Thread: Usernames versus real names

For the sake of brevity, you are welcome to skip to the 4th paragraph (not counting this introduction) for the point of this post.

Some members of this forum use their real names as their usernames. Most use something else for their usernames. Last year a member who had as high of an opinion of me as I had of him chastised me for a long list of things, including the correct accusation that my signature line is not "real Latin," (which I never claimed it to be), and that I did not have the nerve to use my real name in the forum.

I suppose in one sense, he might have been right. (Wow that was difficult.) I fully realize that internet anonymity can be problematic if people chose to behave in a manner that they would not if they were held up to public inspection, but I also don't care to have a great deal of my personal information strewn about the internet. I'm not ashamed of anything that I have written in this forum, but I do not wish to be professionally judged by what I have written here either.

For that reason, I chose a username that makes sense to people who know me well, but that has no actual association with my real name, which might or might not be Ron. Okay, I admit it might be Ron (though my mother planned on calling me Wendy right up until I was born) and that might be what I go by in "real life." Now I admit that I was kind of slightly unnerved when people started calling me Ron on the forum. I felt like I had just been outed again. (Yup, I was outed in college when the school newspaper incorrectly identified me as Ron #@#@#@#@, a gay student. That was really a problem because I had just broken up with my girlfriend and because my mother subscribed to the paper.)

So I'm on the verge of the point here. Some may or may not care about anonymity within the forum, but that is a separate issue. The point I'd like to make is that it is confusing when members with anonymous usernames are referred to in posts by their real names.

Lynn is Lynn (that one's pretty easy)
Gssixgun is Glen
JimmyHad is Jimmy (well, duh)
Hi_bud_gl is Sham, though some call him Bud
Utopian might or might not be Ron

Those of us who have been here a while know these names, but this is confusing, and perhaps a little exclusionary, when posts use the actual names of people who have other usernames. I'm guilty of it, but I'm going to try to get out of the habit. I know in a sense it's more personal and friendly to use the real names but I for one think it is more inclusionary to only refer to members by their usernames.

Sincerely,
Utopian
(not Wendy)