think people like that have no life at all!
When this whole thing happened, I remember what my mother used to say when I was little heh, never trust strangers. Afterall on the internet that is what we all are to each other Scary. I haven't been on this site long enough to know if there are any people like that here....
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post #6 of 36
7/7/05 at 2:31pm
this is one of the few boards I trust. Other boards I almost think everyone is lying. Although it's probably not that bad.
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post #7 of 36
7/7/05 at 2:48pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Marge
this is one of the few boards I trust. Other boards I almost think everyone is lying. Although it's probably not that bad.
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post #8 of 36
7/7/05 at 2:52pm
I can't say I have ever encountered anyone who falsely claimed to be someone s/he is not. That said, I have not spent much time on internet Boards and no time at all on a chat room. One hears so many wild things about "chat rooms". I take everyone at face value here and if anyone is anything other than who they claim to be here, it would just make no sense to me. This is just a place for cat lovers to share ideas and thoughts - I can't see why it would serve anyone well to play games with it. Anyone doing that would need more than a life. They'd need help!
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post #9 of 36
7/7/05 at 3:01pm
I have enough trouble remembering hte real things I have done - how do people remember three or four different 'lives'!!!
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post #10 of 36
7/7/05 at 3:02pm
Oddly, the only other two boards I visit are full of people I've known for 6+ years, some I have met in person, others I have not.
Everyone on those sites has met some of the people on those sites, thus everyone's real self is known.
Both sites are slightly affiliated, one though is strictly for us girls.

Sunday, two people who met on one of those sites were married, 60% of the board population attended the wedding, all of us were invited.
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post #11 of 36
7/7/05 at 3:13pm
This is a bit sick, but I know of two people (married) who had their own computers in the same room and they would go into teen chat rooms and pretend to be mental health counselors just to see what type of problems the teens would share with them. They were actually just two drunk asses that had nothing better to do and would brag about their exploits on other forums
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post #12 of 36
7/7/05 at 3:21pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Arlyn
Sunday, two people who met on one of those sites were married, 60% of the board population attended the wedding, all of us were invited.
Neato...that's how I met my dh
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post #13 of 36
7/7/05 at 3:39pm
I have seen that on other boards as well. My s/o goes on several tattoo artist boards, and they do have to prove they are working professionals, but aside from that, anything goes. The shop where my s/o works needed an artist to do a temporary guest spot, and since they have found several good artists on that board, they looked there. This ultra-liberal military hating smart ass jerk ended up wanting to come. He poses as some kind of tough guy with loads of talent and professional connections. He was constantly wanting to argue with most of they people on the board, my s/o in particular. He got here, and he is much younger than he made out to be, and a big, sweaty dumpling, not the ass kicking ultimate fighter tough guy he alleged to be. (He seems to have stolen that bit of his online persona from the last guest artist.) Not that anyone cares about all that, but it was just stupid. He would not give a decent handshake to any of the men, but insisted on crunching my hand several times. Turns out he has worked at over 20 shops in the past 2 years, that is how he knows all the people in the biz. We think he is just running out of options. I have not seen any of his actual work, but if it is not up to the standard that he says it is, he will be gone by the weekend.
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post #14 of 36
7/7/05 at 5:51pm
This is the only forum, wherein I post and I've never been in a chat room. Most of the people here seem to be pretty straightforward.
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post #15 of 36
7/7/05 at 6:07pm
Okay, this is embarrassing, but I actually once faked a persona on a message board - I was 17 at the time (four years ago), and it was a board that discussed baby names (researching names and their meanings is one of my hobbies) - I was afraid that people would think I was odd for posting about names if wasn't actually having a baby, so I pretended to be a mother, and pregnant - I only kept it up for about a week before I realised that there were lots of people on the board who weren't expecting babies and who still wanted to talk about names and that doing so wasn't considered weird there, so I 'fessed up and have posted as myself there ever since (I'm still a poster there). Really lame, I know, but obviously I've learned my lesson.
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post #16 of 36
7/7/05 at 6:13pm
I was part of a forum where a man in his 40's began posting as a teenage girl... he had this big dramatic "emotional breakdown" where he told everyone the "truth", which was that he was a 30 year old single father. All was revealed when he showed up for a group meeting... and snookered one of the ladies there into dating him somehow. Then, he broke her heart and never posted again
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post #17 of 36
7/7/05 at 7:26pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Juniper
Okay, this is embarrassing, but I actually once faked a persona on a message board - I was 17 at the time (four years ago), and it was a board that discussed baby names (researching names and their meanings is one of my hobbies) - I was afraid that people would think I was odd for posting about names if wasn't actually having a baby, so I pretended to be a mother, and pregnant - I only kept it up for about a week before I realised that there were lots of people on the board who weren't expecting babies and who still wanted to talk about names and that doing so wasn't considered weird there, so I 'fessed up and have posted as myself there ever since (I'm still a poster there). Really lame, I know, but obviously I've learned my lesson.


i'm sorry, i shouldnt laugh but its such a cute story! what did you name your pretend children?
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post #18 of 36
7/7/05 at 8:14pm
What the hell is it with some men? Does anyone else find any of these stories disturbing?

Believe it or not, I just got my first computer (a pretty cool laptop at that!) about 6 months ago, and this is the only forum I post on. I'm on a scooter list, but rarely post there.
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post #19 of 36
7/7/05 at 10:04pm
I belong to several boards and several chats..well i do not chat as much as I used to. Anyways. I have met MANY people who pretend to be something they are not. Animal forums seem to be the lesser of that evil IMO..Catsite, and some horse boards...

But chat rooms, and RP forums are CHALK FULL of pretenders..perhaps its the fact that they enjoy rp..they feel they have to rp their realife as well.
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post #20 of 36
7/8/05 at 3:27am
I've never pretended to be anyone else, I'm an awful liar as I have the memory of a goldfish and I catch myself out within minutes! I also don't see the point in it, and it can be downright odd.

I did know a girl on another forum who was being 'stalked' by another member. The other member would email her threats, follow her around the boards and start fights, posted her personal information across the boards, even posted pictures of the girls wedding online and said she was going to wait outside her house one night and kill her. We were obviously all horrified by this other member, who was banned time and time again but kept reregistering under different names to continue the threats. Then we found out it was the girl herself who was making the whole thing up, was registering under different names and arguing with herself, posting her own photos and information on the boards. Have no idea why she did it, sympathy maybe? Sign of a very derranged mind if you ask me.
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post #21 of 36
7/8/05 at 5:01am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Purity
Then we found out it was the girl herself who was making the whole thing up, was registering under different names and arguing with herself, posting her own photos and information on the boards. Have no idea why she did it, sympathy maybe? Sign of a very derranged mind if you ask me.
That is pretty strange!

I have seen a number of people living make believe on a couple of boards! Although, I actually have a friend in real life who is a 'romancer' - she would tell everyone in school different lies and then we would find out from eachother what was said! Some of the lies could have been very damaging though!

I still believe that she was crying out for attention!

The thing is with 'romancers', with the things they say, it makes you feel like they think you're boring when you're honestly telling people how you worked in the garden or made a quiche or something!
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post #22 of 36
7/8/05 at 7:58am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Purity
I've never pretended to be anyone else, I'm an awful liar as I have the memory of a goldfish and I catch myself out within minutes! I also don't see the point in it, and it can be downright odd.

I did know a girl on another forum who was being 'stalked' by another member. The other member would email her threats, follow her around the boards and start fights, posted her personal information across the boards, even posted pictures of the girls wedding online and said she was going to wait outside her house one night and kill her. We were obviously all horrified by this other member, who was banned time and time again but kept reregistering under different names to continue the threats. Then we found out it was the girl herself who was making the whole thing up, was registering under different names and arguing with herself, posting her own photos and information on the boards. Have no idea why she did it, sympathy maybe? Sign of a very derranged mind if you ask me.

Wow. That is INCREDIBLE.
Who has that much time??
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post #23 of 36
7/8/05 at 8:01am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Loveysmummy
Wow. That is INCREDIBLE.
Who has that much time??
I kind of think that is a red flag...when someone is constantly on a forum, while claiming xyz - when xyz would seem to require a lot of time out of their life!
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post #24 of 36
7/8/05 at 8:28am
I can't honestly say I've ever seen it for sure, there were a couple of folks I wondered about on a motorcycle forum I used to frequent. There was one in particular that kept stirring up trouble and getting banned and re-registering. It's hard to ban people with dial-up accounts because they have a floating IP---it changes every time they re-boot. I kinda doubt that the folks on the Planted Aquarium forum had any reason for doing such a thing .

I don't "do" chat rooms, 'cause I don't like not being able to edit my responses, and there's just too much going on at a time for me to be able to pay attention. I've had to re-register on forums before if it's been a looooong time since I'd been there and would have no idea what my password or logon (if RoseHawke doesn't work) or even e-mail address was/is! So I might have multiple ID's but not really with the intent of being somebody else.

I tend to go whole hog into a forum for several months depending on what my current hobby/interest is then I'll get interested in something else and "disappear," or at least become much less noticeable.

Purity --- "...memory of a goldfish" I love that! Mind if I borrow it? I'm about the same!

Cindy
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post #25 of 36
7/8/05 at 9:09am
One board I was on had a woman who kept up her story for at least 2 years. She had the most incredible string of tragedy happen to her, during the time she was posting, several family members died, she had serious back surgery, and then fell out of bed at the hospital and needed more surgery. Then rehab, and treatment for depression, and her son was arrested for drugs. Two of her beloved pet dogs died, she married her long time bf, and then he was killed in an industrial accident, her brother died before he could see his son born, then when she went to visit the fatherless baby, she fell and broke her back again.

She finally left the board when someone accused her of lying. She was posting about her trip to Florida, to meet her nephew for the first time, and we finally had enough. So someone linked to her post from a year previously where she posted the exact same thing. She never came back.

It just went on and on. Someone posted a link to this article on people who fake illness for attention and now I am suspicious of a lot more people. It's so easy to lie for attention, if that's what you crave.
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post #26 of 36
7/8/05 at 9:44am
That's a really good article!

The one other thing that happens on animal sites, and it has happened here, is Munchausen by Proxy for Profit. I couldn't prove it, but there has been some post-and-run, "Look at this site and raise money for my kitty's surgery". Never hear from them again. I seriously doubt they are legitimate. I know there was one person a long time ago who claimed to have a very sick kitty, went on and on for months with technical details about it, got a lot of people suckered in to sending them money for the necessary surgery...and then disappeared for a month. When they came back, they posted something along the lines of, "There was no sick kitty, but thanks for paying for my vacation to the Caribbean! Suckers!" That's why we have the Rule about solicitations now, and why we post it whenever someone posts asking for money.
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post #27 of 36
7/8/05 at 10:38am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by valanhb
That's a really good article!

The one other thing that happens on animal sites, and it has happened here, is Munchausen by Proxy for Profit. I couldn't prove it, but there has been some post-and-run, "Look at this site and raise money for my kitty's surgery". Never hear from them again. I seriously doubt they are legitimate. I know there was one person a long time ago who claimed to have a very sick kitty, went on and on for months with technical details about it, got a lot of people suckered in to sending them money for the necessary surgery...and then disappeared for a month. When they came back, they posted something along the lines of, "There was no sick kitty, but thanks for paying for my vacation to the Caribbean! Suckers!" That's why we have the Rule about solicitations now, and why we post it whenever someone posts asking for money.
That article is very good.
It's odd, but I encountered a woman on two German cat sites whom the Münchhausen by Proxy tag really fits. She had a number of cats, and at any given time at least one of them had a life-threatening disease, required surgery, etc., and she was broke, of course. She never directly asked for money in her posts, though I have no idea of what was going on in her PMs.
The one site is moderated by a veterinarian, and when she started asking some "hard questions", the woman stopped posting. I just figured the woman was looking for sympathy; I've read about several cases of Münchhausen by Proxy involving kids, but it never occurred to me that it could also apply to pets.
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post #28 of 36
7/8/05 at 11:36am
I post on a forum that is local to my county. I melded my BF's and my name together for my log in name. People assumed I was male. I thought about it and decided not to correct them just to avoid stalkers.
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post #29 of 36
7/8/05 at 12:13pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by RoseHawke

Purity --- "...memory of a goldfish" I love that! Mind if I borrow it? I'm about the same!

Cindy
Not at all!! Would be funny if it wasn't so true! I'm one of those people who forget why they even walked into a room sometimes, or have a thought, start to do it, then forget what it was
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post #30 of 36
7/8/05 at 12:49pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Purity
Not at all!! Would be funny if it wasn't so true! I'm one of those people who forget why they even walked into a room sometimes, or have a thought, start to do it, then forget what it was


I'm with you...Have you ever started doing something different than you intended to do or gone into a room to get something and picked up something entirely different than you were going to get?
I am perpetually in a state of standing there murmuring "now what was I coming in here to get?"...

Or worse is when you start asking the kits what you are supposed to be doing?
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