Don't read your idols' blogs.

I've been having a big of blogger's ennui lately, which is a sillier sentence to write than it is to read.

I was going to write a post for This Recording that talked about the five bloggers I had blog-crushes on (nearly all platonic). It was going to include Rich from Four Four, Tracie "Slut Machine" Egan from Jezebel, and Emily Gould. I was considering including Alex Balk because no one else on the Internet can make me laugh and then shake my clenched fists at the computer screen with rage, and then there's Julia Allison, just 'cause. I know enough that name-dropping Julia Allison in a blog post (in the same as Emily Gould!) would certainly guarantee an extra five to ten hits.

When the whole Lizz Winstead / Jezebel thing went down two weeks ago, I watched the entire Thinking and Drinking episode featuring Tracie and Moe Tkacik from Jezebel and had a lot of opinions about it; I thought they were unfortunately unaware that the show could turn serious, and, like most of us under thirty, suffer from the curse of the "like and y'know?" generation that makes everything we say sound incredibly dumb despite what brilliant thoughts are buzzing inside our brains. At the same time, however, I was a little disappointed with what they said, but it was representative of a generation of feminists (and really, a generation of people) who forget about the progress of previous generations and how it opened doors for those that followed.

When I thought about writing this, I clicked around Tumblr and saw that everyone was writing the same stuff. People were arguing about how Moe and Tracie represent (like Emily Gould) a generation of women who are too willing to share personal details about their lives for their own gain (whether that is true and a bad thing is debatable, but I'd like to go on record as saying I never want to read the word "overshare" again, ever). And I don't want to go into a gender studies rant about why male bloggers aren't criticized for the same issues, but the idea is exhausting, much like the idea of writing about bloggers who are all related to Gawker.

The thing is this: I used to avidly read Gawker. I still do, on occasion, but with less frequency. Once I made a comparison on this blog to how the old generation of Gawker editors seemed like "the old people in charge of your college radio station." It was a comparison I made because, as a blogger, I sort of emulated those writers because I really enjoyed what they wrote and how they said it. They really were to me a sort of cool clique on the Internet, much like those music snobs who ran the radio station in college. It took me a while back then to realize that, even though I felt like "knowing" those people was a big deal, it didn't make much of a difference a year after graduation.

What's funny to me is that my friends, most of whom read this blog, don't give two shits about Gawker, and they don't recognize those names that used to be on the masthead. Nick Denton doesn't mean anything to them; neither do Julia Allison, Emily Gould, or Slut Machine. Most of them might not know anything about the "scandal" behind the Thinking and Drinking show, because they don't live their lives on the Internet.

I used to write here with the anticipation that one day I would write professionally, and I would turn this blogging hobby into a way to make money and do something that I really enjoyed. To be honest, the idea seems kind of repulsive now, probably because I realized that work is not necessarily something I'll enjoy, even if it's blogging. And I think that I've changed how I feel about writing about myself on the Internet; I've got a lot to say about myself, but that doesn't mean that I should, especially when having my personal shit become public makes feel a little gross.

I talked to my therapist about this (of all things), and she asked me why I don't keep a private journal, wherein I write about myself for myself. I told her I didn't know, that perhaps it's a generational trend: not only does it feel great to type away at these plastic keys (and save time doing so instead of writing everything by hand), but it's also exhilarating to risk putting yourself on the Internet and to let people read what you have to say. After all, as soon as chat rooms became unfashionable when I was seventeen, I joined my first blogging site, and I've been doing this since.

In Which No One Ever Gets Over Middle School

If I ever become famous for my writing, I certainly hope my middle and high school misdeeds don't come back to haunt me. I really don't want to rehash my one trip to the principal's office in ninth grade.

Related:
Emily Gould Broke Some Hearts Back in Middle School [Gawker]
Exposed: Blog-Post Confidential [NYTM]

I have been banned from Gawker.

Well, not really, but I can no longer leave comments.



Related:
Gawker-Baiting [This Recording]
My last comment on Gawker. Coincidence?
NEVER FORGET.

Two Internet moments I will never forget.

About a month ago, this happened:


It kind of blew my mind. When I told Christina, she said, "You did it! You win!"

No one other than us really understands or even cares, but it was exciting none the less. And I figured, "Hey, that's cool. I've peaked! Nothing else, Internet wise, will be as exciting."

Then, a little while ago:


That's even more hilarious.

Thanks for the memories, you guys!

A Gawker Thought

I've been reading the blogs of Choire, Emily, Balk, and Doree with much more frequency than Gawker, and I especially love it when they bitch about the current Denton regime over there. It's like complaining about the new people in charge of your college radio station: they're all the same, but in your eyes, they'll always be lesser than.

It's a slow news day.

We have an army of temps in the office working short shifts all week to "train." My bosses set up an impromptu classroom in the file room, and it all seems like overkill because we don't have much work to do at all right now. In fact, I was all set to watch The Hills when I was told I had to train two of them. I was not happy, and I think my performance reflected it, as I finished "training" my temps way before the rest of them were done. I'm not sweating it, though, as I have four job leads. Four! That's a lot of chances for inevitable rejection!

Also, I'm apparently Gawker's Special Correspondent For Sexy Midwest Trends. Finally, a title I can put on my resume.

Ben: 1, Tyler: 0.

Exactly how jealous am I that someone I know has been ridiculed on Gawker?


Um, very.


Related:
Bedbug Population Explodes At Bushwick Hipster Ground Zero [Gawker]

I will gladly take that dude's job.

Because I'm lazy and admittedly vapid and uninterested in the news unless it primarily affects me, I don't read the newspaper. I've thought about getting a subscription to one, maybe even just a Sunday edition, but let's be honest - all that will leave me with is a stack of newspapers, mostly unread (except for the Arts section and possibly the Best Buy ads). And since I already have a growing stack of unread Vanity Fairs and Smithsonians, I don't need to add to the clutter.

Basically, I only read things in the New York Times when they are pointed out to me, like this article about AC Newman's wedding, which would have probably made me really mad had it not featured Neko Case, who can do no wrong no matter how many pretentiously indie-rock wedding receptions she's involved in.

Vicariously through Gabe Delahaye's column on Gawker, I read Randy Cohen's "The Ethicist" column. There's no need to read Cohen's actual column, whereas Delahaye's feature is pitch-perfect every single week as it rips apart the assholes who think it makes perfect sense to ask their burning ethical questions with a signed letter to a national news paper. Today, was no exception, although it made me wonder WHY PEOPLE ARE SO STUPID. Please, ponder this paragraph from a link Delahaye provided in reference to one of this week's letters:

Nick McCarvel tells The Ethicist (second letter) that his editor ordered him not to mention that he worked for the magazine when he posted on publication's blogs. "Your ethical instincts are excellent: it is wrong to deceive the readers, even implicitly, and that’s what your editor asked you to do," writes Ethicist Randy Cohen. McCarvel doesn't name his employer but a web search shows he was an intern at Tennis magazine.

Doesn't anyone understand the power of Google?


Related: The Unethicist: Randy Cohen And The World's Last Mystery [Gawker]

I can has irony?

I have a problem with two articles I recently read.

The first is a brief piece in Bitch magazine by Sarah Seltzer about Tina Fey's character on 30 Rock, Liz Lemon. Now, if you haven't watched 30 Rock, you need to, because it's simply the best comedy on television right now. But Ms. Seltzer does not think so, apparently; she takes offense at Liz Lemon's stereotypical characteristics and makes a claim that Tina Fey is damaging the idea of a strong female role model. Now, I love feminists as much as the next guy, but not when they don't get irony. I think Tina Fey is smart enough to get the joke here, and it bothers me that Ms. Seltzer is not. Liz Lemon is indeed an important female figure in the show, and she does suffer from those stereotypical attributes that society places on women of such important stature. I believe Tina Fey is playing on those stereotypes; after all, she's a satirical writer. My suggestion to Ms. Seltzer is to watch Spike Lee's Bamboozled and then tell me if she thinks putting African-American characters in black-face is offensive.

The other article was in today's Red Eye, which I swear I only pick up for the sudoku and the crossword. I was tempted to read it today because the cover article was about John Travolta's role in the movie version of the musical version of Hairspray. Already I'm against it because the original was good, the music in this version sounds shitty, and John Travolta is stupid. (By the way: what's up with his southern accent in the movie? Baltimore, Maryland?) I read the article, however, because apparently some gay blogger in Washington took offense that Travolta is in "an iconic gay role," despite being a Scientologist, which "rejects gays and lesbians as members and even operates reparative therapy clinics to 'cure' homosexuality." This is a pretty stupid tiff, especially compared to the negative view of Tina Fey in Bitch, because the argument here seems like someone trying to garner a lot of buzz over something pretty inconsequential. John Fucking Waters is quoted in the article as saying that he didn't intend for the original role of Edna Turnblad to be a "gay role;" it just happened that Divine was a drag queen. I think we can all agree that the reason that Edna is played by a man is because seeing a man in a dress is, well, funny. And John Waters knows this, and he wasn't afraid to make use that kind of humor in an effective way.

On a sort of related note, one of the Chicago Tribune's bloggers took a swipe at Gawker today because it made fun of Jews in a post yesterday.

I think my point is this: lighten the fuck up, people. It's only a joke.


Related:
Sour Lemon [Sarah M. Seltzer]
Playing it straight [Red Eye]
Chicago Blogger Unamused By Our Anti-Semitism [Gawker]