I have been engaged in serious contemplation regarding the direction that this blog has been taking of late. This has not been limited to the subject matter, but extends across my own ability, or lack of, to properly edit my thoughts, and control my subtlety; something which has been difficult for me since I made the decision to be a writer. Why the need for subtlety? you might ask. Well, to put it bluntly, words contain power. Therefore, when I use a term like "revolution" innocuously, even though in my own mind I am viewing this as a peaceful positive, the vast majority of English speaking readers do not share my perspective, because the word has other, broader, more universally negative connotations. It then becomes more challenging to communicate within such strict confines, and an element like subtlety takes on a whole new level of importance.
Just as my supposed understanding of the world increases, so too does my desire to speak out against the ignorance that through its very existence prevents social advancement, and individual evolution. Yet, I fear that it is not within my realm of skill as a writer to continuously and comprehensively censor myself when it pertains to issues that I feel are of critical magnitude, and as anyone who visits this blog on a regular basis can attest, my ability to contain my rhetoric has eroded to near zero. On the other hand, I have learned to control my tone, and that is a source of great humor for me. Actually, a few weeks ago I found a website that scans blog URLs, evaluates the blog's verbal content, and assigns it a movie rating. Imagine my surprise to find out that Wandering the Ether was rated "G." Considering that conceptually, it would probably be about an "NC-17."
I am quite sure now, that unless I am able to learn how to better exercise a much higher level of restraint in relation to the relative depth of my inner-workings that I am exposing for public consumption; it is in my best interest to pull way back on the blogging and only release finished pieces, and completed ideas that have been edited many times over. Without that safeguard in place, well, I won't go there. Just as literally, I should not. Swimming upstream is difficult. Hence you will only ever find a few fish willing to do it. These fish will of course be viewed as aberrant, deviant, "crazy." As a man with a child to consider, and aspirations of landing a meaningful job after graduation, I must consider one of two things. Take it down a notch, or post anonymously.
22 comments:
Well Dave, I'm probably the wrong person to judge, but I haven't found your posts to be too controversial. They seem right in tune with my thinking. Of course, I'm pretty out of tune with most folks in the US these days.
It's funny ... I guess it's okay to be unsubtle if you're a conservative pundit and mock patriot, but not so good for someone presenting an opposing point of view. So much for that first amendment ... do we still have a constitution?
I love the linked images, btw. I hope the NSA has a close look at them :).
I'm with franscud. Doesn't seem too controversial to me, but I'm not the one to judge! On the other hand, I suppose I do censor myself quite a bit - I too wonder about spiders searching for certain words, so I try to leave them out... though somehow they end up there anyway...I imagine one day soon we'll all be unceremoniously deleted anyway, the way things are going, we should just run with it while we can. But hey - I do use a pen name, if that says anything (though I know They could find me anyway).
Its hard to be yourself when you have one foot on the break and one on the gas. Try going full tilt; the bullshit will be very evident, eventually and will, if you're sensitive and discerning, weed itself out.
To me, writing is a process of vomiting everything up and then figuring out what's you and what's the programming. The road of excess can really pay dividends if you barrel down that muthafucka and not worry about what's around the corner. Who gives a shit what people think, if its real and its you?!
Write it with feeling and keep pumping to get that oil at the bottom of the well.
Bruce Lee in "Enter The Dragon" tells his student, 'don't think, FEEL.' Then, later, '...A good martial artist does not become tense, but ready. Not thinking, yet not dreaming...ready for whatever may come. When the opponent expands, I contract. When he contracts, I expand. And when there is an opportunity, I do not hit. It hits all by itself.'
Somehow, this seemed relevant.
Francis,
Where to even begin? You know, I really have no clue what is, or isn't controversial anymore. I can guess based on cultural reactions, but it's all vicarious. Seems the more time that passes, the fewer taboos remain in my thinking... and maybe that is what I fear. There was an expression we used as kids; "check yourself, before you wreck yourself." So I try to put that into action by comparing myself to other bloggers, whats on their minds, what they choose to talk about... and it feels generally like a lot of people are in a cultural coma. Sure they might talk about "the issues," but what are they really saying? They don't exercise critical thinking, they don't step out of the box. So I figure, if it feels to me like people are saying a lot about nothing, then it must seem to them like I am saying a little bit about something! But how much is too much? When does the Madman cross over from side show curiosity to perceived threat? And who decides that?
I mean, seriously, one could argue that everything we see, and hear, everything we THINK we know, is NOT as it appears. The whole of reality is fair game for reevaluation in my opinion, but to do that, we would have to set aside the ego, the pride, the security blankets must be retired! And what, historically is rewarded those who advocate this philosophy?
Maybe what I write doesn't seem controversial from an observers standpoint, because the observer can only see the text, and not the full blown, uncensored version of these thoughts as they dance about my gray. I'm just getting to a shaky spot, where I really want to stay on the path of subtlety, but the temptation is mounting to forgo self-limiting censorship.
But yeah, you and I see a parallel reality, for sure.
Angela,
I do this all-the-time! So much, that by the time I've finished, I don't know whether or not I've actually accomplished saying what it is that I had originally set out to say. With blogging especially there is this weird internal struggle that I go through over whether or not to publicly speak to myself, or to speak of myself to the public. At that point, I am so twisted up as to my intentions, that by factoring the other nuances, and censoring, and everything else, in the end some posts feel like a Frankenstein quilt.
You bring up an excellent point. Does anonymity even exist anymore? "They" know who we are.
Free,
I like that. Solid advice, and most definitely relative.
I always have told myself it doesn't matter what anyone thinks about me, after a certain point in my life, I was content to be the black sheep, even drew strength off that. But then I started writing publicly, and then I started having an audience, then I started thinking about what is it going to take, what will it require of me to bring home the "bread."
A couple years ago, I started listening to that Saul Williams song "Penny For a Thought." I try to apply that to my thinking, as if Saul was asking me, personally; 'What have you bought into, what will it take to buy you out?' I also view this as a question that everyone should want to be asking themselves.
Sometimes I know exactly what I have sold out to, sometimes I don't. All I know, is that I don't want to BE bought and sold, I don't want my ideas to be controlled by fear, or any type of negative, consequence based perceptions, but the deprogramming is sloooow going.
Diogenes, a blogger maybe you have seen around, he once said "blog in haste, repent later." And though I dig that, I'm still working on the repent aspect. Ideally, it would be nice to be able to let it all hang out, unapologetically, like you're saying, come what may.