Online Identities

Identities and our sense of self emerge from our earliest experiences and are based internally on what others think about us. Some of our identities are formed at birth such as your sex, and others such as your faith, can be inherited or adopted from your family and culture. We also have a choice in shaping our identities and in the online world it makes it very easy to change your identity to be seen differently. This can be both good and bad in my opinion. The ability of being capable of changing your identity gives a person a chance to be seen differently or heard differently, then they probably actually are in person. I believe that online when it is not necessary to state what your gender or ethnicity is, most of us would assume that the other person talking is a white male, when actually the person could be part of a minority group. I believe that I also possess this same prospective because it is a part of my heritage, and it impacts the way I shape others identities that are otherwise unknown online.

In other Internet interactions where having the ability of changing your identity can be seen in a negative way would be for example in some online chat rooms, social networks and dating sites. Here, being able to change someone's identity is dangerous because people sometimes choose to use the ability to change their identity in a negative way, unlike changing it in order to be heard. Some examples of this are when teens are talking to strangers online and then begin to create a more emotional relationship with the person on the other side of the screen. When they decide to finally meet up with that person who they thought they were talking to online, that person usually ends up turning out to be someone completely different, and in most serious cases, someone who is very harmful.

From my own personal experience on social network site such as Facebook or Twitter, I will only interact with the people I believe to be legit. If a person chooses not to have a profile picture or a little blurb about himself/herself, I am more hesitant to interact with them because they are limiting the amount of information they share with you and they are then perceived even more as a stranger. The information that we choose to share on the web on sites such as Facebook, have a major role in developing our identity. The way you talk online and the things you choose to post or talk about all have an impact on the image you are leaving for yourself. Recently, I have heard of companies usingFacebook as a place to gather free data about certain market groups, and they do this by collecting data on what sorts of things people choose to "like" on Facebook to help them get a better understanding of their market.

Having the internet as a place to converse with strangers can be done in a safely manner, as long as you always take precautions, because even though if what they say and tell you about themselves sounds to be real, it just may not actually be the truth. The Internet gives us the freedom and even the confidence that we may not have if we were to have the same interactions in person. Being able to create your own identity empowers you to be heard in ways that might not be possible in real life interactions. This all just goes to show that even though we believe we now live in a country where everyone is seen equally, we actually still have a long ways to go.

Memes: Condescending Wonka

In today's Internet culture memes have become a very popular trend especially with the younger audience. Memes can be identified as an image paired with a specific text to create humour to the viewer. Humour usually reaches people the best and we are more attracted to forward on something humorous to others. Internet memes were first seen on websites like Reddit and Know Your Meme and were shared between a network of friends as inside jokes. Now Internet memes have grown to be seen on social networks such as twitter, Facebook and Tumblr and are continually expanding across the Internet. 

The meme I decided to look more in depth on was the Condescending Wonka memes. My reasoning for wanting to explore more about this meme was because of its popularity on Facebook and it seems to be the most common meme I have seen. "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory" was one of my favourite movies as a child and when I first started seeing memes about the film I found myself being quite interested in learning more about them. The image of Willy Wonka in the meme comes from a scene in Gene Wilders 1971 musical "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory" when the the character Wonka a chocolate and candy inventor asks the children if they are interested in his new invention the Everlasting Gobstopper. In the memes Wonka is seen as someone who likes to talk down to people, and was first used with the caption "You Must Be New Here" referring to people who are new at something, afterwards the image caught on by many people and was referred to as "Creepy Wonka." 

The Condescending Wonka meme I chose had the caption "Your parents bought you an iPhone, a macbook and a car? And they are paying for your school?... Please, tell me how hard your life is." I found this caption to be quite humorous because of how sarcastic and true it is that students think this way. Being in university now you constantly hear students complaining about how hard their lives are right now, but in reality these will probably be the easiest years of their lives. They don't always seem to appreciate everything their parents do for them. The Condescending Wonka memes captions seem to be endless and very popular, people are continuing to make new ones all the time. The Condescending Wonka memes can also be seen in other ways such as dry humour and signify irony such as how it was transferred into another meme where there is a picture of a Wiemaraner dog that says “Oh, you run a chocolate lab? / I am a chocolate lab.”

After looking into the Condescending Wonka memes it has opened up my curiosity to other memes and has interested me into learning more about where they come from. Once you have a good understanding of where the image or text comes from it makes the memes a lot more humorous and enjoyable. 

Her Bad Mother

The blog I chose to analyze was Her Bad Mother, the reason why I decided to examine this blog was because I thought it was focused on a very specific group of people and that their discussions would be quite opinionated and in depth. My first impression when I went onto the blog was that it looked put together very well and I felt like it gave off a more personal vibe. Without even reading any blogs yet I knew what the main focus of the blog site was because of its name as well as the photos that appeared on the home screen. 

The readers of Her Bad Mother are mainly made up of young mothers all the way up to mothers whose children have grown up but still want to offer their advice. I believe this blog is trying to appeal to new moms who have a lot of questions on being a new mother and it gives them a place to let out some of their frustration to other people who can relate. I also think this blog appeals to mothers who wish to brag about their families or want to share stories about their own children. 

I think Her Bad Mother is a place that gives mothers a chance to escape reality for a while and allows them to be able to sit down and have their own time and express their thoughts. The community aspect of Her Bad Mother I believe is very important, they rely on each other for their support and guidance. From reading a few entries it seems that most participants in the blog have taken part for quite sometime, which has allowed them to get to know each other and have created good friendships. Having created these friendships it has lead most of the blogs to become real back and forth ideas, allowing each one of them to share their suggestions, advice, support and love. This aspect of Her Bad Mother I believe to be quite important to the blog. All mothers want to be able to find people who have been in their shoes and can really relate to what they are going through whether being good or bad, and Her Bad Mother gives them a place to do so.

If I were a new mother who did not have many friends who as well were becoming mothers, I believe this blog would be a great place to come. When we are faced with new challenges and excitements in our lives we as humans like to know that there are others out there who are going through the same things and are able to relate and give us comfort. My older sister has just recently had her first baby and I think she would really enjoy partaking in Her Bad Mother because she is just starting to learn all the new roles of motherhood.