I grew up in a hyper conservative family in a super conservative part of southern Indiana. Even with the remote contacts I made online via BBS, IRC, forums, etc; I was still a quasi-suicidal (and incredibly closeted) atheist and bisexual. If I hadn’t had some kind of community to which I could vent some of my frustrations I’m very confident I would have done myself in. I even met my wife over IRC when we were teenagers.

And, weird as it is to say, if the price of my mental health and training in what would eventually become my profession is that I occasionally had people trying to trick me into looking at goatse… show me that horror anus.