Connection and “knowing” each other

From November 21 memos:

Eleanor talked about the “audience fallacy” in which you feel like you know someone you have seen perform.

It leads,

or it could lead

to what I call the audience fallacy.

This is my own personal theory

that may or may not make sense.

I think sometimes when I am audience,

and I watch you perform,

over

a period of time,

more than

three or four times,

I think that I know you.

The fallacy is that

I really don’t know who you are at home.

It’s true that I know you

in terms of your stage persona.

My feeling, and Eleanor agreed with me, is that this could be even more prevalent in a setting like Carapace, because people are sharing stories about their own lives. So the audience could really feel like they know them. I think part of the disconnect is in the uneven flow of personal information. The storyteller doesn’t know the audience members unless they have interactions later. Even though the audience responds and participates in the conversation it does not lead the storyteller to feel that they know them in the same way.

I’m looking closely at the feeling of connection that sometimes occurs during Carapace. This is a term that people use again and again, and I think it might be the ultimate “message” of Carapace, more so than the stories themselves. What Eleanor talks about here is a little problematic. One person could believe they have a connection with another person, that the other person is unaware of. However, maybe the connection that forms during those particularly magical moments isn’t as much about knowing another person as sharing a moment of truth?