Last night I was stitching away and watching a House marathon on TV. Andy joined me later in the evening when an episode containing the description of an “avid blogger” came on. This is when Andy said, “This is what happens when you blog, you bleed from your mouth profusely.” I have never bled from my mouth profusely, FYI. The episode centered on a young woman that blogged every single thing that happened in her life. Every fight with her husband, every interaction with her neighbor, everything. She also seemed unable to make any life decisions without writing a post and getting feedback from her readers.
This got me thinking. How much is too much to share with your readers? I know a couple bloggers that have absolutely ZERO filter. So much so that I feel uncomfortable reading some of their posts. But, they have hundreds of people follow these blogs and legitimately care about these blatant overshares.
Like in the episode and in my life, I feel like I relate better to my blog friends that my “real life” friends. Some bloggers I would consider “real life” friends because I know them so well. So well that I may have traveled to Portland without ever having met the person I was going to visit. To a lot of non-bloggers, that’s weird. For us, it’s normal. In this great big internet world, we are able to find people like us. But is that an excuse to bypass real life?
That being said, I will never post about when Andy and I have a fight. I won’t post about family issues. I won’t post about awkward medical situations. I won’t post about religion. I won’t post self depreciating thoughts intended to get sympathy comments. I’m not saying that you can’t, or shouldn’t, I’m just saying I won’t.
What do you think about bloggers oversharing? Is there a line that can be crossed?
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10 comments:
I agree with you 100% on this post. Some of the people I've met blogging have turned into great friends, and I'm happy to share my life with them, but privately...which usually ends up being e-mail because we have yet to get to the point of texting or calling (plus I imagine that would be outrageously expensive since I'm in another country than most!!)
I will post a comment or two about Mike driving me bananas, but I will never, ever get into details about our issues or family issues or...everything else that you already listed. When/if I have kids, it's pretty likely that not even a picture will grace the pages of my blog.
So...that's a really long comment, just to say....yeah.
"I won’t post self depreciating thoughts intended to get sympathy comments." <- the worst kind of bloggers.
I overshare about the kraken. But other than that, I don't share much.
It's a catch 22. I struggle with this myself. There ate certain things I think you shouldn't do but yet maybe if I acted like a drunk lush, posted naked pictures of my kid and sucked their ass I might get more followers. What I find bizarre is the 1000 people that find it appropriate. It's not something I compromise in my life. But then again I guess it's a matter of judgement. I would write about more things with a funny twist but I care about people getting offended. Well sorta. So I don't know Bung. I love you for who you are. I will keep reading your shit.
Amen! I try not to get too personal about life and things like that. It's just no ones business. It's another reason I like blogging, plenty of time to put a filter on myself because I'm very bad at filtering in real life haha.
Was it the farting post? I'm sorry.
I don't post TOO much about our relationship, but because it is SUCH a learning process for me to be in a normal relationship, I like to share and see what other people think. But I agree, every dirty detail of my life does not need to be shared. Except for period mishaps. Those are hilarious.
Sometimes I think that if my family didn't know I blogged I would write more about them. And then I think of the chances of getting disowned...
I totally agree! I sometimes read peoples posts or tweets about their how they hate their sibling or that they are fighting with their significant other and it makes me cringe! Only thing worse is a "self depreciating thought intended to get sympathy comments." I am with you 100%.
I think it is hard to find a balance between "being real" and oversharing. At first, I just blogged about my outfits, and I think it was pretty boring (I'm wearing a pink shirt today, because pink is pretty, blah blah blah). Over time, I have started writing more about my life, but I try not to get too personal.
I saw that episode too!! Loved it!! I try not to overshare...I think it's overshare when it makes people uncomfortable. I think bloggers do have to share, but at the same time the things you won'r are the same things I won't. I'm debating on a post I have been working on, it's not gross or controversial but it's personal to me and that makes me think twice about actually hitting publish.
I agree in those non-posting topics. Sometimes I wish my blog was only read by me so that I could discuss some if those things but I know there's no shot when it's so public. Kind of weird.
I agree completely. Bashing your significant other in a post is just not ok. We all have different comfort levels...I could never share about family issues or fights with James. I've even seen a blog post about sex, and it was just TOO MUCH.
I do overshare about work sometimes, but I consider it a coping mechanism.
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