> I had to stop using Reddit for the most part, since no matter what I said people would attack it in some way shape or form.
> [...] even though and all of these cases I was a complete stranger I was never insulted or made to feel unwelcomed.
My feeling is that once people no longer have a keyboard and monitor with which to "hide", they no longer have the ability to hurl insults at other people spontaneously and without being reprimanded for it (if anything they might get juicy upvotes).
The reason I put "hide" in quotes is because people don't act this way consciously. No one wants to throw personal attacks at other people for simply expressing a different opinion. In fact, I regularly read stories of politicians who were arch rivals politically but would still foster good friendships with one another. Another good example is the relationships the judges have in the US Supreme court. I have trouble believing that the judges would be able to form similar friendships with one another if they did that online through soulless text boxes, rather than face-to-face contact.
The anonymity provided online enables this subconscious switch in people's minds that allows them to do things they would never do face-to-face. And I want to add that it's not really the anonymity (though that does amplify this effect), it's the lack of seeing the other people. Posting online with your full name (e.g. Twitter) can still enable these subconscious switches simply by virtue of giving you the illusion of not talking to people because you can't see them. In the end, all the people responding to you are text boxes, not humans with feelings and emotions.
Seeing somebody face-to-face just cannot compete with online connections. The way you see what you say form an expression on somebody else's faces, or the way that looking into somebody's eyes somehow forms this inexplicable connection (I remember reading about how studies were done on the brain that noticed hormones being released when people looked into each other's eyes... not sure where to look for that now), or how you can listen to their voice tones change as they talk allowing you to subconsciously gain more understanding of what they feel as they express something. It's... just not the same.
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There was this article I remember reading a couple of years ago an article that delved into what guaranteed anonymity does to people. It was very interesting, I highly recommend it: https://gawker.com/5950981/unmasking-reddits-violentacrez-th...