Wrangler Dani

Sometimes I love blogging. It’s an incredible outlet, and sometimes, just like in the real world – you meet some fantastic people. But sometimes, also like in the real world – there are Big Fat Jerks lurking, in the anonymity of quick, judgmental comments and an expectation that everything anybody else writes should of course jive with whatever said people personally believe.

Which of course, never works, and just makes everybody involved – the anonymous commenters and bloggers who don’t agree with anonymous commenters – feel icky and gross.

Which brings me to why I’m writing this – I’ve started following a little blogger called Miss Banshee – and she’s been taking a bunch of heat for twittering too much, twittering too dramatically, writing too much personal business, writing whatever it is that the anonymous commenters don’t like.

Now, I don’t know this girl at all. I’ve just read her blog from time to time and am now enamored with Twitter, so of course I’m following her, because that’s what we cool kids do. So she could be super cool or not.. I have no idea. She doesn’t exactly seem to be the Devil Herself, however, and I think she’s funny, so there.

Anyway, it seems to me very strange how the blogosphere reacts to contradiction. If you read a magazine article that you don’t agree with, you may write a letter to the editor, but more than likely you’ll just rail about it to your girlfriends or go have a glass of wine and forget all about it, leaving the author to blissfully carry on believing whatever it is that you find so offensive. But in this new age of social media, such a thing simply can’t be doe.. we must all instantly scramble together our witty comebacks or snarky remarks so that the Author knows JUST HOW WE FEEL ABOUT THIS TRASH.

Which strikes me as OK in one way, because I’m all about Free Speech. But the narcissism of it bothers me. Why should Miss Banshee tweet less to make you happy? She’s not a content mill, she’s a person. And if she wants to use her Twitter to say anything, she can. Of course, you may use yours to say anything back, but why? Unless you’re willing to engage in reasonable debate about a topic other than your personal preferences, it strikes me as an atrociously self-centered and frankly, mean, thing to do.

So that’s my soapbox. I don’t know what it is about the Interwebs that makes us forget that PEOPLE with FEELINGS are on the other side of our rants, but I think we should. Play nice, y’all.