I seem to have a lot of controversial stuff to say and since
I got lazy and stopped blogging the only platform I've had to express my
thoughts is Facebook. I have recently realised that it is not often a good idea
to log in to Facebook, post something controversial, and leave it up to [mis]interpretation.
Here’s a couple reasons why:
TONE (or lack thereof). Facebook, or any other online or
written forum or form of social network, fails to accurately portray tone. Actually,
it fails to portray tone at all. The problem with this is that not everyone on
my Facebook friend list knows me very well. Or at least they don’t know my
heart or intention behind whatever it is that I post. In addition to this they don’t
all share my worldview. Due to these two major points any reader (other than
the one who knows me well or shares my worldview) is going to read my post
through a lens of assumptions and in a tone that he or she thinks that I may
have said it in, resulting in misinterpretation of what I have posted and the
formulation of a rebuttal based on the misinterpretation.
CLARITY. On social media platforms where posts have to be short
and concise it is difficult to be clear or explanatory in your discourse. This
is where blog platforms have an advantage. I can spend a whole paragraph on
explaining my intentions behind my statement and making sure that my intended
tone is portrayed accurately. I can explain, define and reference without the
fear of my post extending into the ‘see more’ zone.
SOCIAL MEDIA BOLDNESS. People (generalising for a second)
are a lot bolder online than they are in real life. This means that I'm going
to get a lot of responses from people who really wouldn't engage with the topic
if faced with it in a real life, offline situation. These commentators have
also, on occasion, proven to be people who for reasons other than mere
disagreement or willingness to engage have taken part in discussions and thus
been invaluable and time-wasting.
AUDIENCE APPROPRIATENESS. Not the kind of appropriateness
relating to profanity or nudity or such. The issue here revolves around my
target audience. This isn't as much of a problem when I am addressing a general
issue as opposed to when I choose to address an issue or discuss a topic that
is exclusively Christian. By exclusively Christian I mean an issue that may be
heavily misinterpreted or possibly even impossible to understand if you are not
a Christian. For example: “Should Christians celebrate Jewish festivals or not”.
This is a topic that a person who is not a Christian would not be bothered to
get involved in as it would not be applicable to his or her life. On the other
hand, everything I post, whether directed at Christians or nay, stems from a
Christian perspective and worldview and will therefore automatically warrant a
fair amount of response, depending of course on the controversy levels of the
post.
There are probably more good reasons that I am not able to
think of right now but these are my main ones. So for these reasons I am going
to start to blog again. This way, as a Facebooker, you are not forced to read
all the rubbish that I post - unless you really want to.
Please do though.
