by Jerome du Bois
I'm going to take care of one last anonymous comment, about Writers' Bloc, writing, and risk, which has been blocked since I closed comments the other day. The original comment and my fisking is here.
When Catherine read this latest one she said, "Why bother fisking it? Why not just say:
'You're just mad because the blogosphere doesn't care who your rich daddy is.'"
I don't know who this commenter is, but that sounds right on. The whole tone, beyond the boring syntax and total lack of humor (hence my Zombie digs), and despite all the repetition of the word "risk," is smug, complacent, and entitled. For example:
Living 53 [sic; it's 55] years is about as meaningful as having babies; folks do it every day. Nothing new there.
She left out the part about the seven hells. Oh, yes, I think it's a she, I even think I know who it is, but Blog forbid I say anything. You see how wankers get to weasel around? I could say so much more if I knew this woman's identity; of course, that's why they stay shy. They can read what happens when I know their names.
Reread the sentences in italics. Sounds like someone who's never been hit, never slept in an alley, never been broke, never been jobless, never been without wheels, and never been more than one phone call away from lawyers, a warm bed, and money. As if 55 years ground out in South or West Phoenix --or Washington, DC, or East LA-- is identical to the same sailing 55 in Paradise Valley or North Scottsdale or Carefree.
One of the marks of a sociopath is this: Life is as meaningless as death. Sounds heavy, I know, but I do believe having babies is a very meaningful life course, new or not. The commenter is so damned flippant. And all lives are not lived out the same, and living any length of time against adversity is something to be proud of, something meaningful, something to stand by and for; that's so obvious that having to point it out reflects badly on the commenter's intelligence.
There's more.
The comment begins:
J & C,
Notes on your frisking . . . that's also spelled correctly.
"Frisking . . ." No. That implies touching; yech, no thanks. Or maybe it's her way of getting "risk" in there yet again.
Of course I have a "you" for reference; I'm one of a league of anonymous writers to your site.
Baloney; if only. Hardly anybody writes to us. There may be a league of anonymous readers to our site, or seven leagues for all we know; but very few writers, though we invite civilized discourse.
One member of Writers' Bloc, Amy Young, always signs her name, so we're pretty confident this present commenter isn't her. We don't admire her work, but she steps up and steps out, and we give credit where credit is due. You're not in her league, Anonymo.
Is there a reason why you don't list your personal email address?
It's kinganddubois@cox.net.
Or your mailing address? Or your address at your domain name? Perhaps because you wish some privacy?
Yes.
For that same reason, I'll use the anonymous route. Certainly, I don't resort to name-calling, but I'll stay this way, thanks, and you're welcome to continue to censure me.
Thanks. I will. What you call "name-calling" in many instances is just passing judgments, demanding accountability, calling for high standards. And anonymity is baloney. You're just scared. And if you mean name-calling, cite some examples, please, such as wanker, stupid, and Zombie.
Living 53 years is about as meaningful as having babies; folks do it every day. Nothing new there.
You spend time writing, you can afford to. But you don't risk anything by that. Does it take you away from the process of making a living?
No. And how does risk get in here? Instead of writing, am I supposed to be out playing in traffic? Training pit bulls? Catching javelins? Am I supposed to be suffering in some way? What the hell is the matter with having free time to write, loving it, and doing it? You just resent it, and most of all our freedom to say what we want without a gatekeeper --like you, maybe.
Regarding editors and such, that's not my point.
This is a dodge. You're an editor, I'm going to guess, or have been one in the past, or hang out with them.
You self-publish on the net. It's cheaper than dirt.
Really? My monthly internet nut is almost as much the members spend every month to hang out at the Writers' Bloc house. (I don't know how much dirt costs, by the way; maybe you're more familiar with dirt than I am.)
No risk in that. Now if you paid for the dead tree process and risked whether you'd sell them or not, that's risk. Especially if it made any financial risk.
The Risk. The Risk. The All-Important Risk. Now I know you're at the editorial/publishing end of the dead-tree process here. A writer submits his story to a magazine, absorbing the opportunity costs lost. But only in vanity publications does the writer submit a fee as well. It's the publisher who takes the financial risk, as usual. The editor makes an aesthetic judgment, and risks her reputation and her job. Again, as usual. Meanwhile, the writer does whatever he does, taking risks elsewhere, perhaps.
All the people you want to frisk have actually risked their finances, futures, time away from work that brings in an income. This is your personal hobby, and as a hobbyist you risk nothing.
It is entertainment for you and a side-show for us.
Rave On.
It's Blog On, okay? Get it right.
I don't know all the people that you didn't mention. I mean the ten members of Writers' Bloc. How do I know any one of them risked any of those things you do mention? Esser, Dach, Silverman, Young, Susser; they're all doing fine, sitting pretty. And how do you know that we don't risk those things every day we live?
You want to talk about hobbies? How about having the free time and money to get out of the house and go down to a Clubhouse and pretend to be a writer with other writers? So far, nothing has issued from Writers' Bloc for the wider world. Nothing in six months.
But I have an idea, Ms. Riskydeadtree. A zine! A real one, made of precious paper. Don't tell me, you're working on it already. Well, if you're not, there's this wonderfully inspiring piece on Style.com that features over a dozen just rilly neat zines. Handstitching! Found material! Mail-in art! What's old is new again!
And, best of all, they imply that blogs are so yesterday.
You'll love it.
UPDATE / CODA: Blogs versus Zines.
Compare and contrast, the oldest school exercise.
[I point these obvious differences out only while we're waiting for the ultimate media vehicle --setless television, or maybe the morphing newspapers of Minority Report.]
A zine is short, small, limited in time and space, bound by physical front and back covers, and bound by one-dimensional print limitations (e.g., no streaming video). If one refers to someone else's work, one cites it, but that's a far as it can go. The reader must wait a fixed amount of time before the next issue appears, either in the mailbox or at the newsstand or bookstore. If anything comes up relevant in the meantime --say, a newly discovered alt-indy musician who knits-- the zine has to wait until the next cycle. Letters to the editor take a lot of time. Meanwhile, they'll get scooped by knittingmusicians.org, if there is such a thang. A zine is, I conclude, a fetish object, a collectible, much more of a vanity project than a blog; it is a limited-edition talisman one passes around among the initiated. (On the high end, think Parkett, or, before it folded, nest. I don't know about the low end.) Rather quaint in a disposable culture. We don't archive our magazines, for example; we cut out what we want and recycle the rest. It's paper, not gold.
A blog is as physical as a computer, I say, not some ephemeral thing, since the computer (and all the physical infrastructure of the internet) creates and supports the blog. But a blog is unlimited in time and space, can be updated continually, can change instantly, has no front or back cover, and nearly every point on the screen can be activated to point to a whole other world. Need I belabor the multimedia capacities, from full-color digital photos, poppable, to podcasting, to videoblogging? Whaddaya you got? Paper. A blog has a free entry to every publicly available web page. Anybody in the world can read the blog without paying for it. The reader doesn't have to wait very long for new stuff. And, if the blog only has one story, post, or entry that day, it doesn't matter. Since the blog is connected to the blogosphere, it's like being connected to millions of pages, just a click away. So each blog is every blog, I say, thicker than ten thousand telephone books, which makes your skinny zine look, well, paper-thin.
Zines are safe. Blogs are risky.
Posted by Jerome at June 23, 2005 09:00 AM | TrackBack