Ways LJ isn't Like Other Blogspace

[akirlu]

Every now and again you encounter someone on LJ whose "bio" comprises a bullet-point list of proclamations of how and when the user reserves the right to silence or ban others and generally control all discourse in their journal to a degree that even the editors of Pravda would stand in awe of.

I am baffled by these people.

On the one hand, the declaration is a case of stating the painfully obvious and redundant. Of course they have the right to control "their" journals, down to the point of deleting comments they don't like, or banning anyone who doesn't worship My Little Pony. Whatever. Saying I have the "right" to do these things doesn't make me any less of an asshole if I do them, though declaring my intention ahead of time does make it clear that I'm an asshole with malice aforethought. For whatever that's worth, warning-wise.

On the other hand, if they want a private playspace, free of the random influences of others' opinions, why the hell are these folks setting up their fiefdoms in frigging LiveJournal, of all things, in the first place? Last I checked, the whole blinking idea behind the LJ software was to build community by leveraging the interconnectedness of the conversational feeds. If someone wants Happy-Sparkly-Princess-MeMeMeLand, why not go set up a free-standing blog? Or, if that's not an option, why post publicly and why have a Friends List? It's this business of wanting to borrow the benefits of audience and community without having to put up with the grubby fact of other people that I really don't get.

Or rather, that I get morally outraged by, I guess I mean. Because as I'm thinking "aloud" about this, I realize that to me, this business of having it both ways seems a lot like free-ridership.

Comments

Because...

[seawasp]

... it's harder to set up your own blog, especially when you don't know ABOUT other blogs but do know about LiveJournal. Obviously.

I agree about the silliness.

[daystreet.livejournal.com]

Wait...

You mean there are people who don't like "My Little Pony"?

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

Avert your eyes, dear. I didn't mean for you to see that.

[cakmpls.livejournal.com]

I don't know whether this is what you mean, but I added the following to let people know what type of avoidable behavior I would not support by its publication in my LJ--

"I may delete from my LJ, without warning, any comment that does either of the following:
(1) does name-calling of real people, i.e., characterizes people rather than their behavior or actions;
(2) imputes intentions and motivations to others when the others have not explicitly stated them.
NOTE: These do not apply to public figures.

"Anonymous comments that do not have an identifiable name signed to them will be deleted."

I don't think I have any obligation to let people abuse others in my LJ nor to publish the remarks of people who won't identify themselves at least by an LJ name. But I also want to give fair warning.

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

This isn't really what I had in mind, actually -- both because you're very specific, explicit, and limited about what the proscribed behavior is, and because you aren't doing any flopping on the deck about how you are totally within your rights to do whatever you want, because it's *your* *space*. For that matter, you aren't engaging in pre-emptive gratuitous name-calling of anyone who complains about your policy.

[cakmpls.livejournal.com]

LOL

Yeah, I can see the difference.

[barondave.livejournal.com]

Power corrupts. Pseudo-power sillies.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Well, when we're going to have a party, I try to make house rules clear: that we will be serving alcohol, for example. We know a family who is not comfortable attending events where alcohol is consumed, and we want them to know up-front whether we're having a picnic with lemonade or a poker night with beer or what. We also want people to know that kids are welcome but that the house is not childproofed.

We do not, however, issue invitations with three-page disclaimers like, "Any guest attempting to discuss instant-runoff voting in city elections with any of my aunts whose names end in consonants will be summarily dismissed from the premises." So.

[sartorias.livejournal.com]

I suspect a lot of these are young teens, or teens still emotionally young. One of the things I've noticed teaching elementary through high schools is year after year the girls will do the same things: in third grade we get the clubs formed basically to keep others out, and to wear badges proclaiming themselves in, and the anxious lists of first best friend, second, etc, formed by the alphas.

By high school there are still cliques, but the most balances of the girls in them have learned to compromise, negotiate, and finally to be able to step out of the group withour drama and fanfare if they don't agree with the hive mind.

I see a lot of that sort of interaction here.

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

Further proof that some of us are just perpetually reliving middle school then, I guess, because in two of the cases I'm thinking of, they are grown up women well past the first blush of youth, and in a third, there are signs that it is a grown-up-type person as well.

[pir-anha.livejournal.com]

LJ is actually perfect if you're perpetually stuck in that sort of junior high school attitude that values clique above all -- you get to rub your popularity in the face of those who're prone to pointing out that your new clothes are invisible, while attracting more squeeing fangrrls/bois to your oh-so-exclusive hang-out.

[jerrykaufman.livejournal.com]

From what I've read/heard/seen, MySpace is even better for this, which may be why it's ever-so-much more popular.

[bedii.livejournal.com]

There's one user I'm friends with who has a list of unacceptable behavior: the reason it doesn't offend me is that I've also got access to the user's locked LJ where the comments that get folks banned often gets put.

Wow.

If I had a guest who was that offensive in my living room (which is the way I think of LiveJournal), I'd strongly insist they leave. And probably threaten them with bodily harm if they come back.

There are posters in the main LJ that argue that have argued that since the user has strong opinions and expresses them forcibly they should be ready for a certain amount of hostility and object to any bannings. Based on the locked stuff, the journal's owner is being pretty damn liberal with what's allowed--I'd have been in a rage by the third day!

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

If I had a guest who was that offensive in my living room (which is the way I think of LiveJournal), I'd strongly insist they leave.

This is a view of LJ that I find entirely nonsensical. It just doesn't map to the way the environment works, especially once you factor in the rss-like effect of the Friends List. For one thing, your living room isn't open to anyone who wanders by who happens to know someone you know. Other people do not direct dozens of strangers to show up at your door because of something you said. And it certainly isn't the case that your living room appears in my den every time you say something publicly. As I implied in my original post, I think that making public posts to your friended LJ and pretending that you're doing so in your personal private space is just dumb. If you want personal private space, use private posts or pick a blogging service that doesn't automatically push your posts to others. Otherwise you're just swimming upstream against the nature of the technology.