Over the past few years, I’ve become increasingly passionate about online privacy, but not because I’m a particularly private person. I just believe everyone should have the right to it should they choose to. Personally, it's not something I care about all that much in practice. Sure, I'd rather not have my information sold to the thousand highest bidders and be force-fed algorithms every hour of the day and I take steps to avoid those things, but I use my real name as the domain for this blog. My personal email is linked at the bottom of the page. I use the same username for just about everything, much of it is tied to my real name and my location in some way.
I don't really mind if the few people who happen to stumble across this blog know my name or where I live or other details about my life. I'm a very open person. I don't really have any secrets or sensitive subjects or mysteries about me. Which is why I was so surprised the other day when I tried to write about being abused in my previous relationship and I couldn't. I was too embarrassed.
What I was really trying to write about was how much I grew and all the confidence I gained after I was able to end that relationship. I got a job as a contract archaeologist and started travelling around the western United States, meeting all sorts of people and constantly going out of my comfort zone. This sort of culminated the last couple months when I was able to go on a research trip to West Africa.
But in order to convey that growth, I had to write about what a miserable state I was in before that. When I was being verbally abused every day, when my every move was monitored and tracked, when all my devices had to be turned over for inspection, when I wasn't allowed to socialize with my friends or family, when I wasn't allowed to spend any time on my own hobbies or interests, when I was fifty pounds heavier and my hair was falling out, when she would threaten to kill herself if I ever left her, when my sexual consent wasn't respected, when she assured me that no one else would ever love me, when I had to give up my dream of pursuing archaeology.
And I just couldn't write it down. It's not that any of it is private. I'd be happy to talk about it with anyone in person or online. I just feel ashamed and embarrassed about it. Even speeding through that last paragraph was difficult and I'm not going to go back and proofread it. I know it's illogical. I would never judge anyone else for being trapped in an abusive relationship. I would never think anyone else was weak or had anything to be embarrassed or ashamed of. I would admire their strength and their honesty and their bravery for being open about it. But I'm still embarrassed and ashamed of it anyway.
I also know it's illogical because there's a 99% chance no one I know in real life will ever stumble across this blog. I don't even know if it's even accessible by Googling my name, and I doubt anyone in my life is Googling my name anyway. I'm definitely not embarrassed about it showing up for ten minutes on the "New" page of Bear Blog. So what's stopping me? I don't know. Maybe when I figure it out I'll be able to write about these sorts of things without being paralyzed.
But hey, I figure that's at least a start.