Today I read an article titled “Don’t Dismiss Online Relationships as Fantasy” by Regina Lynn. This article caught my attention because I do view online relationships as surreal. In some of my past blogs I wrote about how we need to have face-to-face and physical contact and that online relationships are bizarre. So to acquire some information from the other side of the story, I stuck with this editorial.

It starts off with this freaky story about a man and a woman who both lie about their age but find each other online. He becomes jealous because she was also seeing his co-worker online and shot the guy dead in a parking lot. Well that story right away caught my attention. Lynn then goes into discussion about how he had a real relationship that was based on power and manipulation (trying to keep other men off his woman) and ended in a real life tragedy. I can understand her point of view – makes sense.

Another part of the article that caught my eye was the common thread that Lynn observed in these real life online stories and it was “that people get deeply involved in online relationships.” This is definitely true; going back to class when we discussed about that girl who killed herself because a boy (or so she thought) was making fun of her and calling her terrible names online. I hear about it more and more that people are becoming very attached to their computers and online relationships.

My favorite quote from this article is from Cory Silverberg, a sex educator. He notes on his blog that “maybe we want to pretend that what happens online stays online because so often, we want it to.” A lot of individuals who have had or are having online relationships really want to keep it hush-hush because of the fact that online dating or online relationships still are not in the norm. However, it is rapidly making its way up the ladder.

This article absolutely made me change my mind on how I view online relationships. If you, like me, believed that online relationships are fantasy, read this article real quick. It makes you think.

http://www.wired.com/culture/lifestyle/commentary/sexdrive/2007/09/sexdrive_0907