On blogging

The blogging phenomenon reflects three observable truths which can be proven through sociological observation and personal reflection. Given my current lethargic state, a condition permeating my sense and intellectual faculties on Sundays, for me to write a thorough treatise on the subject is not a possibility, let alone a plausibility. Nevertheless, allow me to throw the gauntlet and reveal these self-evident truths of which the insecure postmodernist theorist will inevitably find faults and the bored reader will apprehend at the very least a droplet of amusement.

First, man's nature compels him to communicate the incommunicable inner life to his fellow social animals. Of course, the scrutinizing mind could raise an interjection like "if the inner life is incommunicable, then man cannot communicate it." This is a valid argument IF only semantics and syntax are taken into account. However, language is not entirely literal but also figurative. The asserted truth here is what literary scholars, who by the way are failed creative writers, classify as a paradox. And this is a digression of my main point. But as you see, considering that "you" is a thinking being, the advent of the internet allows the contemporary subject to express his thoughts (mostly unworthy of readership), emotions ( the deluge of which is a proof of his crass barbarism), desires (obviously of the material kind), and experiences (mostly involves the romanticized nature escapades and the weekend gatherings filled with drugs, booze, cigarettes and sexual advances) to a wider audience. By means of the blog, man reveals his inner life, and this 'revelation' is indeed revealing at the conscious, sub-conscious, and the unconscious levels.

Second, man has an excess of vanity that overflows even to the sphere of the 1's and 0's. It is an undisputed fact (okay, the Nietzschean student can plagiarize with all his liberties his idol's claim that there are no facts but only interpretations) that the main reader of a blog is the writer himself. This vanity can put to shame Narcissus' chronic affectation of looking at his reflection from the lake. For Narcissus never made the lake and the reflection he sees are of a natural occurrence. On the other hand, the blog, the blog entries, and the blog site are creations of man, the blogger. He creates his own tool for the purpose of self-gratification through a skewed appreciation of the constructed self. It is pathetic really from a self-righteous point of view. But the "high" experienced in the sense-perception of his own blog justifies the repressed self-reproach of the blogger.

Third, man wastes too much time. The creation of a blog entry, which most of the time is senseless sputter of gibberish, wastes a lot of precious time. The reading of other people's blog entries is a waste of time. The navigating of other blog sites is a waste of time. But then again, the philosopher can contend that 'time' is nothing but a socially-constructed device made for the purpose of controlling the daily habits of the outdated modern man. And the philosopher may continue his argument by claiming that to 'waste' time is to manifest a non-conformist stance on social structures that curtail man's exercise of freedom. In other words, to 'waste' time through this blog phenomena is to go against the grain; thus transcending what is deemed as the flawed and obsolete state of humanity.

Truths make themselves evident by means of tangible realities. The blogging phenomenon shows to us with lsd-esque lucidity three self-evident truths that we have no choice but to accept inviolably. To quote the great gay British writer Oscar Wilde, who puts to shame any French gay with the possible exception of Michel Foucault, "arguments are to be avoided, they are always vulgar and often convincing".


With love,
Boredom