I was poor often throughout my childhood, and apart of that came my family living with others at random points, and from that I had older cousins as well as not specifically related family friends expose me to many things I probably shouldn’t have seen.
I think I first visited 4chan when I was maybe 9 (although I was 12 before I became an active shit poster), and from there that’s basically a bit of the worst of the worst from all over.
I gave the above context to explain how at each instance I really just wanted to fit in because I was technically homeless and suddenly living with teenagers, so I went into it hard. I laughed at gore videos, watched porn, racist humor to the Nth degree, etc. I just emulated the behavior I was being exposed to because that’s how children socialize. I didn’t really introspect on it until I was a teenager and figured I’d never ever show a kid the things I’d seen. It’s really kind of fucked up, honestly.
Now this was a time period when the scary parts of the internet from the previous generation was “Don’t get lured out by a stranger and kidnapped” or something dumb like that. They had no idea what kind of deep abyss of fucked up things the internet had to offer, all for free, all on demand.
I don’t specifically regret having these experiences. I think having been lightyears ahead of the curb on horrible bodily disfigurement helped me cope with some issues I had as a kid (I saw the aftermath of a shotgun suicide first hand). It fucked me up for a little while because I knew the guy, but it wasn’t like having nightmares on repeat kind of fucked up. I dealt way more with the psychological aspect of suicide than I did with seeing an actual victim, and I can really only say it’s because that was kind of tame to what I had been watching for the few years by that point.
That is kinda fucked up. Understandable though, peer pressure sure is a bitch sometimes. Making you do things you should have never done, all for the sake of getting that feeling of “fitting in”. Especially when you are not yet mature enough to even realise that what you are doing is bad.
I was poor often throughout my childhood, and apart of that came my family living with others at random points, and from that I had older cousins as well as not specifically related family friends expose me to many things I probably shouldn’t have seen.
I think I first visited 4chan when I was maybe 9 (although I was 12 before I became an active shit poster), and from there that’s basically a bit of the worst of the worst from all over.
I gave the above context to explain how at each instance I really just wanted to fit in because I was technically homeless and suddenly living with teenagers, so I went into it hard. I laughed at gore videos, watched porn, racist humor to the Nth degree, etc. I just emulated the behavior I was being exposed to because that’s how children socialize. I didn’t really introspect on it until I was a teenager and figured I’d never ever show a kid the things I’d seen. It’s really kind of fucked up, honestly.
Now this was a time period when the scary parts of the internet from the previous generation was “Don’t get lured out by a stranger and kidnapped” or something dumb like that. They had no idea what kind of deep abyss of fucked up things the internet had to offer, all for free, all on demand.
I don’t specifically regret having these experiences. I think having been lightyears ahead of the curb on horrible bodily disfigurement helped me cope with some issues I had as a kid (I saw the aftermath of a shotgun suicide first hand). It fucked me up for a little while because I knew the guy, but it wasn’t like having nightmares on repeat kind of fucked up. I dealt way more with the psychological aspect of suicide than I did with seeing an actual victim, and I can really only say it’s because that was kind of tame to what I had been watching for the few years by that point.
That is kinda fucked up. Understandable though, peer pressure sure is a bitch sometimes. Making you do things you should have never done, all for the sake of getting that feeling of “fitting in”. Especially when you are not yet mature enough to even realise that what you are doing is bad.