Recently a good friend of mine told me that he doesn't read this blog any more because it is all politics now. I looked over my recent archives and indeed I have been relentlessly pursuing what I would more broadly call religipoliticosocial commentary. I don't have any strong feelings about his comment, meaning it didn't offend me or sadden me, but I've been trying to figure out if I want to try to change anything here, not for his sake but for mine. I've enjoyed that a situation has developed here where a small group of friends read what I write and often chime in and discuss things. It is nice building a little community around a few ideas. But would it be better to build a larger community by being more diverse with my content?
For the most part I write about topics that interest me, and more specifically topics that inspire me to want to write. I've been consumed with, and motivated to write by, religipoliticosocial things lately, which I realize is a polarizing area of discourse since I avoided it like the plague for years. Now though I think that the topics I've been digging into are very very important, not always to me personally in a direct and tangible way (today anyway), but in some other way that is hard to neatly fit into the structure of this sentence or paragraph or entry. I guess for now the way I'll put it is that I'm trying to be a better person, which I realize seems to have the awkward implication that not being interested in these topics makes one a lesser person. But it isn't really the case that I think it is wrong or irresponsible for someone to recoil from this stuff, just that for me personally I'd feel like I would be violating something if I didn't go where I'm going.
That nebulous italicized something is going to take more effort to write about than I feel like making right now. But to the point of the post, this is a good time to take stock and reevaluate the direction of this blog, because that something is leading me to a turning point too. I guess before I get more specific on that, I'd be curious to see what other people think. Of course the few of you left reading this have an obvious selection bias so I might not reasonably expect anyone who has endured months of this stuff to suggest I change direction now. But it is my impression that open-mindedness and broad curiosity is a common trait of the kinds of people who would come this far in the first place, so I don't imagine a change it likely to be met with howls of protest either.
2 comments:
Let's not get an overinflated sense of importance here. It's a blog. If you want to write about politics, write about politics. If you want to write about religion, write about religion. If you want to write about marmot crap, write about marmot crap.
I guess if what you're after is more readership and contribution, then by all means, pander to your audience. If you're interested in the introspective process, then just keep on keepin' on. I would vote for the latter, because I'm more interested in what it is that makes you tick than what you think about the things that make me tick.
I'm sure you already know this, but I read your blog way more now than when you used to write about sports and poker. I could care less about sports and poker. I hate it when you write about poker. In case you're interested in pandering to me...
Seriously, I'm so glad you stopped writing about poker.
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