Dealing With Identity

Contributor: Adriana Ravenlust Adriana Ravenlust
Not gender identity or anything but rather.. your sexual identity.

I have worked for several years on a web presence which does not, for the most part, include my sexual forays like reviewing here and my sex blog. Although most of my peers know I have a high interest in sex, it's not something I need them - or my family should they stumble upon my myspace or blog - reading the details of. Thus, I have developed something of a second identity online. It is becoming increasingly difficult to manage, though. It takes a lot to promote a site.

So I'm curious, anyone else like me? Tips to managing it? Or maybe your sexual identity is one with the rest of you online? Or maybe you only have this identity online?
10/29/2008
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Contributor: Beautiful Dreamer Beautiful Dreamer
Quote:
Originally posted by Adriana Ravenlust
Not gender identity or anything but rather.. your sexual identity.

I have worked for several years on a web presence which does not, for the most part, include my sexual forays like reviewing here and my sex blog. Although most of my peers ... more
I was actually thinking about this earlier. While I am by no means "popular", I do take precautions to protect myself. I recently changed my Location to be much more broad and will be using the more broad location in the future (one of the downfalls of not being able to change post forums). My boyfriend's friend actually figured out who we were on Edens, simply because we both had our locations listed as Ohio. I list my age. My career aspirations. But the few photos I have up are very vague. I edited out a small scar on one, simply because I was afraid someone would notice it.

I know the chances of someone accidentally stumbling on my blog and putting two and two together are rare, I'm just a little paranoid. I have a few friends that know some of what I do online, but they do not know my screen name or exact toys I've tried.

I have my normal everyday identity and then "Beautiful Dreamer". I keep separate emails. I have a myspace, a facebook, but they are in no way connected to my sex toys/blog identity.

My concern lies in my future career as a RN. I don't want to risk losing my job. It's sad, but it's possible that not all hiring interviewers would be responsive to.
10/29/2008
Contributor: Backseat Boohoo Backseat Boohoo
Quote:
Originally posted by Beautiful Dreamer
I was actually thinking about this earlier. While I am by no means "popular", I do take precautions to protect myself. I recently changed my Location to be much more broad and will be using the more broad location in the future (one of the ... more
^ Ditto. While I am not QUITE as cautious--the truly astute could figure out the connections between one of my things and another--I do try to keep my sexual side relegated to friends and open-minded onlookers only. I want to a professor some day, and while I know that's a career that tolerates a certain amount of eccentricity , I still have to be careful. I am primarily afraid of my family members finding out about my sex life, since 90% of them are very conservative.
10/29/2008
Contributor: His scarlett His scarlett
i suppose from reading your post i have two identities - the one where i am hisscarlett - with an lj blog, writing stories for online sites and here on Eden - and then i have my facebook where i am the very "normal" self - i keep it that way as Master and i don't really want our family and his sons to know the intimate details of our M/s life
10/29/2008
Contributor: His scarlett His scarlett
part of my post didn't appear... strange

the main reason we don't want them to know is that it is our personal life and not their business but also we worry that they may not see our M/s as something fulfilling for us both and instead see it as abusive

plus the stories i write tend to be more explicit than anything i would be comfortable with my step sons reading knowing that i had written it ... the very thought!! it was hard enough to deal with the time when i was using one of their laptops and discovered he had been browsing a porn site - although my Master was proud when i told him about it and he checked it out to discover it involved gags
10/29/2008
Contributor: ZenaidaMacroura ZenaidaMacroura
Hmm...I guess I don't guard my personality here very well, really. I never really cared to. I'm not going to be going for any good careers in the near future (which sounds a lot worse than it is), and I don't mind most people knowing I review sex toys. I'm young and I'm recently married, so most people who do know pretty much understand and are okay with it, or seem to be.

Hehe. I even have my picture as...well, just a picture of me. But I can definitely understand guarding your identity. I mean, I'm not going to get on here and tell anyone my real name, or anything like that. And if I do start reviewing some more interesting, kinky kinds of things--things mah momma would be shocked about, etc--I would probably start guarding it a lot more carefully.
10/29/2008
Contributor: Epiphora Epiphora
This is a great post, and very timely for me, as I just started a blog under this pen name and am beginning to establish my online presence as a "sex blogger" and "sex toy reviewer" a lot more. It has always worried me a little, but it worries me more now. I wish I could stop worrying about it because then I could post better photos on my blog (photos that would give me away if my parents somehow happened to see them, for instance) and give more details about my life. I'm not especially worried about future employers, as I have a special email address just for this name, and also because I'm hoping to get a job in a sex shop, so these things would actually be resume boosters. But I know exactly what you mean... feeling like there are two sides of you. My first mostly know what I do online and that I review toys, but it kinda does suck when professors ask me "so what do you want to do after college?" and I have to say I don't know, even though I do. And I can't gush to anyone except my boyfriend, my friends, and my Twitter followers when a sex-related thing happens to me, you know?
10/30/2008
Contributor: Epiphora Epiphora
Quote:
Originally posted by Epiphora
This is a great post, and very timely for me, as I just started a blog under this pen name and am beginning to establish my online presence as a "sex blogger" and "sex toy reviewer" a lot more. It has always worried me a little, ... more
My first = my friends.
10/30/2008
Contributor: Airlia Airlia
I have two email addresses and keep everything pretty separate. I am Sienna when I blog about sex - but I do realise that to an extent I appear clearly in my blogs. I talk about my sex life, my love life, the army and sex all in one. The army is extremely conservative but I do know that plenty of people in the army have 'extracurricular activities'. That doesn't mean that I want everyone knowing... maybe one day.

Like Epiphora its hardest when I achieve something I was dreaming about... how would my friends understand that I was over the moon about being nominated for best review of the month (for a sex toy). And it's hard the other way too... I can't talk about my other writing achievements on my sex blog in case two and two are put together. I guess that's why I might start to think about relaxing it a little.

I'm not sure what field I'll go into eventually - but if it does have to do with sex then my true identity can come out
10/30/2008
Contributor: Jimbo Jones Jimbo Jones
I guess I do have two online identities, sort of, since the one I maintain here (and on a couple of other sites) would probably be very surprising to most people that know me in real life. I don't really have an online presence as myself, but I have regular e-mail and things that I keep completely separate from the stuff I do here. I don't have any good advice because for me it is pretty easy to keep separated because most of the people that I know in real life don't frequent Eden Fantasys. Not that I know of any way... There are times when my experiences in this area might be helpful to some one or fun to talk about, but I try to be careful about what I say so as not to reveal too much. Maybe I'm not being 100% open, but I kind of like it that way.
10/30/2008
Contributor: Cock Wrangler Cock Wrangler
I work in the general industry right now, have in the past between other jobs, and have pretty much failed completely at keeping separate identities as far as sex-related things go. I'm a pretty sexuality-focused person, so even in my daily life I end up connecting with people and bringing up those subjects. It's often professional development, though, so it works out. My mom knows how I make money, and is open and smart enough to be comfortable with it.

The one thing I do try to keep separate, identity-wise, is my kink side, because I'm a heavy sadist and it's a topic that some people who are totally into talking about sex still aren't comfortable with. And something my mother doesn't ever need to know about.
10/30/2008
Contributor: Miss Jane Miss Jane
Quote:
Originally posted by Adriana Ravenlust
Not gender identity or anything but rather.. your sexual identity.

I have worked for several years on a web presence which does not, for the most part, include my sexual forays like reviewing here and my sex blog. Although most of my peers ... more
I have to keep my kinky self hidden from potential onlookers, because of the job field I'm in. Can't have that kind of topic associated with my name, or it would get bad publicity for my job.

Other than that, I'm not censored with a good chunk of my friends. I don't go around spouting my sexuality, but I don't hide it when I don't have to.
10/31/2008
Contributor: Dragon Dragon
Yikes! The majority of this thread indicates a high level of innocence here. I'd say be careful with ever crossing online identities in any way. Especially if you do more than just review sex toys- any sexual kinks etc. BDSM, M/s, playing with other people, etc.

I started a blog under DevilBlueDress initially without my husband knowing. I was very careful at the time, and I had a separate gmail address. I knew enough to clear my cache regularly and not keep browser history. It grew very popular, very fast without any effort on my part. 150+ hits a day. I was finding that I was finding my name on blogs that I'd never been too. Given my husband was online I choose to tell him about the blog.

After that, I eventually realized that the kids had seen the name "Devilbluedress." Part of it was the name on the browser bar which I figured they would never notice, who knows what else. I did a search on google. My name came up everywhere with direct links to posts. I've since changed my name most places to DBD, and locked almost everything.

Another place where "identity" is at risk is web based email. Gmail has the ability to link two different email accounts. I'm not sure exactly how, but I know that it's linked people before based on email accounts. I believe that Google calendar (from any group) will link to gmail accounts. I have actually received spam in my real name under my gmail account, and I'm REALLY careful to never link those.

For protecting identity- never forward some email accounts to one that has real identifing information.
10/31/2008
Contributor: Airlia Airlia
Quote:
Originally posted by Dragon
Yikes! The majority of this thread indicates a high level of innocence here. I'd say be careful with ever crossing online identities in any way. Especially if you do more than just review sex toys- any sexual kinks etc. BDSM, M/s, playing ... more
This may sound really naive but why shouldn't we forward email accounts? I have separate everything but the emails forward back to my normal email...
11/01/2008
Contributor: Dragon Dragon
Quote:
Originally posted by Airlia
This may sound really naive but why shouldn't we forward email accounts? I have separate everything but the emails forward back to my normal email...
I'm not sure how the filtering/linking system works on something like gmail or I'd have a better answer. However, since I know that email accounts CAN be linked. (I've seen this happen- gmail will show two accounts for one person when I only knew of one, or the person being very surprised that I know of one- especially when one has their name in it.) I'm assuming the primary way that it happens is because of forwarding email between accounts and using one to manage accounts.

For online sexual identity- if you want to protect it. I would not take any chances. For me, DBD or Devilbluedress is SEPARATE from everything else at all times. It's just not worth the risk. It's a case of caution is better than regret.
11/01/2008
Contributor: Adriana Ravenlust Adriana Ravenlust
Quote:
Originally posted by Dragon
I'm not sure how the filtering/linking system works on something like gmail or I'd have a better answer. However, since I know that email accounts CAN be linked. (I've seen this happen- gmail will show two accounts for one person when I ... more
It seems that this account linking is related to autoforwarding, a setting which you can change. It's not gmail alone, however. Most e-mail providers have this option. So, you may want t check your autoforward settings if you're experiencing this problem as it's something you probably did without thinking rather than Gmail mysteriously linking your account.

11/01/2008
Contributor: Adriana Ravenlust Adriana Ravenlust
Quote:
Originally posted by Adriana Ravenlust
It seems that this account linking is related to autoforwarding, a setting which you can change. It's not gmail alone, however. Most e-mail providers have this option. So, you may want t check your autoforward settings if you're experiencing ... more
I do not keep my identities as separate as Devilbluedress but I make sure that my known e-mail addresses for my main profiles do not show up publicly on a profile such as the one I have here at EF.
11/01/2008