Because I can, Should I?

Ah, another nice evening with my wife, chillin, playing a game of Mobile Legends together, me the support, she the marksman...but lo! What is this? A troll! And not the under the bridge variety (which, if real life, is arguably worse), but a nasty, toxic internet troll! Thankfully, these creatures can be muted -but not before they've done some verbal damage, and since actions speak louder than words, continue to do their damage through their gameplay.

Now, I have a particularly thick skin for these situations, but they were rather effective, and at least that match was thoroughly ruined. Oh, sure, we can "report" them, and they"ll be "severely penalised" -and sure, we did such, but you know the penalty is just a message warning and a slight point decrease, to which they'll smirk contemptuously.

Because they'll always be protected by the mask or anonymity, affecting people and things far removed from themselves, and it's ever so easy to, as a book put it, "feed your serpent beast" when the consequences against you are negligible.

But, beware: feed that beast too much, and that mask may start usurping your real self -or, perhaps it's the other way round, and your mask always was your real self, that you kept suppressed for the sake of appearances?

For in truth, we all have a serpent beast: that darkness which lingers in our hearts, those thoughts that should not be, the hate that we whisper, but do not act upon: should we all then just abandon ourselves to it, embrace and celebrate our dark side? It reminds me of a nice phrase from Kingdom Hearts: "The closer you get to the light, the greater your shadow becomes."

Are we then a doomed race, to keep advancing and progressing, yet paradoxically devolve and debase, until the shadow is greater than the light, and there's nothing left of us?

Perhaps...or, perhaps, one day we shall become more than just homo sapiens. Perhaps, one day we will become homo illustratum (so google tells me is latin for enlightened), and will be beyond having a shadow.

Here's hoping we get there!

Your hopeful homo something,

Stefano Ronchi