To Blog or Not to Blog

If anyone were to ask me what I blog about, I really wouldn't know, actually.

I tend to just write whatever I happen to think of at the moment, that I think I would like to share. Some of it is interesting, some of it isn't. In between the excited, frantic typing on the keyboard and the moment where I click on the "Publish Post" button, I rarely think about whether I should or not actually click that button.

Should I?

Lately, I've had two non-blogger friends tell me that we shouldn't rant on our blog about things that are personal. Words may be just words to us, but words actually can hurt people if we don't think.

Writing about things on my blog, what do I hope to accomplish? Maybe I will ask myself this every time I post from now on.

Ranting on my blog about people I know is not cool, I guess. I read back one particular post where I ranted about cockroaches, I think although I intended the post to be humorous, I probably unintentionally offended some people. I apologize for it. The post shall, however, remain on this blog, to serve if nothing else, as a reminder.

Sometimes, we get so caught up in the syok-sendiriness of blogging, that we don't stop to consider what will happen if we publish a particular entry. While we do have the freedom of speech to write what we want, we also should be aware that what we write has its effects.

I was brought up with the basic and very general principle of "be good, and do good". Eventually, I came to interpret it in my own way as, "whatever I do is my own business, but if it hurts someone else, I should probably not do it". Essentially, I can blog about whatever I want, but if someone I know personally is hurt by it, then I shouldn't write about it. If the blog entry will trigger fights with people I know, then I shouldn't write it.

There are diaries for that sort of thing, after all.

I hereby apologize to anyone I may have offended in the past through a personal comment on my blog. And I hope that anyone who may have been offended by, or caused an offense through a blog entry, be it by me or any other blogger to just forgive and forget. Or at least settle your fights outside of the blogsphere. The whole world doesn't need to know about what and ass so-and-so is. Really, they don't.

Blogs are not a venue for us to launch our personal vendettas, be it in retaliation or otherwise. So hopefully, we will all think twice before publishing a post in future. And hopefully, some fights will be settled in a rational, calm and very non-public manner. Because I'm actually tired of reading and hearing about friends fighting publicly online. It's just ugly. And there are really enough ways of offending someone unintentionally or otherwise without adding blogs to that list.

Ummm... but everyone is still friends right? Please don't fight over blogs. Doesn't it sound just silly?? Peace, hugs and kisses, everyone?

In the meantime, I have no idea what to blog about if I can't rant. Umm. Kittens?

Owh wait. I already did that one. Ah well.