More on Blogging … Enough to Say Enough is Enough …

Yes, I know …

True to his word, Brett Schulte offered his responses to a series of queries I posted here. Brett maintains a discussion/review blog, known as TOCWOC, as well as what I may start to call an online archival source blog, The Siege of Petersburg Online. You ought to take a look at his responses as well as his blogs.

I have a little (but not much) to say about Brett’s answers. I’m not terribly interested in discussing types of blogs, although some descriptive terminology that seems a bit more neutral (and precise) than what I’ve seen others employ may help readers understand what they might expect when they peruse a blog. I don’t think it helps to speculate upon the motives of others when they blog, and in many cases there is more than one motive or objective. I think some of the most heated confrontational exchanges here have had content worthy of consideration, for example, depending on what one is looking for. Nor would I lump black Confederates, Civil War causation, and CBF discussions together and then deem it a better use of one’s time to discuss how to classify blogs, but that’s me. “Better” is in the eyes of the beholder, and I note that most of what I’ve heard that’s judgmental and disparaging comes from the “content” side. The fact is that there are different audiences, different needs, different interests, and different expectations. Educators who know that students glean a great deal of information from the internet have expressed their thanks that people are out there who talk about how to use the web critically and with discernment and who have countered some favorite tall tales. I remind you that the Southern Heritage Preservation Group sends out packets of information to public schools, and if that’s what you want American schoolchildren taught, then say so. Historians of memory are well aware of how people use understandings of the past to shape discussions about present-day issues, and I have no problem with that sort of social engagement. If at times those discussions have an edge or elicit a giggle, well, people tend to get their news from Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert.

For someone to say, as Robert Moore did, that “there are some of the opinion that regular doses of confrontation degrades the overall Civil War blogosphere” leads me to wonder who appointed themselves guardians of that sphere. Just because something interests you does not mean that it interests someone else, and vice versa. Everyone gets to define their own “blogosphere,” and so it’s their choice as to what to read … it’s not their choice as to what I write (indeed, this notion of what merits blogging about sounds a little bit like the critical comments of some professional academic historians, just as some of what I’ve read faintly echoes the endless discussion on who’s a historian).

Do I care why people blog? Oh, it may be interesting to hear what interests them and what brought them to blogging, but I see no reason to judge why they blog, how they blog, or to engage in pernicious or invidious comparisons about blogs … or to blog about that. I’m more interested in saying something about what they say, and if I’m not interested, I don’t see the need to say that or to tell people what I think is more valuable or lasting or whatever. After all, who knows? Different people find different things of interest and of value, and value depends on context and purpose. Often ascribing motives to folks without any evidence tells me more about the needs of the person doing the ascribing than anything else. For example, what you think I find “interesting and engaging” I find curious and amusing … but I believe it also says something about the nature of historical awareness among some Americans, as well as how history and historical inquiry functions for them. Such folks are just as much part of the world of how Americans approach the Civil War as you and me, and commenting on heritage advocates is no better and no worse than examining a small unit action or recalling the exploits of an officer. Moreover, while blogging may be the primary mode of expression of interest in a historical topic for many bloggers, for others it is part of a broader menu of activities. Indeed, as someone noted privately to me, last June’s CWI called on me to act in areas connected to several of those functions, from traditional biography to scholarly commentary to battlefield guiding to blogging. Blogging is only part of what I do. Some people forget that.

In the end, my question may be addressed to all who felt compelled to hold forth on the virtues of content blogs and the vices of “controversy/confrontational/label du jour” blogs. Simply put, “why do you care?” If you don’t like a blog, then don’t read it. If you want to pick and choose among blog posts in a blog, fine. If you want to share with the world why you blog, great. But what I saw was unseemly, self-serving, unnecessary, whiny, antagonistic, and ultimately fairly useless in intellectual value … although I also saw the irony in seeing people exhibit the very traits they deplored in the (unnamed) blogs they criticized. I don’t mind being judgmental about other folks being judgmental … but then I didn’t start this discussion, did I? For that we’d have to look to those people who had so many questions about the value of controversy that they decided to try it out for themselves.