Um, yeah. About the bloggies.
Were I to write any serious commentary regarding the ugly spiral of dram and events regarding the bloggies yesterday, I would have begged that the kind readers prepare themselves with safety goggles and laying down a tarp. A keg o’ whupass would have been tapped. And some serious bitch-slapping would have taken place. I was ready to shed some blood.
In light of the real life news of *real blood* being shed, over what is likely to be just as stupid a miscommunication or excess of hubris, I’m glad I’ve held off.
I am in a better mindset too.
Because of that much needed orgasm mentioned earlier in the day. (*cough cough*)
Because all things in perspective, the people in my real life do very small things that, with every God given right, impacts me with greater significance than all the online shenanigans which has made me feel like I’m back in high school again. People, haven’t I told you how much I hated high school? My gawd. It was before I even had breasts. Or snark. Or personality. Way way way before I had cute Spanish shoes, even.
So with that, I present this. My father’s first photo attachment to me.
Sent earlier today with the msg which translates roughly to
Subject: “Daddy picture sending test”
Message: “Min Jung – sweetie, First time picture sending I try, hope get you good. Can you see it? Health is good. Daddy.”
Mind you, the poor translation is not due to my father’s incapacity for English so much as my handicap with trying to read his emails in Korean. As it stands with other lengthy missives that he sends me, I usually pass them on to friends from church who translate them for me. They always laugh at me because my father always includes such grand little tokens of wisdom like “Go to church and wear skirt. Nice man there. ” or “Boyfriend yet? How old you now? I am old too. Hurry up, you dry up soon and nobody want you” or. “Doctor shorty. He still single. Maybe you meet?”
I can make out enough of my dad’s email msgs so that I can limit my daily humiliation quota to just the online world.
Re: the bloggies, I’d like to express the following.
#1. Nikolai is a good kid, smart, and has a good heart. I’m sure this whole debacle has wounded him severely as he’s been attacked on many levels as being somehow responsible for allowing supposed drama or corruption to take place. Cut the kid some slack. He meant well. He’s not Gawd. And heaven knows he takes enough of a beating knowing that folks vie more heavily for an antibloggie than a bloggie usually.
#2. To folks who are offended that they weren’t nominated. Sorry. No one intends it to be a clique thing. Though there are communities of bloggers based on interest, sexual orientation, ethnicity, geography, or publishing application, sense of humor etc. I think we all need to remember that a) it’s just a silly little award, and b) the internet is *way* bigger than just those blogs that you are familiar with and read.
Sorry if the world doesn’t land on your doorstep on a regular basis to nominate you and/or those writers that you think are worthy of nominations. If you really felt that strongly that folks *should* be nominated and have that opportunity to win, then there are opportunities for you to lobby and campaign to request support from your friends and readers, and if desperate enough “stuff the ballot”. Otherwise it’s like being spiteful to a lottery winner when you wouldn’t even put in two bones for your own ticket.
#3. Yeah, I’m a straight woman in the GLBT category. I’m on the fag hag platform. And I really do believe that fag hags are a part of the GLBT community. I was convinced by this further by the support of many of my gay friends who encouraged me to “campaign” for this opportunity in the bloggies. In fact, I asked for insight from several folks within the gay community as bloggers of whether I should *dare* to “go for it” on that lark of a platform. Many of them emailed, im’ed or commented on my site regarding their support of me. I am thankful, incredibly. Yeah, it’s funny. It’s a little weird. It’s very ironic and more than a little unusual that a straight woman should want this title. Some called it a joke. Some considered it part of a conspiracy to demonstrate how skewable the bloggies are.
Whatever.
I’m just saying I’m not dropping out in spite of some of the hatemail or IM’s I’ve gotten over it. I’m not dropping out because you might not think I’m *gay* enough to be in that category. And what is *gay* enough content anyway? If I’m gay, but write about cats all day, does that make me a qualified GLBT bloggie? What if I’m a closeted individual who only talks about politics? Or is gay content only that which talks about gay porn, jockstraps, and queer personals? Is it gay news bits & commentary? What if that’s the “beat” and coverage of a straight individual? I dunno the answer, do you? Consider this when you’re voting. And vote after visiting all the great nominees. Rannie, Ernie, Nancy, Brad, I respect and like them all and feel honored to be in their company as a finalist. I know I probably don’t belong in this category but if you’re going to take the title that seriously, then you may as well also hoist Randall out of the “Asian Weblog Category” cuz he’s a big white guy living in HK. The rules don’t say you have to be GLBT. They say that you have to be part of the community.
I’m not going to drop out because you think it’s an affront to the dignity and identity of gays, lesbians, bisexuals, transgendered, or whatever. Frankly, I love the gay community and I hope that the gay community likes me enough to want to recognize me as a member of their community as well. It started out as a joke but I’d like to believe that it’s also one of those “hey, it’s funny because it’s true” kind of situations. I don’t expect to win. Heaven knows the other folks are far far far more worthy because they have *great blogs* and as writers, they just *happen* to be gay.
#4. Regarding folks who’ve gotta get a grip. Ok, if and I say *if*, a person were so desperate as to “stuff the ballot” regarding nominations in a particular category, they’d also be likely to spend the effort to make fake hotmail addresses and send me hatemail, right? I hope you do well on your Algebra 2 quiz next week. Oh wait, you’re older than that? Wow, could have *fooled me*. Are you sure you’re old enough to drive?
#5. I believe that there are a lot of things that could be done to make the bloggie awards selection better next year should Nikolai choose to continue doing them. Were I him, I’d just get drunk and look at CGI porn rather than bother, but go figure. You never know. I have a few ideas which I hope he’ll consider as constructive.
a. Nominations for categories must auto-exclude previous years winners
b. More advance notice regarding the nomination window of time w/o necessarily increasing that window’s size.
c. Possibly requesting agreements from nominees regarding finalist status in those categories they’ve been nominated for. Thereby if a person doesn’t want to be in the finalists then that space can go to someone else who wants it.
d. A larger pool of individuals who are on the “committee” to select finalists w/ agreements from them disavowing collusion/discussions on voting decisions
e. Greater effort to increase the breadth and width in the spirit of diversity for the bloggies. IE: Not just Asian bloggies, but Asian American. Finding the best personal blog on blogspot and offering a prize of their own domain or hosting. Going after even diaryland or xanga writers who might be great niche communities of writers to learn about, discover, and introduce to a greater audience.
f. I dunno. I can’t think of anything more right now. My point is that we should try and be more constructive and supportive regarding this if we’re going to bother to get so emotionally invested in the results rather than being so shitty to each other which is completely counter productive.
And that’s my very long winded two pennies.
