more on writing
A bit of synchronicity; I am reading some Simone Weil, and got to a bit about Matthew 18:20, "where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them", taken as an endorsement of intimate conversation.
"Everybody knows that really intimate conversation can only take place between two or three. Even if there are only six or seven present, collective language begins to dominate".
This morning I was reading an article from a Polish newspaper entitled "Jesus was a Leninist", an interview with Slavoj Žižek (which is hilarious, and I think I'll translate it later). Mostly it's about beards, grooming, and stealing socks, but he refers to the very same passage. Of course, being who he is, he interprets it completely differently (more in line with the Church, anyway) -- two or three or MORE, and more is better, yay Masses (pun intended), The Holy Ghost = idealized communist collective! But still, somehow the same bit of the New Testament popped up twice in one day, both times from radical lefties. (Although I think Simone might kick him in the nuts).
I might not have noticed, except I myself have been already thinking about my relationship to writing, to self-censoring, to things I constantly erase or leave unsaid, and as a part of that -- to my journal, and to the journals I read; ideally, a series of intimate conversations, but in a format which allows them to grow, scaling fluidly from the individual to the crowd. The post before this one also touches on the same idea, free speech being on the personal end of the scale, shame on the collective. So, another reason people retreat from public blogging is that they are not prepared for the potential repercussions of writing intimately in a way that allows, even encourages, a collective response, and are shocked, as Nick writes, shocked to discover some of their ideas are found offensive and risible and that people are quite willing to castigate them for voicing such. For people of limited experience, people who seem to have never spoken out to anyone but a coterie of confederates (preaching to the choir, shouting in an echo chamber), the experience of being found inarticulate is jarring and frightening.
Certainly I myself am a part of this problem. I enjoy sharp criticism, both given and received, and don't hold back. "Grow thicker skin" is the only advice I have; and yet I worry about voices silenced because their owners are temperamentally incapable of forming even a rough cuticle let alone an armoured cicatrix. They, too, may have stories to tell. Bother.
"Everybody knows that really intimate conversation can only take place between two or three. Even if there are only six or seven present, collective language begins to dominate".
This morning I was reading an article from a Polish newspaper entitled "Jesus was a Leninist", an interview with Slavoj Žižek (which is hilarious, and I think I'll translate it later). Mostly it's about beards, grooming, and stealing socks, but he refers to the very same passage. Of course, being who he is, he interprets it completely differently (more in line with the Church, anyway) -- two or three or MORE, and more is better, yay Masses (pun intended), The Holy Ghost = idealized communist collective! But still, somehow the same bit of the New Testament popped up twice in one day, both times from radical lefties. (Although I think Simone might kick him in the nuts).
I might not have noticed, except I myself have been already thinking about my relationship to writing, to self-censoring, to things I constantly erase or leave unsaid, and as a part of that -- to my journal, and to the journals I read; ideally, a series of intimate conversations, but in a format which allows them to grow, scaling fluidly from the individual to the crowd. The post before this one also touches on the same idea, free speech being on the personal end of the scale, shame on the collective. So, another reason people retreat from public blogging is that they are not prepared for the potential repercussions of writing intimately in a way that allows, even encourages, a collective response, and are shocked, as Nick writes, shocked to discover some of their ideas are found offensive and risible and that people are quite willing to castigate them for voicing such. For people of limited experience, people who seem to have never spoken out to anyone but a coterie of confederates (preaching to the choir, shouting in an echo chamber), the experience of being found inarticulate is jarring and frightening.
Certainly I myself am a part of this problem. I enjoy sharp criticism, both given and received, and don't hold back. "Grow thicker skin" is the only advice I have; and yet I worry about voices silenced because their owners are temperamentally incapable of forming even a rough cuticle let alone an armoured cicatrix. They, too, may have stories to tell. Bother.