Writing for Publication: Intent Versus Content

I’ve recently heard or read somewhere a curmudgeon’s diatribe about the omnipresence of cathartic virtual devices at the disposal of the general public. Apparently this is a bad thing. The individual was expressing certain dissatisfaction with the concept of self-publication, blogging, vlogging, and virtual opining via social networks, et cetera. It’s the same tired complaint about FaceBook’s purported influence on and exercise of relativity and narcissism. Sure lots of people are on FaceBook, and sure lots of those people over-post banalities, bang out the most cliché of platitudes, and, more often than not, straight up projectile vomit linguistic stupidity, and sure some people use such a device as a means for social juxtaposition and posturing, but most of these people aren’t philosophers; they’re just people, picture-taking-people feeding the addiction of the picture-looking-people, the Dionysian dialectic of sadism and voyeurism. It’s ironic that I myself haven’t a FaceBook account, (primarily because of my contrarian nature and my vertiginous spite for some pop-culture conventions) but I do have a blog. 

I understand what the curmudgeon was getting at. The more avenues there are for any individual to voice his or her own opinion, plus the more individuals there are who are both willing and able to practice and engage in such an enterprise means the less potential importance and possible chance for recognition that a scholar or a critic in such a field might possibly obtain. If the market is flooded with ideas, both similar and oppositional, then the ability to navigate through them becomes exponentially difficult. The fact that an individual (both in concept and in flesh) is merely a grain of salt falling towards a great ocean only to be immediately dissolved is a scary one to grasp, especially for those who consider themselves serious philosophers. Relativity is frightening to Absolutes.

But over time the pain resides. The melodic waves massage you into a state of acceptance and contentment. Muscles relax. Mind resolves. Dissolution isn’t such a bad thing at all. Nothing has the potential to be the most beautiful Non-thing.

Jump in, the water’s fine, it’s just a bit murky.

I’m not certain exactly what I am trying to say here. In fact, I think this has turned into a sort of diatribe itself. Must be the curmudgeon in me.  Nevertheless, who really cares? This is my blog and I create my own truth here.