the opposite is also true. online I’m more talkative and confident, IRL I’m shy as fuck from lifelong trauma and masking. my online me and IRL me might as well be two different people.

That’s not the opposite. It just the same thing in a different form. Offline you mask and online you don’t need the mask. Racist do the same exact thing.

The difference is that at their core they are deplorable and you are not. The masking is the shared trait.