I was a catfish for 10 years. AMA

Do you ever do this on TSR and are you doing it right now?

and its so WEIRD not to chat ****

I still catfish. Because I'm a pathological liar and see no reason to be honest or 'true to myself'. Not even sure what that is. There is no self, beyond some vague reflection of that around me. An actor. A shallow existence, perhaps, but mine all the same.

wow.. lol

just wow

That is what most serious catfishes are like; pathological liars with no fixed personality. I'm self aware now about what I did. I created my own world; a warped version of reality and I could play any role. My facade was delusional and my lies, but people would believe them because I was charming and they felt beautiful talking to me.

And you felt beautiful in return. It's beautiful how narcissism works. one creates a delusion of grandeur which lures people in, and in turn they find you impressive and you get a sip of what it's like to be a person who is admired and a person who is loved. But you did it because you're not sure whether you can be loved or admired as you are. There's a pertinent difference between us both. My cat fishing is to hide my identity and still contribute/participate in a community. You sought connection through a false persona, because of a deep rooted sense of insecurity about yourself.

I described my existence as shallow. It seems, given what you've described here, yours is better described as hollow.

This is the exact reason I don't care for online 'friendships'. So desperately sad.

Good, stay away from them for your own sake.

what do you do for a living?

I haven't scrolled through all of the thread.

Still answering any further questions anyone has.

Catfishes are welcome to share their story also.

Even if you need help spotting a potential catfish, let me know the deets. It will be obvious to me.

I haven't read through all of the posts, but after 10 years you must be quite good at it. Ever thought of posing as a young girl and luring paedophiles, To Catch a Predator-style?

How old were you when you started to Catfish?

Even if you need help spotting a potential catfish, let me know the deets. It will be obvious to me.

You mean a loser trying to make themselves feel powerful?

What sort of red flags are there which tell you someone is a catfish?

If someone's catfishing, the most obvious thing is that they won't meet/Face time/Skype you and will make any excuse or conversation change to avoid it. Sure, someone may be real and just doesn't want to, but if they constantly give you empty promises to do so and then don't (because they literally can't) that's a red flag.
I couldn't have phone calls and had to make excuses about that also.

If you aren't that close yet, another thing is that they probably won't ever mention their friends/have irl friends on their social media.
I only had a Twitter and on there it's normal to follow people you don't know.
If they have a FB which seems legit (loads of friends and messages, tagged pictures, etc), then they're probably real. FB is too much effort to fake and maintain, but many people just don't like FB in general.
If they don't have insta or snapchat, that's kinda odd. However, my character was seen as a very private and mysterious person.

Someone I catfished was obsessed with taking pictures of everything and so she'd randomly ask me to take a picture of what I was doing at that moment and I'd have to delay it. That's another thing to look out for.

These are the main things I can think of rn and it's a combination of these which will help you figure out whether they're catfishing or not.

Some boy in another thread 'she wants a relationship but not with me' is convinced that he's talking to a real girl but what he described sounded like it could be a catfish tbh, I tried to encourage him to question things more.