The Search for Signs of Intelligent Life in the Blogosphere

"No matter how cynical you become, it's never enough to keep up."
-- Jane Wagner/Lily Tomlin

Well, this period of unbridled ugliness in the blogosphere continues with no relief in sight. I have now seen behavior I could not have imagined in my wildest dreams; repeated attacks on Maryscott O'Connor for her reaction to BeagleandTabby's publicly posted suicide note. Never mind that her quick action and community outreach resulted in his rescue by police. Never mind that she was in shock and grief upon learning from his delayed posting that her friend was probably already gone. Nope. Whatever she did... not good enough.

So the armchair quarterbacks at Daily Kos, where she posted his, thankfully premature, memoriam, attacked her for being too quick to assume him dead, for making his private life public, on and on and on... Don't bother to look for that diary. It was removed so the vicious comments would not be an assault on BeagleandTabby's senses when he returns. The sniping has been significant enough that Steven D. felt it necessary to publicly defend her here and here.

Worse still, someone ironically nicknamed cronesense, had the audacity to accuse Maryscott of inventing this incident of whole cloth to get attention, based on nothing but some fucked up time stamps. Time stamps. Work on a computer much? Jesus Christ.

You know when I first started reading liberal blogs and message boards, I was admittedly stunned at some of the behavior; the censorship of ideas, autocratic management styles, abusiveness, aggressive thought policing, etc., etc., etc. Several times I showed my husband threads that had left me feeling gobsmacked for one reason or another. He would blink a few times in astonishment and say, "These are liberal sites?" But ultimately I came to the conclusion that, well, people are people wherever you go. A good bit of the drama in the left wing blogosphere owes to the foibles of human nature and is as good an argument for our complex system of checks and balances as anything. We are a nation of laws, not men, for good reason.

Readers of this site are, by now, aware that I write almost as much about the internal dynamics of the blogosphere as the political arena. The metaphors are there. I have to use them. Sure Ann Coulter's narcissism and inability to admit her flawed logic is fascinating, but so is Armando's. Sure Bush's tyrannical style and simple-mindedness is disturbing, but so is Kos's. I could go on, but I already have at length.

But what I've seen over the last several days -- and my reading has necessarily only skimmed the surface -- defies any categorization I can think of. Mind-blowingly nasty stuff.

And finally I must publicly apologize -- and I am doing this through gritted teeth -- to the Blogging Curmudgeon. He is a free agent and he is entitled to go off half-cocked if he wants. It has nothing to do with me. Or shouldn't. I was wrong to blame him, even in part, for the dust up with Marisacat. The fault was hers and hers alone. Not because she conflated the two of us -- such confusion is inevitable -- but because when she was apprised of the truth she continued her vain assault on my character. I find it rather telling that she continues to disparage me for not paying her proper homage by linking to pages in her blog I did not have enough interest in to read, in the first place. (I trust my readers to follow further links and use the google according to their own interest level.) Yet she did not see fit to READ the blog she was defaming. A quick glance at the prominently placed bio would have informed her that the Blogging Curmudgeon had left the building. Pot calling the kettle what now? Blog etiquette, indeed.