Better Blogging?

Surely offering guidelines and criteria of how a blog post should be written defies the very definition of blogging?

Blogging, as I have grown to understand it, is an individual experience in which opinions and experiences are articulated for a particular audience. The key words there are "individual," "opinion," and "experiences," as blogging cannot possibly follow some sort of structure. Essays and other academic endeavors follow a degree of structure and rigidity, however, blogging is meant to be an outlet of individualism and informal opinion. I cannot idly read articles from fellow bloggers that suggest that the way a large amount of people write is wrong.

Assuming that individuals write for other people's benefit is the first problem. That is, people do not necessarily write for other people, blogs are often treated as electronic journals. Personally, I write to articulate thoughts and opinions that have been on my mind -- I do not intend my writing on my blog to have the same characteristics as an informative comment in a respectable newspaper.

Blogging opens the experience of writing to the masses, which is a wonderful thought. Blogs allow for people to be open with their opinions, and it also allows people to express themselves however they see fit. As soon as police are assigned to blog posts limiting the prospect of individual opinion and expression, then surely the very spirit of blogging has been lost.

The statement "paper-writing produces papers while blogging produces writers" is very true, however, paper-writing and blogging are becoming dangerously similar thanks to internet theorists who believe in the standardization of expression and opinion. I cannot willfully endorse such criteria as it seems to me that they are wholly contradictory, and logically flawed.

Blogging should be about the message, not about the way in which the message is written.

Comments

Response to L's "4/20."

Response to CMC's "Why Americans do it Wrong."

Response to CEC's "Your Brain on Steroids: Buying Flow?"

Cultural Misunderstandings

Cultural misunderstandings are some of the most concerning problems in the world today. From cultural stereotypes, to blatant generalizations, it is far easier for individuals to misunderstand a group of people than into experiencing the culture itself. The problem with this is that there are two types of misunderstanding: the concious misunderstanding, and the unaware misunderstanding.

Simply, the concious misunderstanding generally manifests itself in humor. People from France are bastards, people from England drink tea more than water, and people from America are fat. No one usually takes any serious offence from statements such as these -- I certainly don't. The central issue is when people make statements such as these and do not realize that what they are saying is a generalization, or a lie. For example, when people claim that people of certain religions are conditioned to dislike others. I have heard countless people seriously believe such an idea. This is unacceptable.

In my opinion, this is a problem that sprouts from education systems around the world. As children people are encouraged to believe whatever they are taught in school or whatever they read in textbooks. The fact of the matter is that these are largely recycled opinions presented in an intelligent format. If individuals fail to experience the world for themselves, or to engage in further reading, then it is likely that these inaccuracies will perpetuate themselves in society. If individuals choose to rely upon recycled ideas then there is no hope for the advancement of the human race.

Individuals must not rely solely upon the opinions and ideas presented before them. Everyone is entitled to their own opinions, and therefore, everyone is entitled to question arguments set out before them. If discussion and argument cease to exist, then cultural misunderstandings will continue to spread -- and not in the humorous sense.

... Seriously though, English people do drink a lot of tea.