“Blogging is for losers” or so they say

I caught up with an old friend (who I’ll call Aye) over pesach. We had so much catching up to do, so many stories to tell, and of course, so many people to talk about! Once we covered the requisite who’s-dating-whom and filled each other in on marriages, kids, moves and jobs, Aye piped up with an insidious grin, “So… did you see so and so (who I’ll call Beeh)’s blog?”

I did, actually, and I’m a regular reader who very much enjoys Beeh’s output, but I didn’t say as much because I don’t want her or Beeh to uncover my blog identity. Aye continued, “Somebody should clue Beeh in—blogging is for losers.”

Hmmm, “You don’t say.”

Now, Bee blogs with her real name, so it’s only fair that people will take her to task about it, but this was the worst kind of an attack. I’m used to arguing about whether bloggers have the right, so to speak, to bring up internal issues that border on lashon hora and/or chilul hashem, or whether online discussion of important issues is in any way productive or just an excuse to waste time. But this was the first time I had to defend the very act of blogging.

According to Aye, while I was out the cool kids decided that people who blog think themselves brilliant and self-important, so much that everybody out there wants to hear their opinions on everything. The old argument that ‘many a writer is part narcissist” might apply, but that ‘every blogger is all narcissist’ most certianly does not. The occasional self-aggrandizing bloggers who shove their uninformed opinionated drivel down everyone’s throats are for the most part weeded out from the blogging community—worse than being killed off, they are ignored. For everyone else, blogging and reading blogs provides interesting information and discussion, humor, stories, a sense of community, etc.

I used the traditional defenses to try and convince Aye that blogging could in fact be very cool and fulfilling and entertaining. It didn’t work—mostly because the only blogger she knew personally (besides for me, he he) was particular obsessive about her blog. If anyone bumps into Beeh, her ‘hi how are you’ is always immediately followed by, ‘do you read my blog,’ and then, ‘why don’t you comment’. Beeh has also become a person who started going through life as a venue for blogging ideas. She lost touch with many friends (as in, real humans) because her need for companionship has been effectively replaced with co-bloggers and commenters. I conceded that Beeh’s blogging behavior is less than exemplary, so Aye got her way in this particular argument; but when I pressed her to agree that blogging as a hobby could be cool, she said, “Who the hell has hobbies, anyway?”. With that she put a dagger through this uncool blogger’s heart. Lucky for me, I insist on anonymity, so I walked off superficially unscathed. But deep down I know the truth, “Who the hell wants to be cool, anyway?”