The benefits to pseudonyms /far/ outwiegh the penalties.
As pyre has already said, 4chan's b channel is a force unto itself, but there are plenty of other places with no consequences where the speech is fine and isn't the devolved miasma you make it out to be.
Pseudonyms also protect people against unwarranted discrimination. I speak as a white male with a white male name that it's fucking awesome being a white male. But I have observed those who aren't white males get subtley (and sometimes not so) discriminated against online. Check out /any/ tech post where a commenter with an Indian name takes part. Unless the Indian is well known, there's bias against their comments. Same goes for women - if the discussion is outside the 'women's sphere', watch the subtleties as some of the men close ranks. Get an openly-declared woman involved in a discussion on physics in a general forum and she won't be treated as an equal.
People should be judged on what they say, not how their name slips hints about their background. To that end, a pseudonym greatly levels the playing field.
A name, pseudonym or otherwise, merely defines a body of work, and humans are complex creatures with interests in different areas. Why should we throw away the awesome things pseduonyms do for us simply because of internet trolls - which have other effective ways of dealing with them anyway (user moderation >>> unprovable 'real name' requirement)
4chan doesn't really use pseudonyms, it's all anon. This means the speech itself is all you can go by and not the (pseudo)name of the poster. The idea itself gets judged without the bias of past posts or who actually made the post.
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The benefits to pseudonyms /far/ outwiegh the penalties.
As pyre has already said, 4chan's b channel is a force unto itself, but there are plenty of other places with no consequences where the speech is fine and isn't the devolved miasma you make it out to be.
Pseudonyms also protect people against unwarranted discrimination. I speak as a white male with a white male name that it's fucking awesome being a white male. But I have observed those who aren't white males get subtley (and sometimes not so) discriminated against online. Check out /any/ tech post where a commenter with an Indian name takes part. Unless the Indian is well known, there's bias against their comments. Same goes for women - if the discussion is outside the 'women's sphere', watch the subtleties as some of the men close ranks. Get an openly-declared woman involved in a discussion on physics in a general forum and she won't be treated as an equal.
People should be judged on what they say, not how their name slips hints about their background. To that end, a pseudonym greatly levels the playing field.
A name, pseudonym or otherwise, merely defines a body of work, and humans are complex creatures with interests in different areas. Why should we throw away the awesome things pseduonyms do for us simply because of internet trolls - which have other effective ways of dealing with them anyway (user moderation >>> unprovable 'real name' requirement)
4chan doesn't really use pseudonyms, it's all anon. This means the speech itself is all you can go by and not the (pseudo)name of the poster. The idea itself gets judged without the bias of past posts or who actually made the post.