Mike Sanders points to a Stanley Kurtz posting that he found via Meryl Yourish on the continuing thoughts of the self-centeredness of bloggers:
THE WORLD OF THE BLOGOSHERE
The blogosphere is usually filled with self-congratulation (often deserved) about its own innovations and advantages. But let me raise a problem. My column from last week, “The Libertarian Question,” evoked a tremendous response–far too many e-mails and blog comments to answer individually. There were some critiques by bloggers that might have been worth answering, had they been even minimally respectful instead of riddled with sophomoric insults.
I?ve learned through hard experience that when an otherwise intelligent e-mail contains a direct insult, it only brings trouble to reply. I try to hold to the same rule for blog critics, many of whom seem to spend more time crafting insults than arguments. In a given paragraph, the typical blog critique of my last article interspersed outright misrepresentation of my position with proclamations of amazement at my boundless stupidity.
The biting wit that works so well in the hands of a smart and basically fair-minded fellow like Instapundit is devolving into something shallow and mean-spirited in the blogoshere as a whole. Venom is no substitute, either for argument or for a good accounting of an opponent?s argument. It has come to serve as a way for bloggers to assure themselves that people who are not, say, libertarians, have no points worth listening to. And at some level, I think bloggers know that their insults actually protect them, by making their targets less likely to respond. After all, who wants to dignify this stuff with a reply. Insults are cowardice disguised as courage.
When the blogosphere gets this way (and it does pretty often), it shuts down debate.
The blogosphere offers a welcome antidote to the safety and blandness of the academy. But sometimes the failings of the blogosphere show why we developed those academic conventions of respect in the first place. Under the guise of rough and tumble frankness, the blogosphere risks turning into a society of like-minded partisans congratulating themselves on being smarter than all the idiots who see things differently. Cass Sunstein was wrong. Bloggers do read those who disagree with them. But often their way of responding only reinforces parochialism.
Which also leads back to the issues raised by
Republic.com about how the internet isn’t truly helping democratize us but actually reinforcing the isolation and extremest sides of thought. People are only going to read, link to, hype, talk about what they want to and that’s generally what they already believe. Rarely do you find someone actually going out of their way to find an educated differing opinion, let alone properly responding to it beyond “look at this idiot”. Blogs ignore differing opinions that the blogger can’t refute, so they continue to focus only on what the blogger wants you to see, generally what they believe.
With all the talk of blogging vs. journalism, this is where a huge line is drawn. While many will argue about a biasness in the media, few will deny a biasness in blogging. The media has editors to oversee what is said or published. The blog relies upon the thoughts of the blogger directly. There is no filter, no objections raised.
Which is disappointing, really. While I understand not doing it, I do wish popular punditblogs refered to opposing viewpoints more often and provided valid, well reasoned responses. This not only invites the reader to create their own opinion by seeing all sides, but also forces the blogger himself to back up what he believes with facts. But opposing views are generally ignored, except for the most extreme cases which are used more for humor than actual discussion.
