Catfish

[Calliope]

I used to lie about what timezone I was in, and spell things "The American Way" because I wanted to avoid stranger danger and didn't know about IP addresses xD

[Mercen-X]

I could never understand the severe cases in which people would be fooled into sending these people money and other things. Why would anyone become so attached to someone they've never even met in person? I mean, I've long considered sending money to Jirito, but that has been based on payment for services rendered. Unfortunately, I still can't afford to do it, but I still want to. Anyway, my point is that people shouldn't be so trusting particularly when dealing with the anonymity of the internet.

[Psychotic]

Once I met a girl from EoFF who said she was a geordie but really she sounded like someone from TOWIE.

There have actually been a couple of people at EoFF who I'd describe as Catfish. Cloud No 9 died perhaps five or six times during his EoFF membership, and in those brief periods of life he was in a wheelchair, on a ventilator, or about to have an operation where he had to choose whether to be blind or have his spinal cord severed, or else he'd DIE.

He then had the very clever idea of inviting his real life friends to join EoFF, who were just like "lol no there's nothing wrong with him" when people asked about his health.

[Night Fury]

Hmmm. Not really.

Back when I used to RP and stuff, and I was like 14/15 more people would lie about their age, where they lived and stuff but I didn't ever see it as that big of a deal.

I was once a Catfish though. Again, in my RP days. I had kind of stopped using this one character account so I created a new one as a guy who was a total jackass and a bit of a twat, well lots of people started really liking the guy version of me so I just adopted that persona and it just got dragged out for a very long time xD Nobody was hurt or anything like that as we never openly discussed out real lives all that much. I didn't make up where I lived or my name or anything or age y'know, there was no love involved in it, although this one girl told me she had a crush on me, so I acted like a total smooth criminal and was like 'babe, you live so far away and I don't want to be the one that breaks your heart because of it' or something. She smurfing loved it

[Miss Mae]

A friend of mine had a guy flirting with him online once. He pretended to be Gaspard Ulliel. As in, didn't just use his photos, but actually pretended to be him. He was really pretentious. It was quite hilarious.

[Pike]

I knew a guy in an old World of Warcraft guild of mine who told everyone he was a girl for like... I don't even know, a year? Two years? He was huge into roleplaying and, insisting he was a lesbian, he got into all sorts of kinky lesbian roleplay (presumably with other guys who said they were lesbians). We had no idea he was a guy until one day he posted his picture online and we were all completely shocked that he was actually a dude.

Seeing as it was WoW it really shouldn't have surprised us I guess.

[Mercen-X]

*coufh*Big Bang Theory reference*cough*

Why do they call'em catfish anyway?

[Loony BoB]

I'm too much of a blabbermouth to keep up such a facade. I've known a dozen or so people who have done it, though.

And Sarah, I don't even remember that. xD Hilarious.

[Jess]

Once I met a girl from EoFF who said she was a geordie but really she sounded like someone from TOWIE.

I'm too much of a blabbermouth to keep up such a facade.

I once met a guy from EoFF who assured me he was pretty cool and then he had me attacked by a million thunderbugs.

I don't think I've ever had a friendship with a catfish. The people I've met have been genuine.

However, I have become wary of the internet. I googled my full name once and I found profiles with my name & photograph (but wrong age) on dating sites. I have NEVER registered on a dating site in my life so that is really weird.

[Agent Proto]

I've done a few catfishes long ago in the past where I pretended to be someone else only for fun via chats (never Facebook nor any dating sites), but I've never pulled this on anyone from EoFF. I don't really go very far with them as far as I can tell, nor am I very serious with them. I see it kind of like playing a role.

Someone asked about why it's called Catfish. There's a movie called "Catfish" which is about the same subject.

[Loony BoB]

I once met a guy from EoFF who assured me he was pretty cool and then he had me attacked by a million thunderbugs.

However, I have become wary of the internet. I googled my full name once and I found profiles with my name & photograph (but wrong age) on dating sites. I have NEVER registered on a dating site in my life so that is really weird.

I've discovered someone thieving the identity of someone I didn't know until the day earlier. They were on instagram and they were copying the hashtags and everything, so while I searched for something I stumbled across a genuine person and someone who was pretending to be them, but in a very bullying way. It was a bit sad, to be honest, but better that they could deal with it than to find out much later on.

[Shorty]

Re: why we use the term "catfish"

They used to tank cod from Alaska all the way to China. They’d keep them in vats in the ship. By the time the codfish reached China, the flesh was mush and tasteless. So this guy came up with the idea that if you put these cods in these big vats, put some catfish in with them and the catfish will keep the cod agile. And there are those people who are catfish in life. And they keep you on your toes. They keep you guessing, they keep you thinking, they keep you fresh. And I thank god for the catfish because we would be droll, boring and dull if we didn’t have somebody nipping at our fin.

I always thought it was that they shipped catfish and passed them off as cod and it meant that [thing in question] is not actually the [thing in question].

[Mercen-X]

Heh, heh, heh, that quote. Droll means "amusing". I often use that term in my writing to express boredom... then I remember that's not what it means. lol

[Madonna]

I always thought it was that they shipped catfish and passed them off as cod and it meant that [thing in question] is not actually the [thing in question].

If you are talking about fish being misrepresented, escolar being passed off as butterfish is something to watch out for. You can google all the fun and joy about your health being at stake when people sell/serve you the former labeled as the latter.

I am all about protection, and multiple identities can play into that. I am not above separating my life into slices and portioning it out to ID 1, ID 2, ID 3, and me in an effort to keep other people in the dark about aspects of my life. Outside of EoFF, I have not been so very open with others when it comes to who I am, but have largely abstained here, so you need not worry that I am playing you (or am I, internet). The level of complexity differs when it comes to theses identities, with some having a fictitious history, personality, and their own updated social media, while others mostly languish with monthly email checks and the occasional post somewhere.

A lot of people also experiment with different online personalities as a form of self-discovery and -exploration, and this is a good thing. Finding out who you are and how that is best expressed can be a hard thing, and trying new ways of to present one's self and accept that self are important methods in doing just that. So you are important, and finding who you are and how to be that person is important, but other people matter as well, and you have to try to not hurt others in satisfying your needs. So I draw the line with fake personae at relationships.

Relationships, mind you, do not just entail the romantic ones, but also friendly ones, and maybe possibly your persona is an asshole, so you have a few hostile ones as well. In all of these relationships, a person should remember they themselves are fake, and should use that to temper any actions which would hurt others too greatly, and that includes leading someone on or bullying, to look at two parts of the spectrum. I do not care how cool you are or how in love you are with a romantic partner if you are still a fake; you are hurting the other party, with or without knowing it, and that is bad. Sure, you might love your significant other, but who is it they love? It is not you; it is a construct that has no tangibility, and one day, if both parties are in deep, that information is going to come out, and it will be ugly. The same goes for friendships; sure, you can keep some skin-deep friendships, but are they getting to know you (while you learn about them), or are you feeding them the backstory of someone you pretend to be? Would they forgive this betrayal of trust? And back to the hostile side of things: it is not cool to use a facade to attack or belittle others. You can be an adult (or grow to be one if you are younger) by learning how to communicate or learning when not to. There are times when it is okay to not like another person or more than dislike them, but it does not make it okay for you to harass them, be cruel to them, and anything else you can devise while hiding behind a mask. If any of this paragraph pertains to your behavior, reader, I urge you to reconsider who you have become.

tl;dr smurf catfish and escolar

[Chris]

They taste delicious.