Secret Identity Primer Over the years, it has occurred to a great many people that the medium of E-mails and online chatting lends it's self to a unique form of deception and manipulation. That of the secret identity. Through clever backstories, alternate E-mail accounts, and the feigning of ignorance, one can easily convince others - even those who know them well - that they are someone else entirely. This can be satisfying on a number of levels, in that it allows for one to say and do things that one might not want to have to deal with the consequences of saying or doing in their true identity. It could be used to cause people who you know to tell you things which they would never say to you if they knew who you truly were. It could simply serve as a form of a amusement; fooling people into buying this act of yours. Whatever the case, it has become something of an art form over the years. The thing is, those who are truly adept at it never speak of it, because they almost always have one or more secret identities to maintain at any given time, and showing themselves to be adept at this practice is a good way to shed suspicion upon themselves. As such, the practitioners of this art seldom speak to each other or to neophytes to the craft, and as such, there is little exchange of ideas. What I am attempting here is to shed some light on some of the basic tenets of this art; some of the very most crucial of rules one must follow to pull this act off convincingly. 1) Never, ever draw attention to your secret identity while in the guise of your true identity. Do not, for example, ask someone you know "Hey, have you talked to Carl Incognito yet? My, what an interesting chap he is"! Doing so draws attention to the fact that you have a vested interest in having people you know speak to this person. If they know you want them to talk to this person, there may well be the question of "why". This is not a question you want answered. 2) Never try to get someone in touch with your secret identity. Do not say "Hey, why don't you talk to my sister? She loves to suck cock, and I bet she'd like you", then go online as Charline Incognito, ready to chat the fuck out of the very person you were just talking to as Carl Incognito. Once again, there is the immediate question of "Why does this matter to you"? If you must draw the attention of someone you know to your secret identity, then make use of some neutral device which you know your acquaintance makes use of regularly. A public mailing list, for example. Preferably one which you have no connection to in your true identity. 3) Never show any connection of any kind between your real self and your secret identity. Do not have your secret identity make any reference to your true identity. Do not have your secret identity endorse you, insult you, or make any other reference to you. If you do so, the question once more arises in the mind of the listener, "Why does this person care about this other one"? If your secret identity makes a comment of any kind which is not emotionally neutral regarding your true identity, then there will be those who will notice what kind of opinion your secret identity is trying to push. This could be all it takes for the more astute to realize that this person is just you trying to push an agenda. 4) Know your secret identity at least as well as their best friend would know them if they were a real person. Construct a background for your secret identity which includes several major events in their life, their family situation, their job, their friends, and their hobbies. Work these things out in advance, so you have time to familiarize yourself with them. Furthermore, work out in your mind what their views on certain things are - religion, politics, etc. Even if your secret identity is totally ambivalent about these topics, it helps to know that up front, as it plays a part in what kind of person they are. Work these things into your conversations in small ways. Make passing reference to your brother, Mike. Don't announce them in the middle of a conversation in a way that little things which are taken for granted never are. 5) Vary your speech patterns from your own... Make absolutely, positively certain that you never make use of any figures of speech or distinctive means of communication which you utilize in your true identity in your secret identity. This is just common sense. Furthermore, keep personal opinions you are known to hold in your real identity out of any conversation being held by your secret one. While it IS possible that your true identity and your secret one could hold similar opinions and/or make use of similar figures of speech, it's just possible enough that your secret identity would communicate in a different manner that it's not worth the risk of somebody noticing the similarity. 6) ...but don't vary them too much... If you stray too far from your normal speech patterns, people will realize that the way you're speaking in your secret identity is affected. They will see these blatantly manufactured things you say, these things you do, and realize that nobody ever actually talks or acts these ways, and then they will question your personality. They will begin to try to figure you out, and then they may realize that the person they're talking to is not a person at all, but a character. This is no good. 7) ...unless your secret identity is a character. Sometimes, playing this secret identity up as a character works. Some people, while online, will affect such patently bizarre mannerisms that their true identity is indecipherable. Whether they make use of inhuman figures of speech, espouse views that nobody could ever actually hold, or make claims of their behavior and lifestyle that simply couldn't take place, these people are so obviously artificial that nobody gives any thought to what kind of person they're really dealing with - they take it for granted that it's all bullshit. One can take advantage of this to hide your true identity behind a smoke screen on bullshit and thus avert discovery. The key here is to lay it on thick, and to keep all conversations superficial. Never get into any situation where anyone will have cause to get beneath the surface, and keep your conversations brief enough that you won't have opportunity to slip out of character. In short, make sure nobody has a chance to see anything but the bullshit. For obvious reasons, this sort of secret identity is impractical to maintain in any situation where you'll need to deal with the same group of people regularly, especially if this group includes people you need to speak to in your true identity. 8) Keep it simple. The more complicated the ruse becomes, the more difficult it becomes to keep track of various facts and figures which you'll need to speak of regularly. Don't come up with a complicated life's story to tell people which you could later accidentally contradict. Don't deal with too many people on a personal level. Don't get involved with people in ways in which they may realize that something is amiss. Keep your dealings superficial and brief, though not overly so. There has to be a balance here. If you're too brief, people will take note of the fact that you're holding back, and may want to see what else there is to be seen. If you make it too complex, you're opening the door for slip-ups. Know where to draw the line. 9) Trust no-one. Don't do these sorts of things in groups if you can avoid it. As effective as it may be for Carl incognito to have his buddy Mel D. Sguise show up and talk about Carl's personal life and thus make Carl seem that much more believable, Mel can slip up. He can talk about things which contradict things Carl has said about himself. This casts doubt on Carl's believability. We know where this leads. If you absolutely MUST do this sort of thing with a friend, then make sure that they clear all outgoing messages with you, and vice-versa for inaccuracies and inconsistencies. It makes online chatting awkward, but it's worth it in the long run. Furthermore, in case it needs to be said, never EVER tell anyone about your secret identity, no matter how close they may be - friends, family - they could all too easily let it slip to a mutual friend or acquaintance, not realizing how important it is. They could, in turn, tell the wrong person. 10) Don't be too "smart". Don't have your secret identity rattle off facts and "insights" to someone who knows your true identity which that person knows that a stranger wouldn't know about them. You can try to pass it off as intuition or whatever, but in the end, it just leads to the awkward question of "how did you know that!?!?". Do not, for example, "guess" that your cheating boyfriend is a cheating boyfriend. If you do that, then he will have serious doubts as to how you came upon that secret information. While it's quite possible that a stranger could infer that sort of information, it's also possible for them to be oblivious enough not to pick up on it right away, and people don't ask how you could not infer how they're proud and daring during your first conversation with them. 11) Cover your tracks. Don't leave open windows containing e-mails written by your secret identity on your screen at any time that you're not sitting right there. Don't talk about this identity in public with anyone - you never know who could stroll by and hear the wrong thing. Don't leave pads of paper containing notes on the personality of your secret identity laying about, or carry them with you in anything that anyone else might conceivably have cause to go looking through. Putting them in your binder is a bad idea if you plan on ever telling a trusted friend to "go get something out of my binder for me". Lock them up or destroy them. 12) Proofread, damn it! Always, ALWAYS go over your letters one last time before you send them off. Make sure you haven't made any little slip-ups. Make a point of always changing the phrasing of something in the letter, whether you think it needs it or not. It always pays to be thorough, and you never know what personal mannerisms someone might pick up on. If you tend to be a good speller in your true identity, make a few intentional errors (but not too many). If you make frequent use of abbreviations or emoticons, get rid of ANY you see in your letters. Vice-versa is also true here. The point is, make a last-minute effort to make sure everything is perfect. A rushed job can contain all kinds of little errors, and the extra 3 minutes may keep months of work from going down the tubes. 13) Always have an "Out". Have a ready and plausible story to explain why your secret identity is about to disappear off the face of the earth if someone is getting too close to the truth. Having them simply stop appearing online will only strengthen the belief of a determined inquirer that they were just a front. If they do, they'll be that much more apt to be suspicious of your next secret identity. This is no good. Have some story of economic ruin leading to the loss of your computer, an online affair which went so horribly badly that you don't want to be online at all anymore, or some other event which could plausibly bring an end to your secret identity's presence on the internet, and lay the groundwork for it long before you think you'll need to. Make references to your shaky cash situation, or this weird guy who's been getting way too attached to you months before any trouble crops up, so that when the time comes, you'll have months of precedent to back your story up. Slip up on any of these rules, and there's a good chance that SOMEONE will pick up on the slip. Especially somebody who lives by these rules and/or continually analyzes everyone they meet online for any one of these tell-tale signs. If you're careful enough, keep to all of these rules, and have a fair dose of good luck, though, you ought to be able to fool even your closest friends for years on end.