When I write a blog entry, I try my best to put in references to online articles, or to blog entries representative of something that came up widely in a Google search. It can be very time-consuming – a short blog entry with three references in can take more than an hour to write if I really had to dig – but it’s worth it. Because I always go and look for some confirmation of my opinion, I have a few times had to discard an entry, or change my tack on it completely.
I’ve also seen how easily I can be deceived. Journalists often want to put a specific spin on a story, so it can match a catchy headline or because they want to put their opinion out there instead of just reporting the facts. Thus I’ve taken to reading articles through to the end before linking to them. It’s amazing how often, after the first three paragraphs (the ones people are most likely to read), facts and opposing opinions are brought in which basically contradict the headline, or the spin of the first part of the article.
Other times I’ve taken the trouble of following links to articles or other sources, and either found a much better written article to link to in my own opinion piece, or discovered a different side to the story.
Another way of learning things from blogging is by paying attention to your commenters. It doesn’t happen every day, but it has happened that I’ve changed my mind completely on an issue because of a comment left by a kind reader.
Micky frequents a blog which I avoid like the plague, because reading it just makes me horribly angry. I feel there are few things more pointless than engaging these people in debate: not only do you have to decide just where to begin addressing the crazy, you also have to deal with people who use ‘your argument is invalid‘ type reasoning all too frequently. While Neil Simpson has never done so (and is, in spite of his different life view, a nice guy), at least one of his commenters actually goes so far as to edit replies to his (the commenter’s) blog entries to make sure his own opinion goes unopposed, or is easily defended. It’s happened a few times that Micky has asked questions which are never answered, or made replies which are ignored or misunderstood. I get very worked up about such things, so I just stay away from them.
Now and then, though, Micky will show me some issue under discussion, or run a reply he’s making by me for editing. One of these was his reply to an entry about climate change. Linking first to a blog entry which uses so many bullshit tactics I don’t even know where to begin listing them, and then to a 2000 article on global warming, Neil Simpson engages in a one-sentence rant against those claiming the climate is changing, and that humans are at least partly responsible for this.
Micky read the whole article Neil linked to, and found it in fact predicted exactly what’s happening right now. While I can imagine with a busy life and a blog as popular as his Neil must find it difficult to make time for everything, surely if the very words highlighted as the link to an article are shown to be false with a quote from the article, it’s worth fixing?
Blogging can keep you more informed than you would otherwise have been. It can teach you things. Providing, of course, that you’re honest with yourself, and open to correction.
(Micky comments on Neil’s blog as Racing Boo. This is in fact my online identity – I’m racingboo on many forums and groups – but when he first commented I was automatically signed in and he didn’t realise he was commenting under my ‘name’. So on this one platform, he is undeniably a Boo.)
