Who are you?

Different people have different reasons for using an alias. Most of the time, it's to mask their true identity and save themselves from getting into any kind of trouble, professionally or even personally. So why do I opt for one? Certainly not because it helps me hide who I am. Quite the contrary, actually.

I've been exposed by other points-of-view and aliases as a blog troll, someone who defends plagiarism, a person with no beliefs and a gadfly who is best ignored. Google the words 'Übermaniam' or 'The Daily Unusual' or 'Dopppsy' and you'll get to the posts by various people whom I don't know - in a manner of speaking - mouthing off the aformentioned opinions based on superficial experiences of my so-called sins. Needless to say, these attacks have hurt me in ways I haven't been able to fully comprehend.

The thing about not using an assumed name is you can never be yourself. As your 'Professional name', you've got to make sure you are careful with what you say. You've got to be, mostly, nice to people. You've got to cultivate an audience and so, you have to lie. Honestly speaking, I find that quite impossible to do. In fact, I find people who don't feel the need to hide their name, in a hard-to-explain way, rather difficult to trust.

I would argue that people with the ability to be in public what the world knows them as, are more adept at hiding their true selves than the people who are diseased enough to speak their mind and so feel the need to protect themselves with pseudonyms. It's a well-known lesson of life that if you want to be popular, you cannot afford to be frank. Put not-so-simply, be very afraid of taking a popular person at face value.

So, why do I choose handles? Two reasons. One, because they demonstrate my ability to proudly indulge my schizoid self. And two, so I don't besmirch the public image of a certain 'Mr. Avinash Subramaniam'. Happily enough, the latter is all over bar the shouting.