Chat Roulette

I was holding out on partaking in the madness that is Chat Roulette for the longest time. I've heard the stories ( If you have never taken an anatomy course...) , I've heard all the urban legends (Jonas Brothers are on it?), and I SWORE I would never do it. Ever. I would not stoop to that level of boredom, and I held myself to a higher standard than to go to such a website.

Then comes along last night. A crowd of 6 of us were at Corey Abramson's house watching"Undeclared" (great TV show, btw) when suddenly, everyone became obsessed with the idea of going on Chat Roulette. At this point it was only 10:00, and I wasn't about ready to go home, so I had no choice but to join in. I feel like this is something that, instead of going over the details of what the site is like, I just need to recount my experience to determine whether or not it's justifiable.

The details of my first foray into Chat Roulette are a little hazy. I do remember that the first person we were connected to was a girl touching herself (the stories are true. please trust me), and then from then on out it was a jumbled mass of awkward loners, penises ("I'm asian and mine's bigger than yours"- Ziggy Gamble), groups of bros at parties, uncircumcised penises, people dressed up in costumes, boobs (" TITS OR GTFO!"- Corey), 13-16-year-olds who were way to young to be on such a site, ball sacs ("Excuse me, good sir, could you lift them up for us?" -Corey), awkward loners dressed up in costumes, flaccid penises ("What is WRONG with that? Is it supposed to be that shape?" - Devon Letko)... you get the idea.

Midnight rolled around before we knew it, and that's when we had to start keeping it down because of Corey's roommate trying to sleep. That hardly meant anything to me, however. I came straight home and got on right away (immediately becoming one of the previously mentioned "awkward loners", but I was okay with this).

How chat roulette works is that you get matched up with a stranger on a video chat, and you can either 'next' them, or they will 'next' you, and you get matched up with someone new. If you don't 'next' each other, you can talk to the person, chat with them, whatever. My strategy consisted of this: don't 'next' anyone unless they're over 40 or there's some sort of nudity. That way, I would be forced to talk with people I wouldn't normally talk to (because everyone has something to offer, right?).

And the things you learn about people can be fascinating. One of the people I came across had a webcam showing what was apparently a girl that hung herself. I was freaking out for a little bit, but I decided to hang around and see if there was anything that could be done. After sitting there staring at the screen for a couple of minutes, someone typed "Heeeeellllllp Meeeee", and then proceeded to have a full conversation with me. Apparently there's this "my cam" place where you can have your webcam show whatever image you want. I was one of the only people to not 'next' this person, and they were doing it just to gauge people's reactions to the image. Crazy stuff.

Also, people are incredibly honest with you (why wouldn't they be? you'll never see them again, you know?). I learned that people who don't know me think I'm either 1) Gay ( i think my pink headband did me in there. or maybe not, who knows?) 2. A bro (because long hair makes me a bro? or my thermal I was wearing?) 3. A tool (again, i think it was the headband) 4. cute (but I got called gay more, but whatever), and 5. a jew (my hair? Or they're just being wise guys. either way, I'm okay with that.) I even got called a gypsy by a pair of girls from Missouri (but I do believe they meant that in the nicest way possible.)

I was having a hard time deciding when to stop. It was getting late ( it was around 2:30), but I wanted to have one more good encounter with someone. I get connected with a crowd of 4 or 5 people. They ask me where I'm from. I say Philly. They say they're from Philly too. They ask where I go to school. I say Temple. THEY FREAK OUT! They show me their Temple sweatshirts they're wearing and are going crazy (I'll admit, I kind of went crazy too) that, of all the people on the site, we were connected with someone literally blocks away from each other. They were in 1300, and we started talking about our majors and where they were trying to live next year, with them asking me if Bouvier was a nice street, etc. On that note, I decided to quit it.

Is chat roulette a dirty web-site? Unquestionably. But look at what it does offer aside from the nudity: a chance for you to talk to people you normally never would, making random connections with people nearby you, a chance to learn more about yourself, a chance to learn more about how other people's minds work, and a place to go to quell your boredom to name a few things. I'm by no means praising what some people do on this website (you have to take the good with the bad in all aspects of life, no?), but as far as the benefits that it presents to you? I'm willing to admit I was wrong for judging chat roulette so harshly, although it's definitely more fun with the more people you have with you. Would I recommend this site to my mom? Hell no. I probably wouldn't recommend it to anyone. I do believe, however, that it is a site of some sort of value and not just total garbage.

FINAL VERDICT: JUSTIFIABLE