Repressive Compulsive

I need to start by writing this little disclaimer: I am not encouraging people to look these up. It's why I didn't provide hyperlinks - I'm protecting my own arse, and shielding yours too. But hey, I'm not the boss of you...

When somebody links me something over MSN (invariably Uriah or Sean, sick bastards that they are), I feel compelled to click it. Not because I have an urge to scrape my own eyes out, and not because I want to test the boundaries of what the human body can actually tolerate, but because it's THERE. The winking little box in my taskbar has 'click me' written all over it, likewise for the blue text in my chat window.

The most dangerous links are the ones prefaced by 'LOL!'

For example:

Uriah: LOL! Check this out! www.anobscenelink.com

*click*

Sam: I hate you so much right now.

It's at that point that I'm groping for the 'close window' button, whilst at the same time being compelled to link it to others. If someone 'got' me, then I shall 'get' someone else. It's like the Circle of Life, sans the talking baboon.

This behaviour got me thinking. Why is it that I click? I just KNOW that the chance of me seeing something I will regret witnessing is considerably higher than 50%, but I click regardless. Is it the desire to see the quality 40% of links, is it blind trust, or is it a thirst for knowledge that drives me right index finger?

I can conclude wth some certainty that it boils down to my desire to leave no task unfinished (within reason. I'm glad I quit some things). When that dark blue box flashes at me, I must click. I need to click. I YEARN to click.

What happens next has become increasingly familiar activity (and I'm not ashamed at all. Eye for an Eye and all that). What I will do is tell the linker to go fuck themselves, before linking it to as many of my other online friends as possible. Sometimes I'll link it to people when they are offline, just so they can experience the rich bounty of the internet as soon as they get home from work.

Some of the classic (it doesn't mean they're good) eye-gouging moments are now internet lore. Meatspin for instance, or TubGirl, or Lemonparty, Cakefarts, or that video of the Serbian prisoner of war who gets his throat cut near Kosovo (the gurgling alone is disturbing, let alone the fear and panic in his eyes). Kids in a Sandbox is terrible, and 2girls1cup is something which need not be seen by anyone. Although, I saw that (at 9:30 in the damn morning, thanks Uriah haha), so I figure you should too.

Is it a warmly-embraced and minor case of OCD here or is it just something that we in the digital age have learned to accept?

Julius Caesar is famous for saying Veni Vidi Vici.

I'd like to become famous for saying Veni Vidi Clicki.

Cheers