Catfish the Movie

I have seen several episodes of the T.V. show "Catfish" but I have never seen the movie that started it all. In many of those episodes, there are references to Yaniv's, one of the hosts of the show, experiences when he had gone through the process of being catfished. The movie, "Catfish," takes us on that journey with Yaniv as he gets to know a girl online, fall for her, realize she isn't who she says she is, and confront her.

Already knowing the unfortunate outcome for Yaniv, it was hard for me to watch as he connected with an impersonator on Facebook. They had talked for months and it seemed like he had grown genuine feelings for the girl he though he was talking to. Then he slowly started to find out that almost everything they had talked about was a lie and that she herself was also a lie. It's hard to watch someone realize they were being deceived for so long. I can only imagine what Yaniv was feeling when it dawned on him.

Props to him though for continuing on her charade until he confronted her in person. He could have cut all contact with her or caused a scene when he had gone to confront her. Instead, he was very civil and cautious about his approach in hopes that they wouldn't hurt the family too bad. He eventually came to terms with what happened and in the end, stayed friends with her on Facebook.

I understand how emotionally attached one can become with a another person online but I don't understand how they don't see the red flags associated with catfishes. Either that, or they choose to ignore them in hopes that the person on the other side is real. It's people from the latter that often appear on the T.V. series. They have an inkling, but are too afraid to confront the problem themselves and look to those who have experience in it for comfort. It isn't a bad thing to seek for help or comfort but if I were to go through an experience like this, I wouldn't want the whole world to know how I was fooled by pictures and lies. I would be embarrassed and unable to trust anything anyone would say to me without evidence. I can imagine that was how Yaniv felt after all that he had gone through.