Internet friends: teens opt for online relationships
December 4, 2015
Many teenagers share and connect online with strangers so much, that they eventually build relationships and go on, in extreme cases, to become the best of friends.
With 300 million users on Instagram, 307 million users on Twitter and 1.19 billion users on Facebook, teenagers share more personal information and meet more new people online than ever before.
This is how sophomore Sira Gardner met her best friend, Taylor Noah, from Culver, Indiana.
“I followed her Instagram account,” Gardner said. “She posted about how she wanted an internet friend, and I reached out to her. We have been friends for over two years now.”
“She’s like any of my normal friends,” Gardner said. “We Facetime at least once or twice a day and just talk about little random things on our mind.”
Freshman Hayden Lyseph is another student who has an internet friend, a girl named Tori.
“I consider Tori my closest friend, even out of those at this school,” Lyseph said.
“We can talk to each other about anything and everything, like school or friend problems, I know she will always be there for me,” Lyseph said.
Some students find relationships such as Gardner’s and Lyseph’s false, cautioning that people can not be who they say they are online.
“They could be stalkers and come and kill you at your house,” freshman Emily Shaw said.
“They can fake the information,” freshman Brendan Hermanspan said.
While people can falsely advertise who they are online, students with internet friends say that there are strong precautions taken before meeting an actual internet friend, such as getting to know one another through video chatting and talking to their parents.
“It’s kinda hard to be a creepy old man over Facetime,” freshman Caroline Lambert, who has an internet friend, said.
However, through the doubts and worries many continue to turn to their internet friends in times of distress.
“Being worlds apart allows it so we can talk about everything that is on our minds to one another without worrying that we will judge each other or that that we will tell any of each other’s friends,” Lambert said.
Computer Essentials teacher Cameron Martin teaches his students about how to stay safe on the internet and avoid being ‘catfished.’ This is when an online person portrays a false personality to make one believe that they are something that they are not.
However, Martin does not dismiss the significance of online relationships.
“An online relationship can be a real relationship,” Martin said. “Sometimes people don’t think so; they think ‘Oh, you met this person online, then they’re not a real person,’ but people need to realize that this is our new reality.”
“As long as you’re safe online, and you know that they are not catfishing you,” Lambert said. “I think an internet friend can be the better option versus someone actually in your day to day life.”
“It’s not true that they’re not real friends, people just need to realize that this is like a new generation of making friends online and it isn’t that dangerous if you’re safe about it.” Lambert said.
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