5 Internet Lies

BRB

Ah, the ol’ BRB (known aliases: AFK, BBL, “I have a meeting in five.”) This is the most innocuous way to tiptoe away from a conversation you don’t have the patience or cunning to partake in. BRB opens up a world of opportunities: you can keep up with your Twitter feed (in real time!), surf the web for cat pics, maybe even take a bathroom break if you’re feeling adventurous. You’ve got the power.

How am I not following you on Twitter anymore? So weird.

It’s one thing to never follow someone in the first place, but it’s quite another to unfollow someone after building a Twitter rapport with them, then playing dumb when confronted with the unfollowed person in an offline setting. The funny thing is that people proactively lie about this one out of guilt, even when unprovoked. “I really wanna check out that article you were telling me about, where can I find it? You tweeted it? Okay, cool… wait what? How am I not following you anymore? That’s weird. I definitely didn’t unfollow you. Heh. I mean, why would I unfollow you, right? Odd… Twitter must’ve malfunctioned or something. Following you now!” I’m not saying it’s impossible. I’m just saying I’ve had Twitter for four years and I’ve managed to only unfollow people I didn’t want to follow anymore.

This is what I look like.

This visual lie is sprinkled across Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Instagram, and perhaps most deceptively, OkCupid. It’s all: “At the beach (five years ago)!” or “So sick, I can barely move (because I exerted all of my energy applying concealer to my conjunctivitis eyes and pouting in front of my webcam).” Whoever said “Pictures Don’t Lie” never had a disappointing date with a Photoshop magician.

I think I’ve seen that video (but let’s watch it again, just in case)

We have a serious problem with admitting that we haven’t read that book/ watched that movie/ heard that song, and this neurosis is amplified by the internet — maybe because it takes fifteen seconds to watch the latest Corgi video and admitting we’re “out of the loop” reeks of laziness/ (justifiable) indifference/ a lack of internet savvy. Admittedly, this is one of my bigger offenses. Something about being late to a meme chaps my ass. “Oh, the autotune dog video? Sounds familiar, hmm. Yeah, I think I saw it for like, five seconds. Maybe we should watch it again.” I hate that I care, almost as much as I hate that I only watched my first Corgi video like, two weeks ago, and I seriously don’t get it — is there one Corgi? Multiple Corgis? Do I need to own one? Does it come in black?

I didn’t get your email.

Oh, you didn’t get my email? Perhaps the zip code was illegible or the post office misplaced it. Or not. Because I’m pretty sure MAILER DAEMON would’ve hit me up had my email not arrived. (An aside: does anyone get serious Satan vibes from MAILER DAEMON? His automated message might as well say, “Your email’s trapped in hell and you’re an idiot. What the hell is @gnail.com? Loser.”) As a worshipper at the church of iPhone, I know all too well that checking your emails from the bar or in the middle of the night [ sad life :( ] leads to neglecting messages you would’ve otherwise answered, but let’s keep it real: between 10 PM and 6 AM, email is the credit card bill of the internet — received, read, ignored.