Tag Archives: #occupy

Having a Blog vs. Using It: Some Thoughts

I don’t follow analytics much with my blog. You’re reading it. That’s all I give a shit about. Following the traffic, I don’t do much of that.
I’ll check once or twice a month, see if my daily visits are holding up, and if there are massive spikes, I see what posts were near that day. Pretty chill, but I’ve done this for enough years to actually have a grasp on who you, my reader, often is. Or the readers I care about, anyhow.
And while my old sex posts drive my traffic the most, it was actually politics and current events that became my stratospheric posts over the years. When I get pissed, it seems to resonate. Apparently my anger reflects the frustration we feel both in Canada and the USA, and even England, because most of us are living in a classist divide that’s becoming increasingly religious.
So, over the weekend at the Pride events here in town, I chatted with friends about social media conferences, and how, for me, it seems more about selling tools than encouraging propagation of debate and discussion.
When it comes to blogging, I feel it can, and does, change the world. I don’t wanna talk about WordPress, metrics, and all that shit. The message is the message, for me, not the medium.
I feel an obligation to put ideas and content first, design and discussion-tracking last. I believe my voice matters. (And so does yours; whether you choose to use it is your drama.) I don’t really need to host the discussion here, I just need you to leave this page with a few thoughts percolating in your brain, and then I’ve done my job — that’s always been my take on things.
Sunday’s conversation kind of ended with my thinking that I’ve betrayed my ability to write, my strong beliefs on where we’re going wrong today, and my desire to see the world live according to my ethos (since I’m super-inclusive and secular), all by failing to continue blogging in a more frequent way.
I give good debate, baby. And I’ve been letting myself and my readers down at a time when I think we need more discussion, because if anyone can be the spark to a good fire, it’s me.

The Past’s Shadow is Long

Part of the reason I don’t watch my traffic today is because I don’t want to feel beholden to numbers. I’m cranking out some 1,500 unique visitors a day, and without doing a lot of work to sustain it. It’s what I call “legacy traffic.” Google had lost me for a long time, but now it points anyone looking for sex tips and smart writing here. Good job, Google!
Still, it bothers me a little, because I haven’t been writing about sex for about 3-4 years.
To have so many of you still turning up, with questions arriving in my inbox (which I’ve been ignoring in my life chaos), it tells me there’s a dearth of great information out there, and that mine’s standing the test of time on the web, a hard thing to do.
These days, I’m a-thinking. I don’t want to be writing about sex and relationships, because I’ve more or less been celibate since all the trouble began with my back, except for, you know, a dalliance or two. My head’s not there right now, and I haven’t wanted it to be, either.
Maybe I underestimated the voice I bring to the sex discussion, and maybe I need to rethink my role and the validity of my place in the fight for a smarter world that’s sex-positive in a way that doesn’t mean we have to jump the “taste” shark. Maybe I also underestimated how much we have devolved into an orthodox society with increasing hangups about sex and sexuality.
Maybe, maybe, maybe.

But if the Shoe Fits…

I’ll be doing a lot more thinking about this. I’ve avoided talking about sex or sex news because I was tired of being pigeon-holed as a “sex writer,” since I feel that’s about 8% of what I’m comprised of, but if it’s not getting done properly by others, maybe it’s time I dust that conversation off. Just something I’m considering, and not a promise. Your thoughts are relevant to my thinkin’, so feel free to persuade me on this.

Maybe combining sex and politics in this same post is indicative of who I am/have been as a blogger and a person.

I think sex and love are basic human rights. I believe who we are as a society is something that shifts and changes through the ages, like a river carving a canyon. Change and evolution is constant, but often only visible on a wide, long view, and while I see the massive changes we’ve had for the better, I see how far there is to go.

Born Under A Bad Moon Risin’

I’m of that generation that came of age in the analog times but made the digital world our bitch. I was my college’s last journalism class to lay out a newspaper with glue and paper, and the first to do so on the computer. I was born at a crossroads, with one foot in old-world news, and the other kicking toward the future. My head of journalism was a former editor who ran political campaigns, so I learned about the press from both sides.
I’ve blogged since 2004, about sex since 2005, and I’ve been political since my teens. I live in borderlands and know more about America than most Americans will ever know about Canada, and I bleed maple syrup.
I was raised Catholic, rebelled against it after I learned of molestation scandals and cover-ups in my own Archdiocese and high school. I identify as a feminist but love men and deplore radical thought in any vein, especially if feminist.

The Alchemy of a Writer’s Voice

Somewhere, in the midst of all those qualities and attributes lies the reason why I too have a voice that’s important to the mix of who we are and where we’re going.
We have the ability to stand up and be counted, to leave our prints on the windowpane of the world, thanks to the internet.
For those of us who can do so, yet don’t do so, we’re betraying a gift of being born with talent in this time and space. We’re at a point in evolution where we have the means and the ability to project our lonely voice around the world, free of corporate interference, free of investment, and yet we’re mired in a complacency that sees our society devolving almost daily.
While the 1% keep getting richer, we applaud and watch the Bachelorette while reading TMZ, glorifying the division of our classes, because glamour is somehow more significant to us than protecting our dwindling average-citizen quality of life.
We belittle the intellectuals, want leaders we can have a beer with, and seem to do everything we can to avoid the realities of what’s going on as economies around the world teeter on the brink.
We delude ourselves into thinking change can’t come, that we’re just the little guys. We pretend that if we keep watching TV, shopping for “Made in America” products, and praying to the good God above that we’ll be just fine when that high-water mark of society gets overrun.
I don’t buy any of it.
In a span of three years, with no technology, no automatic weapons, no electricity, nothing, the working class of France brought down the nobility and monarchy, and modern democracy was born. Three years. By people with HOES and SHOVELS, with the occasional dagger for good measure, for crying out loud.
Shit started rolling last year, but I don’t respect the Occupy movement a lot because there are too many dumb-assed anarchist fucks in the mix. But they’re heading in the right direction, as long as they leave anarchy out of the debate.
They’re right, though. Anger, frustration, these aren’t things we should be feeling fleetingly. These should consume us.
There’s a disparity of income distribution that is a mockery of what the USA was founded under, what Canada should exemplify, and it all comes down to legislation by politicians who are bought and sold by the interests of those they mainly seek to protect, the upper-upper-class.
We deserve better.
And the only way we’re gonna get better is if we never, ever let the matter drop.
Me, I’ll never be that guy on the street with a placard, but I have this soapbox.
I think it’s time I start seeing this blog as an obligation, not a hobby, because I loathe the world we’re becoming, and I cannot respect myself if I don’t shout out loud about why I feel it’s all going so horribly awry.
And that’s what blogging can be. That’s what it should be.
If you want the latest scoop on TomKat’s Divorce, maybe it’s time to aim higher, expect more, and become a part of these discussions we really need to stop avoiding.

The Media Is Dead To Me

For three weeks, protests have been gaining steam in New York City, and spreading across America.
People are realizing they’re angry, and hey, so’s the next guy. They’re seeing their way of life evaporate.
Gone is the way I grew up, the life I knew, and I’m Canadian. Americans have it worse. Middle class? Buh-bye, we don’t have that no more.
The media? Where have they been? Not covering the protests, that’s for sure. Why would they? When they’re so advertising-dependent on all the companies that the voices are shouting against, why would the media cover it? Don’t slap the hand that feeds you… even if it means you’ll lose the trust of the masses you need. Fucking idiots.
There was a time when one would turn to NBC or CBS, because, if Cronkite, Murrow, or some other most-trusted-man-in-America told you, then you’d believe it. Now? Jon Stewart repeatedly wins polls as the most trusted man in America, and he’s literally a joke[r].
In the first few days of the protest, there were active disinformation campaigns. People with blog posts showing garbage left by the “nowhere to be seen” protesters. I searched many of these sites and believed it was over.
But the protest went nowhere. They stood their ground, took over the park, and have been there ever since. Gradually, the word’s gotten out.
If it wasn’t for the stupidity of police brutality, they may never have gotten the coverage they’ve needed for growth.
Even now, the cable news shows aren’t focusing on the protest.
Then there’s the talk of what’s the message? What are the protests really ABOUT? What’s the unified theme?
Long story short, money, and how so many of us work so fucking hard, following all that we were told to do, and yet we’re still barely keeping our heads above water. And how much harder that is in the United States, where banks have a stranglehold on the entire economy.
There’s barely a middle class anymore. Thrift stores are doing desperate pleas for donations, because more people can’t afford full-price new items in stores. Food is going through the roof. My bread flour’s up 30% this year. Peanut butter is to follow. Never mind everything else.
Soon, restaurants will be priced out of existence, and the last 50 years of our culture based on dining out and that blissful life will be a memory of the past.
Once upon a time, eating out was a rare treat. For some of my friends and I, we’re back to that era, where dining means we’re stepping into another world for a meal. Most of the time, it’s eating at home. But at least we’re eating. I get takeout, sure, but restaurants? Maybe twice a month. Maybe.
Instead, the media’s talking about the iPhone, new movies, crimes with Americans abroad, and other shit that has no actual relevance on MY life, or most people’s.

From the #OccupyWallStreet Facebook group. Uploaded by PHOTON FREQUENCY.


The real stories don’t get play. Why talk about something that doesn’t have a lot of hope attached — or can’t be spun into advertising revenue?
NOTHING HAS CHANGED since the 2008 bail-outs! Money was handed out with no restraint for the banks, with no rules about how to spend it, and look where we are. The lack of regulations remained, and now we’re hearing from Robert Zoellick and other international players that we’re on the edge of a crisis — world-wide, because America’s fucking up at the wheel.
Apparently the politicians are the last to find out, because those of us who’ve been stressing about bills, rent, and life in general don’t think the recession ever “ended.”
We’re still in the fucking fray, man. We’re still barely breathing here.
Since the economic collapse of 2008, I’ve been dealing with never-ending back problems, job woes, and other stresses. I’m not the happy Steff I once was, and my life is hard, week in and week out, but at least I have a very little breathing room, largely because I shop in thrift stores, eat at home, and keep a lid on my purchases. I feel like my life is lived in bondage because I really have very little room to move, and it makes me so empathetic for those who have far less than I do, or Americans living in an even worse market.
But where the FUCK are you, media?
Thank god for smartphones, YouTube, and social media.
If I’m boring you on Twitter or Facebook with #OccupyWallStreet content, then too fucking bad, because SOMEONE NEEDS TO GET THE MESSAGE OUT, and it looks like it’s on us to do so.
More than 150 cities are now doing protests. Where the FUCK is the corresponding media?
You can’t believe what you hear, read, or see, if it’s in the media. Not anymore.
If the press wanted a nail in its coffin, well, we’ve got the hammer.
We are the 99%.