There is no single self.

I don't believe in the assumption that people are always their "true" selves on the internet; that anonymity or the barrier of a computer screen grants us the freedom to unleash our full, authentic nature. Nobody has one singular self. We are multifaceted, and different facets are expressed in different settings. This is as true for face-to-face scenarios as it is for online discourse. Just because one particular side of someone is being conveyed, that doesn't mean the others are now invalid. They could all be just as real, even if they contradict one another. And sometimes a specific setting will push someone further into a direction than they'd normally go or incite them to express things they don't usually feel. It's not accurate to point to somebody in a specific scenario and say, "That's who they really are, and everything else they've ever said or done which contradicts this is just an act."