Do People Truly "Love" Each Other On This Forum?

by minimus 77 Replies latest jw friends

• 

  OnTheWayOut

  Can you love your best friends because you can see their faces? Maybe it's
  because you broke bread with them at meals, or you had drinks with them.

  NO- you love your best friends for various reasons, but mostly because you
  become familiar with them. You bond in some way, at some level. The bonding
  might be from a common interest or help through a crisis like divorce or death.
  The bonding might be as simple as having someone to visit to watch football
  on television with, or it might run very deep to sharing of intimate secrets that
  even your mate doesn't know.

  We form a bond here. We open up in some ways, and respond when others open
  up. That's the only reason I am still here, as I desire to move on from this forum.
  It's because I love you, Minimus- for your inquisitive ways. We have our differences
  like friends do, but I love you. I love some others here, also. Some more than
  even Minimus. (Okay, many) I have met hardly any of them, but I have reached out
  and spoken to many of them on the phone. They know things about me that my
  wife doesn't know. Yet, they can't tell you what color skin I have, or how tall I am.
  So what.
• 

  JH

  You can't please everyone and won't be loved by all, even if you try.

  As for loving all here, I hate no one.

  And I love a few.
• 

  PoppyR

  What's so impossible about loving someone you never met?

  I wouldn't say it's impossible.. But in my experience, it's easy to come across online as quite different to how you are unedited in real life! I have met lots of people in real life that I have talked to online, and almost all have been great, but almost all have been a lot different to how I expected, or how they had portrayed themselves.

  That's not to say you cant love someone you have never met, but I dont think it's the real, lets get married love deal, it's a different form, no doubt there is a hebrew or greek word for it!

  Poppy
• 

  Sunspot

  There are SO MANY forms and levels of "love". It is next to impossible to paint this word with such a large brush.

  I feel loving towards a good many posters here, and there ARE some that I would say I truly love. Some I have met in person, some I have not, and some have gone out of their way to show me kindnesses in a lot of ways. It would be incorrect if I said I did NOT love them for these things and their loving behavior.

  Looking at it this way, I would then say that yes---people DO truly love each other on this forum.

  hugs,

  Annie
• 

  sweetstuff

  It's possible, you can as NVR said, have a love of humanity towards people online, you can grow fond of people and care for them. Like Poppy said though, people are often one faceted online and very different from who they are in person. But not always, the people closest to my heart on here are the ones I have become friends with outside this forum, via msn or whatever. People I do plan on meeting in the future and who I love for their friendship.

  I've seen genuine love and kindness on here, but this isn't a "group" its a forum. So when it happens, its an unexpected wonderful gift, but I think the key is not to expect anything from a forum but possibly understanding and discussion.
• 

  VoidEater

  Since love requires no specific person to exist, of course love can exist for real people that you don't know very well.

  Love, like experiencing beauty, takes place within ourselves.

  Love, like "God", is a small word that means a myriad things.
• 

  minimus

  My take: You can't love someone you don't really know.
• 

  *summer*

  My take: You can't love someone you don't really know.

  From my experience, yes, online love is possible. It is not a physical love. But it can be an even stronger bond, especially because the "physical" barrier does not come in the way. So yes, I truly "love" some people on this forum... *summer*
• 

  compound complex

  Hey, Mini:

  I remember 01 August 2007, 07:44, as though it were yesterday. I was really touched.

  Have you forgotten me?

  CoCo
• 

  OnTheWayOut

  I don't argue or even try hard to disagree on this forum now.

  My take: You can't love someone you don't really know.

  That's you- Minny Mouse. Not everyone. (Even a playful dig at a name shows affection)

  Love can be defined as affection based on admiration, benevolence, or common interests.
  It can be defined as unselfish loyal and benevolent concern for the good of another.
  It can also be defined as a score of zero (as in tennis).

  Nobody can tell you to love anyone here, but know this:

  I love you, man.