The sound of lies
Self taught Kate has an interesting post up about owning up to truths about yourself on your blog, and making things look or seem other than as they are. (Her example is better, but there are also people who make their lives seem worse. Over time, I have done both, either intentionally or not.)
If you are like me, you read other people’s websites, the websites of people who are so creative and talented, and when they talk about sadness or anger or–if they are actually honest enough to admit to it–being bitchy or rude or annoying, you don’t really “believe” it. It does not seem possible that people who are so far away could possibly get angry or experience negative emotions. Back in the days when I first started this whole weblogging thing (shockingly, this is now seven years ago, if you count the free homepage sites I used to use before I bought a domain name!), I used to read the websites of creative women and I thought that their lives were perfect. I thought they were perfect. I put them on pedestals, as models for what I wanted.
Now, so many years later, after meeting so many and emailing so many and seeing that their lives are just as f*cked up in all the right ways as my life is, I see the layers. I also see how dangerous it can be to believe in the image some portray–I am thinking of one website in particular, someone I was once friends with and am no longer associated with, someone who puts a very pretty picture of their life on the web when the reality is anything but. The experience of that online/IRL relationship did a lot to change my view that the life described on the website is necessarily the real thing.
Sometimes I think I’d like more history up, and consider putting all my usenet and opendiary writings on here, in the archives. (I do not intend to do this, but I have considered it more than once.) This would be for me, because I can’t imagine a whole lot of people suddenly delving into the 4+ year old writings I wrote. I guess it would also be for random googlers.
That’s not the point.
The thing is, I tend to think of people’s blogs as describing the whole of their lives, when I know this isn’t true. But I never know what’s left out, obviously, and because I can’t fill it in, I assume it’s not there, and often I don’t even know what I’m assuming isn’t there. When Jo(e) did her answers to regularly asked questions, I realised that I had thought, in the back of my mind, that she and Mr. Jo(e) had not much of a relationship (other than the sex she talks about all the time) because she doesn’t talk about him. I have decided that most bloggers have no friends, because most bloggers never talk about their friends on their blogs, so it surprises me when people talk about friends. I don’t really think I’m right — I leave my friends off my blog, too — and yet, here I am, making these assumptions.
They are a lot of them boring assumptions. The assumptions I make about people’s personalities (better-founded, but still, inaccurate) are not so boring. And not so innocuous, either. I forget sometimes that this is text, not reality, it’s the story of your reality, the story of your life. I use it as a way to complain about things, mostly, recently, and also a way to make sense of my life, to be able to see things and patterns that I can only recognise through narrative.
But this narrative, of course, turns it into a fiction, or a fictionish: truthy, not truth.
I make decisions about how to portray myself and my actions: show up better, show up worse, try both at once. Not talk about them at all (which makes my understanding problematic, and also reorganises my own story, blogging being, in a way, a way of making things real). I wonder often how I come across. Would I read my blog? Would I like me?
This is an issue I have blogged about and thought about before. I come across happier or sadder than I am. Friendlier or more anti-social. Saner or — well, hard to be less sane than I am and still function in society. (See? I am taking on a persona. Is this persona me? Some days.) I don’t try to lie; I do try to misdirect, sometimes. But I lie anyhow, and my misdirections sometimes are good pointers to the truth.
August 29th, 2006 at 4:10 pm
I like this post very much. It’s a complicated issue. Even the tones and mental images I project onto other bloggers are probably false. Some people blog to self-promote, some to self-denigrate, others to present the image of suave sophication, and still others to project loneliness. Who is exactly as they appear to be on a blog? Moreover, does it matter? Does it matter if I think people are other than they are from reading their text? I’m not sure about that, but I’m thinking the answer is no.
August 29th, 2006 at 7:15 pm
Well, I like you. Or at least the “you” you create here.
It is so complicated. I tend to think that some of the people I know through their blogs are probably a lot like the way I imagine them because there is such a strong authenticity that comes through, but who knows? And is it just that they are people who tend to write everyday, several times a day, about the mundane aspects of life and therefore I think I am getting the “whole story”? If someone writes fewer posts, do we “know” them less?
Maybe we should start a meme where we ask our readers to describe who they think we are based on our blogs.
August 29th, 2006 at 9:22 pm
I have thought about writing a post titled, “This is not a narrative.” Because I keep writing about, well, the busy times, the crises, etc, and providing no context.
August 29th, 2006 at 11:59 pm
I don’t think I think about it a lot. For me, blogging is such a (you know the word I’m going to use yet again) outlet that I don’t censor myself well. Of course, this is why I often wind up deleting blog posts the next day, but I’m getting better at not doing that. I don’t think I ever lie, but I do sometimes misrepresent myself. In my case, it’s usually because I am too lazy to write enough to fully contextualize situations and/or I think that sort of window would invite more questions into what, to me, is the extraneous of the post.
I like pi’s idea of a meme! I read that earlier and liked it and thought I’d spend some time thinking about it, but it didn’t happen.
Also, I often feel like I get to “know” people even more by the comments they leave on my blog. Outside of one’s own terrain, it’s often easier to show another side of one’s self.
Can I say again how much I love the header?! The first time I viewed it, it was just all colors. Ahh, pretty colors. It’s like those prints they used to show at the mall and you had to stare at it a while to find it. It was only the second time that I saw the imagery. It’s just really captivating and original. It may be my all-time blog header ever anywhere.
August 30th, 2006 at 12:32 am
I think it’s much more likely that we know less about the lives of other bloggers, than we do about the bloggers themselves. Certainly some are more open than others, but I think it’s much easier to just not touch on certain parts of our lives than it is to keep parts of ourselves hidden.
I suppose it’s possible to deliberately put forth a carefully crafted image in your blogs. But, to me, that doesn’t seem to be taking advantage of one of the best benefits of blogging - a true exchange of ideas and support. Because if what you’re sending forth is not real, so to speak, then the sharing is not real either. It’s all kind of a sham. And what fun is that?
August 30th, 2006 at 12:03 pm
Sheepish, I think you’re right in a way that it doesn’t matter. Even if eventually you meet (some people even date) other bloggers. We’re never the same to all people. How much is it important if you have the same vision as someone else. But on the other hand, it’s interesting what and where the differences are.
Pi, thanks. I always think people are much like their blogs are, unless they’re clearly putting on a persona. But I know, also, that I am wrong. Not that they’re hugely different, but the differences are enough. I do not know how different I appear to be from my blog based on the people who’ve met me.
Yes, I think that people who write a lot or often I know better. But does knowing about someone’s grocery shopping help? Does not knowing about them hurt? What about time, do I know you much better than bloggers I;ve not been reading for 3 plus years? That goes into what PJM says, because no, it’s not a narrative, but over long enough, isn’t it? Ish?
Shelly, I think we all have to misdirect, sometimes. But I think sometimes it’s a bigger clue, though to something else. And yes, I leave comments about things I don’t/won’t blog about.
Rebecca, that’s a good point. But if I keep most of my interactions with friends hidden — even the existence of them — am I not hiding a lot about myself?
Putting together an image of yourself is good for another kind of blogging. To test out who you can be, or could have been, to imagine a different sort of life. Even to test out writing fiction. I like some of those blogs, when I know what they’re doing. And I understand the others, though I admit sometimes I feel a bit betrayed by them.
August 30th, 2006 at 12:16 pm
[…] Pi and Shelly both seemed to think this would be an interesting meme, so: based on this blog, what kind of person do you think I am? If you’ve met me, what has surprised you about me? […]
August 30th, 2006 at 4:21 pm
Interesting. I leave whole chunks of my life off my blog. For instance, I often write about my own extended family — and yet I don’t write about my husband’s family even though they live in the area, and we see them pretty often. I have this idea that I need to protect his privacy because he is a private person. My mother-in-law comes to our house every single Sunday, and yet she has appeared in only one blog post. I think I am very aware that blogging is public — my posts pretty carefully edited.
I’ve never felt that I was telling my readers all about my life. Each day I pick one thing that might be of interest and write about it. That leaves out a whole lot.
August 30th, 2006 at 4:52 pm
I leave a whole lot of my life out of my blog. Some of it very important to my life. But I think the me that comes out in the things I do write about is very representative of who and what I am.
I can’t even imagine how it would be possible, over the long term, to keep that from being true - unless one approached blog posts as scenes in a play or novel and put yourself in character before beginning to write. I can see how that might be fun or entertaining. But I’d also want a blog where I could be me.
September 3rd, 2006 at 8:39 pm
Very interesting post. I think I assume most people leave big chunks of their lives out of their blogs. However I’ve read some blogs where I’ve definitely thought they’ve documented every thought and bodily function and physical movement multiple times a day - is there anything left? Others are definitely more secretive.
I leave lots and lots out of my blog. Trying to be anonymous and private in a public space. Hehe. My blog’s all very safe and boring (documenting school stuff). It eases my nervous energy to see what’s getting done. I really hope no one thinks my blog is my whole life. :)
I wish I could feel freer to write more stuff down. I don’t know why I can’t or don’t. When I started the blog, I started it with the same intentions I always had when I started a journal or diary when I was young: “This is it, total honesty, I’m going to write it ALL down. Pour it all out there on the page.” And - as always - I chickened out - and it’s structured, cryptic, guarded, detached (which is definitely a part of me and how I interact with people I don’t know).