I just typed up something on msn to a friend, and I realised... that I'm more blunt on msn than I am in real life. Nothing new, I suppose, everyone does this. It's like the classic argument for online bullying-- the repercussions of what you say online are less immediate, so you are more inclined to say something mean and not be afraid of the consequences.

And I am, again, obnoxiously cutting and pasting just to fill up space but anyway.
Kayley from the 5AG said this on her blog today:
"I hate when reading blogs and people are so desperate to cater to what people will want to read. It’s a BLOG. You type what you want. Stop talking about how people won’t like it or how it will confuse them or whatever. Readers don’t care. If they don’t want to read it, they don’t have to. It’s a place for thought, not a place to please people. Don’t stifle creativity. Done."

And it made me think about when I first started blogging-- more than five years ago, wow-- that I was convinced I had a readership, and was concerned about my audience and who I was writing for. Today I am still under the delusion that there are people out there reading this crap, so I keep in mind not to mention things. I self-censor.

There was a time that my friend was strongly against self-censorship (she talked about religion, sex, bad gossip etc) and tried to advocate that people just say what they want. I tried to go with it for a while, but realised that everyone and anyone can see you on the interwebs, and teachers or juniors whom I didn't want reading this blog would be able to read it anyway, and I couldn't stop them. Maybe it's just me, but I am/was extremely self-conscious about what people thought about me, and I couldn't stick having people think I was sex-crazed, obsessive over harry potter, overly liberal, too vegetarian, too agnostic... you get the gist.

And then I tried to frame my blogposts so that I sounded as moderate as possible and inoffensive, but it got kind of dull. So in the end I gave up and mostly did fangirly things about movies or books, or ordinary boring this-is-what-I-did-today posts. Yay for archives; go see how I was when I was eleven.

Right now I kind of like this medium of expression because it lets me put things I have floating in my consciousness into words, and lets other people know what I am thinking. Or at least, I feel someone out there is reading what I've got to say. It's an outlet of sorts, but I am still careful not to be scathing or overly grumpy... because I am in some degree afraid of what people might think. Also because personal attacks and whining would reduce my credibility and professionalism, and make me sound like an immature spoilt idiot. (which I am, actually. )

Now I've started the BEDA thing, I'm a little worried about talking about issues such as same-sex marriage, slash, smut, religion, the origins of life, LSD... since there are new nerdfighters who are going to read this and start flaming. (okay I'm a bit paranoid here) Though of course by mentioning the above already is hypocritical, but there's still hesitation and doubt. This is not without reason-- you don't start talking politics or violence with someone you've just met, do you?

So I suppose I don't know if it is appropriate to take the plunge or not.
But if these issues really matter to me, I shouldn't be afraid to bring them up and encourage healthy discussion.
*Dilemma*

[/random] I hate it when you're im-ing and people think you're being sarcastic but you're not. Or you're being sarcastic and they thing you aren't. Emails with a context are so much better. [/end random]