Friday Night at 8: Thinking Outside of the Box

I know this is going on the front page and I will try the best I can to make every effort to earn that privilege, given my subject matter.

We’ve had some uproars with Underdog’s essay, where he is grappling with how to respond to authority on a blog.

Today I encountered a bit of that as well and was challenged as to my own thinking.  I imagine this, in a way, like Underdog was the big brother, getting kicked around first so that by the time I got dealt with it was far less being kicked around-ish.  As the youngest of six children, well, my parents were pretty worn down by the time it came to tell me what to do.  Heh.

I don’t consider Meteor Blades primarily as someone who posts at Daily Kos, someone who has taken on the job of Moderator in Chief, even though he has accomplished a great deal in that area.

To me, he is much bigger than that.  Just google him.  I’ve seen him post on one particular website which was begun as a hate-Daily-Kos site – he was excoriated and sarcasm and bile was dripped all over him.  It didn’t seem to faze him much.  I’ve seen him at Booman.  And of course he has posted here as well, since the beginning of Docudharma.  He came here as well to DD to pay Underdog the respect of addressing his concerns.

Underdog was amazing in how he allowed all of us to experience his innermost feelings in a very difficult situation.  He opened himself up fearlessly.

How much authority are any of us willing to obey?  What is obedience, anyway?  If it is voluntary, then that’s a far different experience than if we are either forced or coerced or tricked etc.

We all have to make the choice, of course, to whom we offer fealty (in the old fashionedy literal sense of the word).  But this week really showed me there’s a more expansive way to view this.  Expansive, as in the refreshing land of Out of the Box.

I’m not going to comment on this blog or that blog because the conversation transcends any particular website adddress, imo.  And I’m going to describe it in my own words, not quote or do the usual bloggy link thing because it transcends that, too.

Meteor Blades asked Buhdydharma what is to be gained by a certain kind of confrontation of what we oppose done in a particular strong confrontational style.

He made it clear that this was not an order or command, yet he didn’t deny it when Buhdy pointed out his voice now has the power of command whether he liked it or not.

A powerful lefty blogger approached another powerful lefty blogger and they engaged.  It was awesome (she said in a child-like wonder kind of way).

It opened my mind and I started thinking, wow maybe I can communicate in many ways, not just one way, when confronting what I am fighting against.

Not that I know what that would be, of course, just the notion itself was both frightening and liberating.

Budhy said it a while back — now that Bush doesn’t hold power any longer we have opportunities we haven’t had for a long time.

I had no idea I was in the box until I saw many fellow human beings waving to me from out of the box.  But this week, these three examples, Underdog, Meteor Blades and Buhdydharma, resonated with me as a story I need to tell, the kind of story you tell as a child and just believe, not worrying about anything except the wonder of the new view.

Autumn weather is winding its way throughout the Great Five Boroughs of New York – which are:  Queens, Brooklyn, Staten Island, the Bronx, Manhattan.

Happy Friday … and Happy Harvest to all my fellow Docudharmoniouses.