Yesterday, I came across a website that is a forum for people to complain about bloggers. It was started in 2009 to "snark" about various online personalities. I feel as though expressing it in such a way gives people permission to talk shit without feeling so bad. It's a "personality" they are portraying that they hate, not the person themselves. But where and when does it stop? There are people behind the words posted, however sincere or insincere you may view them. These are people with real emotions, capable of reacting to the negative things out there about them.
I have never wanted to self-sabotage more than anything after viewing the most horrendously vitriolic comments aimed at fairly popular bloggers simply because they're successful. It's an attack on those willing to put themselves out there, and when they change even slightly, people take to the message boards to tear apart. Looking at my own blogging experience, I have changed a lot over the three years since I began to blog on a semi-regular basis. I suppose I am different in the sense that I don't blog for money. I don't think many of the for-profit blogs out there began for the sake of money. I think it just evolved over time into a business. I could be naive, I guess, but I guess I haven't become so cynical that I allow the negativity to consume me so much that I have to put it out there for everyone to read.
Online personalities are equated as being the "reality star of the Modern World." I feel as though giving them a name with negative connotation gives others permission to abuse them, and still sleep at night. As humans, we should treat other humans with kindness and respect we expect in return. By turning these bloggers into just "personalities" or "reality starts of the Modern World" almost dehumanizes them. It's like saying,"Hey, it's not necessarily the real person you're insulting. It's the personality they're putting on for the world. Buck up, kiddo. You're not so bad." I don't think that's a right way to look at it though. Where does the personality they portray stop and the real person begin? How does one know that this "personality" they're attacking isn't the real person? No one knows, except for the people behind the blogs themselves. I feel a though everybody has admitted that yeah, they put their best face forward. "It's because they're selling a brand, a lifestyle." Maybe. Or maybe they'd like their blog to be an escape, not only for themselves, but for their readers.
I have never understood the need to bring down another person in order to make myself feel better. I'm definitely not the most secure person, and could see how one could go down that route, but I don't understand how it's supposed to make me feel better. The objects of whatever vitriol I decide to spew are going to live on, doing what they do, in spite of what I say. It's energy wasted. It's easy to critique those out there doing things, rather than expending that energy doing something positive.
Get Off The Internet
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I write what I write because I enjoy words. If you've got a few for me, cool. If they're negative, I don't care. If they're positive, that's cool, too.