This is a critical element of why online discussion forums and anonymity are so powerfully liberating. You can discard the social masks you wear among friends and family, and try different ideas and viewpoints. There's no price to be paid at the judgment of strangers.

It's perceived to be significantly more difficult to approach strangers in the real world, and successful relationships seem to fix people into whatever patterns initiated it.

Successfully developing the ability to approach strangers in real life is more potent than anything online - it can be unhealthy, as with pickup artists, or joining evangelistic cults, mlm, and so on, but socialization at that level seems to be a common trait among highly interesting people.