Blogger blogging near Seattle
We can’t agree
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p style=”font-family:"”>On the color of the sky
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p style=”font-family:"”>Or whether up
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p style=”font-family:"”>Is really there
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p style=”font-family:"”>Or if the sky
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p style=”font-family:"”>Is blue always
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p style=”font-family:"”>Or just sometimes
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p style=”font-family:"”>The flavor of rage
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p style=”font-family:"”>Which we love to drink often
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p style=”font-family:"”>Sweetest bitterness
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p style=”font-family:"”>
Rage’s engine roars
A machine that churns out death
While rotting out souls
Seems this is the favorite piece of equipment to operate anymore.
I’ve been following Mr. Wheaton’s blog about as long as he’s had it. Went from the first page, to Wil Wheaton in Exile (when his site got gummed up and he migrated to a WordPress hosted site), and so forth. I’m a Trek fan who really appreciated Wesley Crusher. And I appreciate his openness in regards to his struggles with clinical depression.
Recently, there he crafted a blog post expressing his disappointment with Lego. They launched a Next Generation line of characters. Wesley Crusher is crying. I thought that was pretty petty of them, and was remarkably unimpressed with a company that, I feel, has done a great job in so many other areas. He and I agree, his fans had a wide variety of responses. What you should expect.
Today he posted an update to the situation. So, some crappy bloggers took his post, misrepresented him, and then invited the loathsome hoards to descend upon Mr. Wheaton. I’ve seen this so many times, and truly hate it. It’s a wearying exercise, trust me. In my decade+ of blogging, I’ve dealt with this myself. Fortunately (at one level), not at the scale he’s dealing with.
Sucky, crappy people seem to have the run of the internet and we have little-to-no recourse, save blocking and deleting each turd left in our blog’s yard. It’s annoying enough to deal with the petty negativity. Lately, this crap has been filled with violent threats, racist vitriol, rape threats, threats against families and children. This simply frustrates me to the point of near rage.
What to do? Well, we can report those who cross the legal lines (threatening to rape or kill some is a crime, dumbasses!). But, how often does anything come from that? I’ve long recommended ignoring them, yet that doesn’t seem to work all that well.
That’s the deepest frustration: our powerlessness to stop this nonsense. Not without damaging the free-speech quality of the internet. At least, I’ve failed to see a viable solution emerge. I’ve mostly abandoned comment-threads. There are days I want the old internet back. Where people were (much more) decent to one another. Maybe that’s me hearkening back to time that didn’t exist. But I will still wish for a world where people interact with respect and dignity. So I dream.
As my culture deals with abrupt waves of awareness of the ugly, monstrous behaviors of so many prominent men, Claire Dederer presents a rather thoughtful article.
What Do We Do with the Art of Monstrous Men?
I struggle with this, too. Ms. Dederer captures my sentiment quite nicely. Very insightful questions, making one think, which seems considered criminal any more.
We glorify
Independence
Yet it is imperfect.
Humanity needs
Community
Nothing more destructive
Than isolation
Should I reply all?
This choice has great consequence
You must choose wisely
Charming finery
The trappings of elegance
Oh, so seductive
The past holds much wisdom
Ignoring it has grave risks
Ignorance delights
Yesterday was spent driving. Meetings in Late Stevens, Everett and Mountlake Terrace. Not at all uncommon. Though I travelled many miles, my body spent the day seated. This hit me at night: I just had to move. I did a little yoga, ran through taekwondo poomsaes, and was eclectic settle down. My body now expects some motion during the day now.
My culture, my community, has evolved to minimize physical effort. Most energy expenditure gets deferred to our cars. Turns out its killing us. Whether the upswelling of type 2 diabetes or the obesity epidemic, our drive for inaction hurts us greatly. This concerns me.
With this mindset: our obsession with speed. Faster! Faster! More and more in less time. Road Rage’s roots are herein. And those folks who get beside themselves in fury because someone is crossing the crosswalk, or being slowed by a cyclist; they’re deeply trapped in that mindset. Really, your blood pressure is going to soar into pathological levels because you need to wait ten seconds?
I’ve wondered how society would look after healing this fracture. Well, first, we’d walk more. Or bike. We’d also have a rational engagement with time. Becoming unhinged over the most minor inconvenience is deeply unhealthy.
As our urban areas are only going to get more dense, we need to start dealing with this stuff now. Or we don’t need to worry about North Korea nuking us: we’ll explode ourselves with self generated fury.