I think I’ve come to the very brink, the point at which events overcome my continued acceptance of “anonymous” blogging. Yes, I know that my own essays and comments are “anonymous,” that my screen name is only part of my full name. But I know that anonymity, including mine, can and does create problems. The problems are credibility and reliability.
The Pussy Diaries exemplify the issue. The reader has no idea who, if anyone, stands behind the essay or comment. Anonymity makes it possible, indeed encourages one to be more inflammatory, more hortatory, more “courageous,” more outspoken by far than one might be if one could be “found out” in real life, if one had to sign one’s name to the rant, if one had to stand behind it. In fact, the anonymous genre appears to thrives on what is most extreme.
Sure, on one level these essays aren’t about who the writers are, they’re about the ideas they contain. The screen name might be like a brand, but it’s not a real person and it’s not of the same value. An argument, however elegant, by a 12 year-old isn’t the same thing as an essay by someone over 70. It’s true that the expressed ideas need to sink or swim on their own merit. But on another level, anonymity leads to false bravado, extreme arguments, and distortion in the essays. And in the comments anonymity encourages combativeness, insults, vituperation and personal attacks that probably wouldn’t be expressed so vehemently if one had to sign one’s own name to the comment and stand behind it and own it.
As I said in a recent comment, I don’t want to hear
yet another voice saying that s/he is more radical, more revolutionary, more enlightened, more righteous than everybody else.
To be frank about it, I really don’t want to hear about how what I do and what others are doing isn’t enough to make big changes in our world and how in the view of the writer I and others fail to recognize our fecklessness and lack of worth and our impotence. I don’t need another ocean of negativity. I don’t need to be called a wuss. Or worse, a pussy.
Put another way, if you have good ideas about making change, lead us by example. Show us how you’re changing the world, or the US, or your state, or your town, or you neighborhood, or your household, or yourself. Just show us. We’re happy to support real change.
The argument that others just aren’t up to the task sells all of us short. It kills off any real change by fostering divisiveness.
And then, of course, one anonymous argument about pussies leads to an even more apparently extreme one: “The danger of the Democrats-as-“pussies” meme lies in the justification it appears to provide for docility and inaction (and voting doesn’t count as action…sorry)…” so “we” should demonstrate and/or riot and/or be obstreperous.
What is one to think of all of this? Can we trust any of it? Can we rely on it? Are agents provocateurs now blogging and urging us on to unplanned, disorganized futile actions, and are they juxtaposing chaos with the safer alternative of powerlessness and despair? Is the purpose of the essay malicious? Is it helpful? Who exactly is saying these things anyway and what do they know about it and what do they want to happen? Are they credible? Are they malicious? Who exactly is churning this up? And why?
I have no solutions. I think it might be time once again for me to take some time away.
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It’s been more than a year since I did that. Maybe that’s why this is a good time to take a break.
… after having blogged for a number of years, I think it’s essential to take a break every now and then. I no longer feel bad about doing that.
You may be right about the essayist who wrote the second “pussy” diary (lolol, this is cracking me up on one level).
But what I’m seeing is folks using power in an unfocused way – and I’ll put myself near the top of that list.
We have power. I am beginning to understand that in a political sense after grokking what buhdydharma has said about this, over and over. And what jeffroby said to heather and me, challenging us to realize our power when we both claimed not to have any.
I also believe that on a spiritual level it’s a case of male power and female power and the tension in each one of us in handling that. I know I tend to have spells where I’m very receptive and yielding and then other times I’m extremely aggressive and penetrating (iirc, you went off on me once over that, lol).
Anyway, I was thinking about this too and I’m probably off topic when it comes to what you’ve written, but I also was affected by all that energy flying around yesterday.
I stand on my almost 6 year record as a blogger and author.
You determine my credibility based on that.
My real name is no more relevant than Mark Twain’s, George Orwell’s, Lewis Carroll’s, George Sand’s, George Eliot’s, or Publius’.
I don’t demand credibility, I’ve earned it.
Believe what you like.
In the end, who really cares who is or is not more radical, more revolutionary, more enlightened, more righteous than everybody else?
And what good does it do to tell everyone else they are wasting their time?
But sticks and stones break bones. Words are just how we try to communicate.
I don’t have a beef with people being anonymous. It may even help us communicate more honestly.
I’m insanely frustrated with the actions of the Democratic Party leaders and representatives.
I’m constantly asking myself what more can I do, am I making a difference at all.
I think every little bit helps. Whether it’s blogging or walking the picket line.
Doing whatever we can, as best as we can may not be enough. But it feels better than doing nothing.
Keep doing.