spectrumsocialskills.weebly.comspectrumsocialskills.weebly.com/uploads/9/0/4/4/... · web viewfor...
TRANSCRIPT
Everyone on the Internet is an Actual PersonFor instance: you. posted on Jul. 30, 2014, at 12:27 p.m.
Nathan W. Pyle BuzzFeed Staff
Have you ever seen a photo like this?
Nathan W. Pyle / Via buzzfeed.com
It might be easy to forget that this is a photo of a person. Probably someone who doesn’t know he’s being made fun of.
Thought experiment: Imagine if you saw such a photo of yourself on the internet.
Nathan W. Pyle / Via buzzfeed.com
It probably wouldn’t feel all that great. Especially if you started to read comments or even just looked at the view count.
Nathan W. Pyle / Via buzzfeed.com
In fact, it would probably feel like a whole stadium full of people laughing at you. (Because essentially it is.)
Nathan W. Pyle / Via buzzfeed.com
The crazy thing? We probably wouldn’t do that in a big stadium. We’d look around and realize, Hey, we’re laughing at a person. That’s kind of mean.But when we’re isolated and staring into our screens, it’s easy to forget how mean we can collectively be.
Nathan W. Pyle / Via buzzfeed.com
And we forget this incredibly important concept.
Nathan W. Pyle / Via buzzfeed.com
Like a girl who is just learning guitar.
Nathan W. Pyle / Via buzzfeed.com
Or even a kid who doesn’t yet know how harsh the world can be.
Nathan W. Pyle / Via buzzfeed.com
For all you know, it could be someone standing right next to you.
Nathan W. Pyle / Via buzzfeed.com
All I can know for sure is that all of my keystrokes affect real people.
Nathan W. Pyle / Via buzzfeed.com
And there are real people out there who could use an encouraging word today.