Self-Censorship Has Got to Go

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Clarissa

July 3, 2012

You know what I have noticed recently? I have started to self-censor. Here, on my own blog.

I go through the scheduled posts and delete those of them that I know some people will find objectionable. I avoid writing on certain topics because I know that reader A will be upset, reader B will write an angry email, reader C will leave a comment saying “Enough already on this topic”, etc. I edit the posts before publishing them, softening the language and removing anything that might cause people to start having a fit right here on the blog.

As a result, I have started to feel tongue-tied and boring.

The blog has started to turn into a community which, by definition, requires that its members castrate themselves, lop off parts of themselves in order to fit in. I have to say, the community is kind of pleasant to have. But if I have to self-censor and silence myself in return, then fuck that shit. The entire point of having a blog was to say whatever I wanted to say. And now I don’t do that for fear of sounding too harsh and hurting somebody’s sensibilities. It also feels easier to self-censor than to face yet another round of emails telling me how I would attract more allies by being less aggressive or comments saying “I really loved your blog but now you have offended my sacred cow and I’m traumatized.”

This is a road to nowhere, people. There are more than enough blogs in existence whose authors publish inane, super-PC, supremely boring swill. Why should I join their ranks?

So I have decided to stop doing this. The preceding post is my first step in the direction away from self-censorship.

I will say what I want and express myself in the manner that suits my fancy.

Please understand that I have no obligation to be a mirror of your beliefs and opinions. All I can do here is express what I think. And if you find the idea that there is somebody in the world who disagrees with you about something too traumatizing, nobody forces you to stick around.

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30 responses to “Self-Censorship Has Got to Go”

Cicero

July 3, 2012

I know you don’t need my validation, but I’m glad to see this. Honestly, I enjoy reading your blog. Sometimes I agree, sometimes I don’t. Sometimes I figure I might not have all the information and your writing makes me think. There is a lot of flotsam and jetsam around on the internet…it is refreshing to read something real.

It seems that the “free expression and lack of censorship” the internet promised would have led to more mixing and sharing of ideas…instead it does seem to have led to these “communities” like you said. That’s an interesting thought.

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1. bloggerclarissa
  
  July 3, 2012
  
  No, I need all the support I can get right now. 🙂 This is a decision that scares me somewhat.
  
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Evelina Anville

July 3, 2012

Well if you need support, I give it wholeheartedly. Please don’t self censor! I love how unreserved you are. It makes the blog seem fresh and real. I think I’ve said this before but some of these blogging communities drive me insane–nothing but endless statements of “you are awesome!” — even when the author is being ridiculous. And for the record, I actually disagree with you frequently (especially when it comes to the issue of privilege–I think white privilege and male privilege exist for example.) But I’m not offended by the fact that you disagree or think differently. I’m perfectly comfortable with my own opinions and don’t need to have others agree with me for me to continue holding those opinions. I read your blog because you seem fun, full of life, and you even thrown in the occasional great recipe! You also seem to sincerely love blogging and it would be sad if you lost that joy. So bring on the fiery Clarissa that we all know and love. 🙂

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1. bloggerclarissa
  
  July 3, 2012
  
  “I’m perfectly comfortable with my own opinions and don’t need to have others agree with me for me to continue holding those opinions. ”
  
  – Exactly! This is how you know people who are certain of their opinions: they don’t feel the need to silence everybody who does not agree 100%.
  
  “You also seem to sincerely love blogging and it would be sad if you lost that joy. So bring on the fiery Clarissa that we all know and love.”
  
  – Yay to that!!! 🙂 🙂
  
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Titfortat

July 3, 2012

Here, here! I hope you dont mind Tit for Tat though. 😉

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1. bloggerclarissa
  
  July 3, 2012
  
  No, you know that I adore you. I especially like your very Canadian sense of humor. I’d like to develop that, too, but I haven’t lived in Canada long enough, I guess.
  
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el

July 3, 2012

I too want to give you your community’s support to post whatever you want. 🙂

I want to say I was surprised & happy to read: “the community is kind of pleasant to have” on your blog. Happy that you can not only analyze, but, at least, partly understand what other people get from communities.

I think autism influences feelings toward communities (lessens desire for them & felt rewards). So probably take rewards & multiply by 2/3/4 (?) AND the same for bad feelings of “how will members of my community react, if I XYZ”. If most not autistic people feel thus, it too can be seen as an explanation for communities and not only, as you earlier said, desire to castrate yourself, not take responsibility & be nobody.

On another topic: Temple Grandin is a very famous “American doctor of animal science and professor at Colorado State University, bestselling author, and consultant to the livestock industry on animal behavior”. I read her book about animals & loved it. Don’t know whether you would be interested in it, but she also wrote RE people & autism (I haven’t read them). F.e.:
— The Unwritten Rules of Social Relationships: Decoding Social Mysteries Through the Unique Perspectives of Autism
— The Way I See It: A Personal Look At Autism And Aspergers
And more info & books on wiki, if you’re interested.

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1. el
  
  July 3, 2012
  
  Forgot to mention: Temple Grandin has Aspergers herself.
  
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2. bloggerclarissa
  
  July 3, 2012
  
  “I too want to give you your community’s support to post whatever you want.”
  
  – Thank you, I really appreciate the support.
  
  “I want to say I was surprised & happy to read: “the community is kind of pleasant to have” on your blog. Happy that you can not only analyze, but, at least, partly understand what other people get from communities.”
  
  – Not only do I understand, I have researched the issue. What people get out of it is:
  
  1. A remedy for a sense of loneliness.
  2. A set of rules leading to understanding the world and living in it.
  
  I’ve been waiting for an article of mine on the subject to come out forever. When it finally does (they have some issues with the publishing process), I will link to it here.
  
  “I think autism influences feelings toward communities (lessens desire for them & felt rewards)”
  
  – Of course. That is one of the rewards for being autistic.
  
  “– The Unwritten Rules of Social Relationships: Decoding Social Mysteries Through the Unique Perspectives of Autism
  – The Way I See It: A Personal Look At Autism And Aspergers
  And more info & books on wiki, if you’re interested.”
  
  – Very interesting. Thank you. You are a fount of useful information.
  
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  1. el
    
    July 3, 2012
    
    //Thank you, I really appreciate the support.
    
    It was kind of a joke too, as “your community’s support”. My jokes are lame enough to demand explanation. 😦
    
    //A remedy for a sense of loneliness.
    
    One of my reasons. In RL I find it hard to talk with people in different life situations from mine. In practice, it’s all people who aren’t my relatives and with whom I don’t currently study together (as long as it’s only RE studying). Not interesting and hard, while I keep thinking “what to talk about” in a loop. Others make friends, enjoy and somehow don’t seem to have this problem. Why? I want to clarify that currently I don’t suffer from loneliness (Internet helps too), but at school thought that I was different because of never having what I would call a real friend. Not somebody you talk with only as long as you study in one class. And as long as it’s not summer holidays.
    
    On Internet it’s different because 1) can choose which blogger to read from far away too 2) it’s on Internet and if a blogger gives interesting to me topics, I can participate.
    
    One of topics I would love to hear about from you is loneliness & friends. Thought to ask you for some time already. Have you (despite autism making being alone more rewarding) felt loneliness? Desire for friends? Which role they play(ed)? And then what do you think about people without autism: why some are lonely? Why some never have a real friend, even when they want it (at school f.e.) ? Or, if you don’t have a friend, it’s a sign you don’t really want one? Or do most people don’t have real friends, as I define it?
    
    Also, as a self-help advice, if I intend to date now, what can one talk about for hours? You don’t live together yet, don’t have shared reality, etc.
    
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    1. bloggerclarissa
      
      July 3, 2012
      
      “It was kind of a joke too, as “your community’s support”. My jokes are lame enough to demand explanation. ”
      
      – Oh, so you are not, in fact, supportive? 🙂 🙂 Kidding!
      
      I will be happy to blog about friendship and answer these questions in a separate post.
      
      “Also, as a self-help advice, if I intend to date now, what can one talk about for hours? You don’t live together yet, don’t have shared reality, etc.”
      
      – Oh, come on! You, of all people, should have no problem doing that. You have so many interests, are so well-read, have such strong opinions. You make a brilliant conversation partner. Just talk about whatever interests you. And if your date isn;t interested in the same things, then why do you need him in your life anyways?
      
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  2. el
    
    July 3, 2012
    
    // You have so many interests, are so well-read, have such strong opinions. You make a brilliant conversation partner.
    
    You think all this because we’ve never talked in “RL”, aka not on Internet. In this medium and after you give topics, I can create much better impression than I am in RL.
    
    F.e. in practice I am extremely ignorant of (Israeli) politics and never know what to talk about. As I described, it happened with potential friends before at school. Now I want to date, but what if the same problems return? Don’t want to mention feminism at 1st date f.e. What have you talked about or/and would advise to talk about?
    
    //Not only do I understand, I have researched the issue.
    
    I see a huge difference between feeling smth and intellectually analyzing it. I knew you analyzed this, but after reading that you also felt it, was moved to ask at last. Imo, to gain full understanding one should also feel a bit, at least. To feel doesn’t mean to think those feelings are beneficial or to follow them, of course.
    
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    1. bloggerclarissa
      
      July 3, 2012
      
      “What have you talked about or/and would advise to talk about?”
      
      – You can always ask people about themselves. This is a topic that everybody loves to explore. 🙂 Ask them what they like to do in their free time, where they have traveled or would like to travel, what kind of food they prefer, what books and music they like, what is the last movie they have seen and whether they recommend it, what they do at work or study at school, if they have siblings and are they close, whether they are into dancing, whether they have any favorite blogs, do they prefer Facebook to Twitter, etc. People respond extremely well to this kind of questions. Even very shy people tend to open up if the interest is genuine.
      
      It’s better not to ask any heavy questions if you don’t want it to feel like an interrogation. I remember being very taken aback when a guy started the first date by asking me about the major relationships in my life. I don’t mind talking about it, but coming from a date I just met it felt intrusive.
      
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  3. el
    
    July 3, 2012
    
    //You can always ask people about themselves. This is a topic that everybody loves to explore.
    
    Yes. But, if you have a second date or 3rd one, those topics end. Did you go to movies? Just walking around town? To the beach? Too soon in first dates. Any good relatively low cost ideas?
    
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    1. bloggerclarissa
      
      July 3, 2012
      
      “But, if you have a second date or 3rd one, those topics end.”
      
      – I’ve been with N. for 5 years now and I’m still discovering things about him, so I don’t think the topics will end. 🙂 But it’s always a good idea to have a stock of funny stories you can share. Short, funny anecdotes help to break the ice.
      
      “Did you go to movies? Just walking around town? To the beach? ”
      
      – I like taking people to bookstores. You can learn a lot about a person from their book browsing strategies. I don’t like movies, so I almost never did that. I’d go to a comedy club instead. Again, seeing what makes a person laugh is very helpful.
      
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  4. Titfortat
    
    July 3, 2012
    
    Any good relatively low cost ideas?(el)
    
    Try bowling, its relatively inexpensive and pretty much everyone sucks at it. 🙂
    
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  5. el
    
    July 3, 2012
    
    Wanted to add that I loved funny (dating) stories from your life. Though they wouldn’t be helpful here. 🙂
    
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Sarah Hague (@sazen)

July 3, 2012

I’m glad you’ve decided to stop self-censoring. I enjoy your strong opinions and fiery passion about things. I don’t care if I don’t agree, this is your blog and you should write what you like. Anyway, I’m very rarely offended and even if I am, that’s my problem, not yours.

Bring it on!

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1. bloggerclarissa
  
  July 3, 2012
  
  This is precisely what I wanted to hear. THANK YOU!!
  
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Stringer Bell

July 3, 2012

Yup, keep on being your badass self! Fuck the idiots who’re looking for some excuse to get their precious feelings hurt.

On another note, I still read you religiously but life/school has prevented me from commenting as frequently as I would ideally want. Just wanted to let you know that my commenting frequency should not be taken as a proxy for my love for you and your blog!

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1. bloggerclarissa
  
  July 3, 2012
  
  Yay! I adore you, too, dear Stringer Bell!!
  
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Leah Jane

July 3, 2012

Remember this: You’re not here to please us. You’re here to write and express yourself and your opinions as pleases YOU. Your readers are a nice bonus, but we’re not the end-all to why you blog. We would just miss you terribly if you ever stopped. 🙂

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1. bloggerclarissa
  
  July 3, 2012
  
  Thank you, my dear friend!
  
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FD

July 3, 2012

Grah, there are reasons why one might self censor, but I don’t see why any of them should apply to a personal blog. My eyes got really squinty reading this post – people really email you to complain about your content and attempt to influence topics?
Yuck. If I don’t like/am bored/disagree/am offended and I don’t feel like debating it, I click away. I don’t understand why so many people find this hard. And I really don’t understand the thought process involved in contacting someone on their own website and attempting to dictate what they do with it.
About the only thing I understand is the waiting to edit before posting – I do that a lot and I have to say while it means I don’t usually say things I’m embarrassed to come back to later, it does mean that I comment far, far less than I read. And if I were a blogger, I think it would probably be a bad thing – if a blog is used as an escape valve, or for exploration, second guessing posts would hinder free exploration and reaction.
If there’s a cathartic element to posting for you I suspect the second guessing might eventually create a form of writer’s block.

TL:DR Self censorship? Sod that for a game of soldiers!

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1. bloggerclarissa
  
  July 3, 2012
  
  ” My eyes got really squinty reading this post – people really email you to complain about your content and attempt to influence topics?”
  
  – A LOT. Long, angry messages, too.
  
  ” If I don’t like/am bored/disagree/am offended and I don’t feel like debating it, I click away. I don’t understand why so many people find this hard.”
  
  – Exactly! Seriously, life is too short.
  
  “If there’s a cathartic element to posting for you I suspect the second guessing might eventually create a form of writer’s block.”
  
  – Yes, that started to happen to me!!
  
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Leah Jane

July 3, 2012

We don’t come here for subdued, self-censored Clarissa, and you definitely shouldn’t cater to people who expect such a Clarissa, the rest of us would miss you, and you deserve to speak your mind on your own blog.

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Lindsay

July 3, 2012

You’ve written many things with which I disagree strongly. For the most part, I don’t comment on those entries because I’m not sure how to fit an explanation of what I believe to be true, and why I believe it, in a comment that you will not fall asleep reading. You’ve also written many things with which I agree wholeheartedly, and some things which made me genuinely excited to see there was another person on the Internet who had the same particular idea, or feeling, or reaction to some random thing, that I did.

When I disagree with you, even if it is at a very profound level, I do not feel any distress. I just think, “well, that’s what Clarissa thinks,” weigh the merits of posting a comment, and then go read something else.

I am never, ever traumatized by something you write that I disagree strongly with. I might believe you are wrong, but at most I will roll my eyes (example: “oh, there she goes with her all-illness-is-caused-by-psychological-problems nonsense again”) and not read a given entry.

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1. bloggerclarissa
  
  July 3, 2012
  
  “When I disagree with you, even if it is at a very profound level, I do not feel any distress. I just think, “well, that’s what Clarissa thinks,” ”
  
  – Exactly! What a healthy, normal reaction.
  
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musteryou

July 3, 2012

There are some things that people simply can’t hear. I’ve learned that from my own writing. There’s just not enough of an external representation of my views already “out there” in the form of some monument, some art movement or some already well-established persona representing my position for people not to misunderstand what I am saying. I would have to ask of my readers careful attention and persistence, which most of them cannot give.

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el

July 4, 2012

Thought you would be interested:
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/07/03/study-for-profit-college-students-end-up-with-lower-earnings/

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