I have a ton of things I should be doing right now, but ever since I read this this morning, I haven’t been able to get it out of my mind.
The always-brilliant John Scalzi writes about a female food blogger, Shauna James Ahern, and the really insanely cruel things perfect strangers say to her. The hate and spite and personal attacks these perfect strangers feel *entitled* to say to her–just because she keeps a blog. Or writes about food, or her family, or her life. Or because she’s female.
Because John’s point is that he *doesn’t* get this kind of really invasive and inappropriate judgment. And that pretty much all of the male bloggers he knows don’t get it either, but that the female bloggers do.
(And this makes me feel lucky, although also angry that this should be a “fortunate” thing and not just the way the world should work DAMNIT, that my biggest complaint with my public response here is “sometimes people unfriend me and it kinda hurts my feelings.”)
I don’t get that kind of ugly, vile commentary that Ahern gets–but then, this is a teeny little blog with a teeny little handful of readers (and thank you so much for being one of them! Yes, you!). I shudder to think what might happen if I publish a novel, get better known somehow.
Already I am aware (and it’s related to the unfriending-business) that there are narratives about me in the world that I have no control over. I mean, that’s true for anyone, anywhere, on the internet or not; but I’m referring specifically to a certain breakup from a certain reasonably well-known (and well-liked) writer in our field, and his publicly stated feelings about that breakup, and what has happened in his life since that time. And people will have opinions about that, and that’s so entirely out of my hands, I can only shrug and go on being me, living my life in the only way that makes sense to me.
But, wow. My heart goes out to Ahern and ALL female public figures who put up with this kind of hatred, this vitriol, this actually really creepy abuse, on a daily basis. And I am incredibly impressed that she keeps on living her own life with joy and intention, in the way that makes sense to her.