I think I need to grow a thicker skin.
Every so often, I'll say something on The M Files that offends SOMEone. And normally, I don't mind that-- the idea of taking an extreme, hard-nosed position (even if you're not 100% hardcore about the subject matter yourself) is to promote discussion; and I think I've succeeded in doing that.
But now and then, someone will email me saying they're hurt by what I say. And this consternates me, because I go out of my way on The M Files to make it general, and never to target an individual or use the blog as an "attack forum."
Yes, a couple of times I've received inflammatory comments that I have responded to with equal-to-or-greater-than heat, but my policy on those now is to cut them off before they escalate, or rather degenerate, into tawdry oh-yeah-no-YOU-are's.
But yesterday's blog set off a friend of mine; he was hurt by what I said and made it out that I was attacking his boyfriend.
I explained to him that, although I was responding to a public post on his blog, that I was not, in fact, referring to his boyfriend but to certain behaviours in general.
...I'm sure you can see how one's paramour cannot divorce the behaviour from the individual. I can't say I blame him for drawing that conclusion, defensive as he was about it.
And then I got the guilts. How could I have been so mean? Why did I have to go off and blow my top like that? Oh, woe, that I should have thought harder before I wrote...
...and then a couple of hours later, I pulled the What The Fuck handbrake as hard as I could.
Yeah, what I wrote hurt a guy's feelings. And maybe I could have avoided that had I written my blog entry differently, better, more specific or less. Somehow.
But that's all the responsibility I'm prepared to take.
I realized that, within a certain margin, I can't take responsibility for how my writing affects others. Note that I did not say won't. I said can't.
If I attack someone specific, yeah, that is TOTALLY my responsibility. But can I be responsible for how everyone interprets what I say?
Before the Liberals out there tell me I'm responsible for everyone's feelings because hey, I wrote something ABOUT feelings-- let me tell you NO.
It's a fair assessment that someone could be hurt if I'm writing about something their boyfriend wrote. It's really hard to un-blur that line-- so I apologized to them. NOT for what I said, but that they felt the way they did about it. And that's it, finito. I am willing to go that far, but no more.
And at first I was really upset that I hurt people, hurt ANYONE, with my words. Hey, sure, be ANGRY, be RILED UP by what I said, but don't be HURT.
Until I realized that, no matter HOW CLEVER I am with what I write, no matter HOW MUCH TIME I spend writing it, I cannot control how it will affect people.
Repeat after me, Inner Self: I Cannot Control How My Writing Affects People.
You know what I'm going to do? I'm going to post a link to the blog entry that sparked this. Screw anonymity. After all, I'm writing about how the entry made me feel, right?
The entry is entitled "Thief" and you can read it for yourself. Here.
Some may call me crazy for how I reacted to this piece, but therein lies my point: You never know how ANYONE is going to react to something. This is a public blog, as is the "Thief" entry. Public forum, public opinion-- and hey, this one set me off.
The WRITER didn't set me off. The things he's writing about did. For me, there's a very real difference.
A few entries back I wrote about people cleaning their goddamn houses. And it caused this big mishmash. And you know what? I found out later that an idiot friend of mine actually TOLD the owner of a messy house to read my blog because it was about his house specifically. Which prompted rage.
Am I responsible for that? Hell no. But, the guy DID have a messy house-- and I had been there recently, so yes, the blog could very well have been about him.
Only it wasn't. HE made it about him-- probably with a little help from my idiot friend's injudicious and incorrect comment that it in fact WAS about him-- and boom. Can open, worms everywhere.
I see that there's a line between what I CAN accept responsibility for, and what I CAN'T. And the line I'm going to have to take is that if I don't have INTENT behind my words that is harmful, then I'm sorry, but I can't be responsible for your feelings as you read this. I can feel sorry that you felt that way about what you read, but that's as far as it goes.
Do I need a thicker skin? Or do I just need to remember to focus on what I'm trying to say? I believe it's probably a little bit of both.
Posted by Agent M at November 13, 2003 11:12 AMThere's a difference in target.
Your last entry was about a specific person, who I don't happen to know. You were, in essence, saying "I don't agree with Bob. Bob fucking sucks. Let me tell you more about Bob." Bob then has every right to ask "the hell?"--at the very least--and you can't really play innocent about Bob's feelings being hurt. You, after all, specifically went out of your way to hurt them.
The messy people rant was not about specific people; rather a common set of behaviour. If messy people chose to identify themselves ("I'm messy and I don't agree!") that's their issue--you didn't single them out or force them to come forward. If they feel their messy shoe fits, then they should wear it; no skin off your ass.
And yes--write more carefully. :)
Posted by: Mike on November 13, 2003 11:39 AMI've engendered my own share of resentful replies from a number of my own journal posts over the past couple of years, so I know where you're coming from. I see you've also reached the same conclusion I have: this is my journal, my opinions, and if someone takes exception to those opinions... well, they're entitled, but so what?
Oddly enough, or maybe it isn't so odd, the few times I have written posts about specific people they've caused lesser kerfuffle than many generic posts. People seem to react more dramatically to a perceived threat than a real criticism. Or at least that's been my experience.
But, yeah, I try to not let it affect my writing... although, that said, I do tend to hack about religion a little less just to avoid the explosive blowback that generally ensues.
Posted by: Rook on November 13, 2003 11:55 AMOkay, having read Wells' post, and your comment thereafter, I do have to add my own comment:
I am kind of taken aback at how personally you reacted to the post. It seems as if you were personally afronted by the admission. It was as if you decided to judge Wells not on his current personality but rather by what he'd done in the past, as if you could not conceive of him growing up and maturing. In that way, and in the response of yours I read on their blog, I can see them both feeling harshly judged: Wells, for your judgement of his past, and Burke for your judgement of his partner.
Yeah, honestly, I'm not at all surprised they felt hurt.
Posted by: Rook on November 13, 2003 12:15 PM*sigh*
Then I guess that yes, it does sound that way, if other people are picking up on it.
I would like to state, here and now, that it was the MINDSET the author, Wells, describes in his blog that just freaked me out, and not Wells himself.
And yes, I am aware he was twelve at the time and I'm not in the least judging him about that.
I attempted to illustrate how my mind cannot comprehend THAT mindset, attempting to divorce mindset from the author-- and apparently I didn't do it at all well.
Once more, for the public: I apologize to Wells if it seems that it is about him; it isn't, just about something he illustrated on his blog.
Posted by: Agent M on November 13, 2003 12:40 PMOk, enough said. Time to close the barn door.
Posted by: Your mom on November 13, 2003 01:31 PM