We Fell In Love Online

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Parents all over the world used to warn kids, particularly daughters, because of the way nature made them: beautiful. Unfortunately, there are sick minds that sit in bars, basement apartments or office blocks plotting how to dismember that beauty, basically hatred for women.

The internet makes it easy because girls voluntarily provide information about themselves, especially bare bones photos, all in the name of love. It is warped love most of the time because the online stranger you are in love with might not live in Warsaw as he claims.

He lives down the block and is watching you in your school uniform. His online photo is fuzzy so you don’t know what he looks like. It might not be his photo at all. In Omo Wobe, a Yoruba movie starring Odunlade Adekola, a woman uses her daughter’s photo for her Facebook profile. His character thinks he is in love with the daughter.

NO COMMON SENSE

The internet is useful in many ways. It is also a no common sense platform. One woman said she broke up with her online boyfriend because she felt he was cheating on her. I just stared at her. I can be very slow at times. It’s difficult for parents to monitor online activity because phones are personal and some cultures permit kids to shout at parents, to the point of literally being scared of your daughters.

But what happens if parents talk to strangers and ‘fall in love’ online? Danger becomes an import. It relocates from outside to inside the home. We hear these stories all the time because of cellphones.

It’s very difficult trying to eat and look at photos at the same time, but that is our reality. You cannot have a normal conversation without somebody whipping out a cellphone. Last year, I listened absentmindedly to a co-worker brandishing her phone in my face while gushing about her boyfriend.

‘We met online.’

I stopped eating. He is wonderful. He lives with her and her two daughters (13 and 8). My heart sank. Falling in love involves sharing, especially pieces of information that lead to bigger things, like inviting a stranger to share your home with growing daughters.

By: Nonqaba waka Msimang.

 

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