Bloggers on Blogging: Part 7

Well, I finally got around to making my own contribution to DJ!'s birthday blog-fest.

First I want to thank all the bloggers who responded to the call-out for blog posts:

Part 1 by Catelli.

Part 2 by TrappedInAWhirlpool.

Part 3 by deBeauxOs.

Part 4 by Mandos.

Part 5 by Alison.

And Part 6 by pale.

Among them, they hit all the points that I would make about blogging. The people, fun, camaraderie, feminism, politics, dissent, and breaking stories.

Mandos, an internet senior citizen compared to the rest of us, takes us back to the dark days of the internet as a boyo-only space. Pale recounts the fun of our push-back against it, partly in the form of the F-Word Awards.

Trapped, Alison, and deBeauxOs muse about the seriousness with which we took blogging. And the political angles we explored that were not being addressed by the mainstream media.

Catelli reminisces about the people and important discussions in the blogosphere.

Like Alison, I loved it and miss it.

Those were the days of the "hat tip" (h/t). It was a Very Bad Form to fail to credit the source of an idea, a link, whatever. As Trapped says, credibility was our only coin.

I miss the collaboration, the planned blog-bursts and the plotting behind them. The passing-along of links and stories to bloggers who had a particular interest in a subject.

I miss all of the very smart -- yet ordinary -- people I met, who, from all over the country and world, were thinking very smart thoughts and sharing them on their blogs.

In particular, I miss Dave of The Galloping Beaver and JJ of The Unrepentant Old Hippie.

Dave was an ex-military man with insights into world events that were completely new to me. (I hear he's doing fine. Hi, Dave!)

JJ was a hoot and I considered her a pal. She was scathing but gracious. I learned a lot about how a good blogger conducts herself in the comments. She replied to all of them. She also helped the TechnoDolts (deBeauxOs and me) set this blog up. (So did Mandos.) JJ flopped the cat-bread picture up there for us.

She blogged on politics, abortion and right-wing nutjobs. Speaking of the latter, she had her own dedicated pray-er. Every Monday night, apparently, she was the target of a prayer assault from a blogger she called TubeSock.

Like most of us, she'd get fed up with blogging. She quit for a while. Then came back for a bit. Then disappeared. Her blog is still up.

I miss her and hope she's well.

So, it's been fun. We're going to leave this blog up and may return to it. I do to scoop old links.

Finally, I want to thank the other bloggers who responded positively to my call-out but who, for whatever reason, didn't hit my loose deadline of "end of the month." If any of you still want to play, email me and I'll publish your thoughts here with the others.

Michael Coren and his own private Christian Taliban.

There's more powerful and insightful writing to read this morning at The Galloping Beaver: The comfort of Michael Coren's cubicle.

Michael Coren's sexism and deeply entrenched derision for women's rights is on display here. From his opening sentence to to his closing paragraph, he bleats and shrieeeks the standard operating glurge and propaganda that others of his tribe have spewed for centuries.

Canada sacrifices another victim on the altar of equality!!!! ... If captured, of course, such a woman would be repeatedly raped. And tortured. Again, I'm not meant to say this. Not Canadian, not CBC, not Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Not the sort of thing we're supposed to feel, so we pretend that men and women in the army, police and fire service are given the same tests and have to fulfil the same requirements. Yet truth still breaks through. We rightly condemn Islamic extremists in Afghanistan because they treat women so badly. Then we allow one of our own to give her life so that we can congratulate ourselves on how liberal and egalitarian we are, lie about how gender differences don't matter and then encourage our generals and politicians to obscure the truth on television about soldiers and causes.

What hypocrites we have become. Poor, poor Karine -- this is not the way it should have been.

You are the hypocrite Michael Coren. Women are captured, repeatedly raped and tortured every day of the week here in Canada. Young Aboriginal women. Children confined to home and hearth by fundamentalist christian religious doctrine. Girls lured here from Eastern Europe and South-East Asian countries under the guise of employment in the service industry.

But I don't think that offends you so much, does it Michael? Somewhere in that reptilian sub-brain of yours, you believe that fathers, uncles, brothers, husbands, priests, ministers, coaches and other men who are entrusted with the well-being of women and girls are blameless if they are tempted into sin. The clients who support the sex industry are men who look, think and act exactly like you, Michael Coren.

Here's the truth about Karine Blais and other women who chose to join the military. They are trained to defend themselves, not as women but as soldiers.

But you and your tribe of Christian Taliban men would much prefer that women remain vulnerable and compliant, happy in the roles that you and Old Boys' Club have determined to be appropriate for them - which is essentially to be available to service the needs of the men who would control their lives.

Dave defended Karine Blais' right to be in a combat position, and her right to be remembered for the pride she took in the choices she made. He is from the tribe of men who truly respect women, not as chattel to male wants, but as autonomous, strong and resourceful human beings and equally responsible team-mates.