Blog comments: here, there, and everywhere
It’s come to my attention that Ann Althouse has ended comments on her blog. I’ve noticed a trend in that direction on a lot of sites in the past few years. Those who run the sites have their reasons, although the reasons may be quite different for different people.
Ann is a blogger who’s about my age and with a similar background in many ways, and we both have been doing this for many years. She has continued to have a blogspot blog, which is a platform I started on but abandoned long ago. If I’m not mistaken, Althouse never migrated from there to WordPress or anywhere else because the technical problems seemed insurmountable. I had some problems with that, too, when I first made the switch back in 2007,even though the blog was of course much smaller back then compared to now. I got someone to help me at the time, and fortunately, for whatever reason, the migration worked. But all the comments appeared on the new site in upside-down order, so that for each post prior to 2007 you’ll see the most recent comments at the top of each thread rather than at the bottom.
But it was a small price to pay for the freedom to control the comments section, which was the main reason I made the switch although there were other benefits as well. My comments had gotten utterly out of control, and at that time blogspot didn’t provide many tools to ban trolls. WordPress gave me many more ways to do that, and although I don’t talk about it much here, I continue to have to ban people on occasion. That means I also have to scrutinize the comments to a certain extent, although some days I’m better at doing it than other days; it tends to depend on how busy I am. But it must be done, or the trolls and the abusive stuff takes over.
Perhaps if I had a ton more traffic, I wouldn’t be able to do a good enough job, and I’d have to switch to some other method. Perhaps, for example, I’d have registration-only comments, the way Legal Insurrection (a blog I sometimes contribute to as an author) does.
But I can’t imagine doing away with comments. To me, that’s unacceptable on this blog. I hope I never have to eat those words. But one of the main reasons I started this blog and one of the main reasons I continue to do so is because of the comments. Perhaps I’m unusual in that regard, but to me a blog without comments is a lonely lonely place.
When I first began to blog I had a plan, which was to make this blog a haven and a community (overused word, but I think it’s appropriate) for political changers in particular, and to mainly explore the process of political change. I’ve done that, but it turned into much more and exceeded my expectations and is broader in scope and theme. I definitely never expected to still be doing it sixteen years later, but one step (and day) at a time really does add up. And the comments remain very very important to me. In fact, about a decade ago I got an offer to write for the online version of a well-known conservative magazine that didn’t have comments at the time, and I declined it in part because it would mean I’d have to close down the blog and do without comments.
Even as a young child, I often had a running monologue in my head in which I opined on things. But very few people were interested (or interested at all, for the most part) when I talked to friends or family about some of the things that fascinated me. Then for many years, as an adult, I wrote essays, short stories, and poetry, and submitted some of them for publication. A few poems got published in literary journals, but I discovered something surprising, which is that after they were published I experienced a “so what?” feeling. I wanted at least a few people to tell me what reactions the poem sparked in them. I wanted to know that someone was out there reading it, and what that person thought. If a poem gets published in a journal and no one responds, did that poem get published at all?
Comments on a blog are a wonderful way to get that response, good or bad or indifferent, argumentative or otherwise. I still get rid of abusive (truly abusive, not just a bit nasty) comments (even between commenters in addition to those aimed at me), and obvious trolls and spammers, but other than that I tend to let it go and to encourage comments.
I have no intention of changing that and making the blog into a place where it’s just my voice echoing in a vast silence. I think that would be something like this wonderful but frightening poem of Robert Frost’s:
THE MOST OF IT
He thought he kept the universe alone;
For all the voice in answer he could wake
Was but the mocking echo of his own
From some tree-hidden cliff across the lake.
Some morning from the boulder-broken beach
He would cry out on life, that what it wants
Is not its own love back in copy speech,
But counter-love, original response.
And nothing ever came of what he cried
Unless it was the embodiment that crashed
In the cliff’s talus on the other side,
And then in the far distant water splashed,
But after a time allowed for it to swim,
Instead of proving human when it neared
And someone else additional to him,
As a great buck it powerfully appeared,
Pushing the crumpled water up ahead,
And landed pouring like a waterfall,
And stumbled through the rocks with horny tread,
And forced the underbrush–and that was all.
One of the main reasons I participate in blogs is to be able to say things just to get it off my chest. The other is to receive constructive feedback on my thoughts.
I think you have the right idea here and l hope you won’t have cause to change your mind.
Comments, especially back and forth really add to your blog. Thanks.
I forgot to mention that I often like to engage in back-and-forth in the comments myself, and in addition I sometimes find something in a comment that I use as a springboard for a new post.
Althouse’s blog always seemed to get much more traffic than this one in terms of the comments section. She’d regularly have posts with comment counts in the several hundreds. Such high traffic encourages bad actors and her comment section has been the target of a small group of very persistent trolls as well as a few other bad faith posters who would contribute to noise. So it was a lot of work to tamp down and I think she just got tired of constantly dealing with it and thinking about it.
But I do agree with you that a blog with no comments is sort of uninteresting to me. I like reading other peoples thoughts on a subject and contributing my own too. I like conversation and debate and I’m less interested outlets that only offer a single viewpoint and that’s it. I got enough of that from reading editorials for decades.
I’ve never commented at Althouse but they were often far more interesting than her regurgitating of some NYT or WaPo story. Some places I go just for the comments some like here where it’s both the content and the comments and some like Instapundit I never look at the comments.
“A few poems got published in literary journals, but I discovered something surprising, which is that after they were published I experienced a “so what?” feeling. I wanted at least a few people to tell me what reactions the poem sparked in them. I wanted to know that someone was out there reading it, and what that person thought. If a poem gets published in a journal and no one responds, did that poem get published at all?” Neo
This reminds me of that line in When Harry Met Sally where Harry and Sally plan to have each other meet their friends as a prospective date and it works out that the friends hit it off leaving Harry and Sally behind. Carrie Fisher’s character repeats a line from a magazine she read and it turns out Harry’s friend wrote it. That was it. He said, “I never had anyone quote me to me before!” This movie is a favorite of mine. And Neo, you, by far, have the best comment section on a blog. You draw interesting commenters and I appreciate the level of respect you maintain.
Commenting here feels like a community. Commenting at the sites that have 100’s or even 1000 comments on a post feels like sitting in the nose bleed seats!
No likey …
I don’t comment on this blog a lot but I’m glad that they will remain.
I’ve been reading blogs since forever, at least since 9-11. More, since then, I guess.
This blog has the best comment section of all of them. Mose reasonable, most knowledgeable. I learn more here than any other blog.
Insty, for example, has many good entries but the comments are predictable after a bit, no matter the subject. Still, once you get a high count, you get a picture of what a lot of people are thinking, which could be valuable information.
Comments are just another way of seeing for yourself just how smart other people are and how stupid other people are.
One of the things I’ve learned from blog comment threads is that a lot of smart people think they’re “A” students in a world full of “F” classmates, when the reality is that most smart people are actually “B” students in a world full of “Cs.”
Mike
I’ve only commented a couple of times here about your dance posts. I greatly appreciate them because you explain things quite well. I enjoy reading most of the comments here ( in the spirit of your post, a special nod of appreciation to Rufus T. Firefly), but I had a surge of apprehension when I read that people were saying they were coming over from Althouse’s blog. I like her blog, but I had given up reading the comments. Here’s hoping you still keep things under control without it becoming too great a chore.
I appreciate both your blog and the ability to comment, although I do so infrequently. Thank you.
Thank you! Thjs is a great blog and I appreciate the posts and the comments.
Oh neo lets commenters go at pretty good till one really steps out line and gets personal … then she’ll crack that whip!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j_QLzthSkfM
In line with your remarks on the near impossibility of changing minds, a relevant illustration of it might be seen in blog comment sections.
Only rarely does one see some ostensible fence straddler remark to another commenter that he has had his eyes opened by this or that bit of information or perspective.
On the one really significant occasion I can think of where it happened personally, I was approached by a female psychotherapist [this was on AOL years ago when a comment ID constituted an e-mail account as well] who said that her perspective on the 2nd Amendment had changed. This was beause, despite the complexity of the historical and philosophical arguments, and the obscure legal issues regarding the militia clause, she could see, in her words, who ” the stand up guys were”. Apparently she had been perceived as safely leaning left, and was approached privately by those antagonistic to the right, who had then been quite frank about their tactics and agendas.
What she had noticed then, was that supporters of the RKBA were arguing the right; whereas opponents were arguing the supporters. Or, more precisely, they were occupying themselves with labeling RKBA advocates as “gun nuts” and “gap toothed Neanderthals” who were essentially human vermin destined by “Progress” for the ash heap of history; motivated in their selfish stupidity only by paranoic fears, Freudian insecurities, and racism.
Eventually, a partial explanation for all this spilt bile was disclosed by one of the progressives himself, when he defended himself against charges of personal cowardice and gratuitous provocation, by proclaiming with regard to himself that, “I fight with words”.
Whether in truth he was simply amusing himself by spreading malice and engaging in bad faith argument, or up to some other business, his official take on his own comment board activities was that he was engaged in a larger project of social warfare which just happened to find a likely battlefield on that discussion board.
We, were his target, as much or moreso than the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, per se.
This tactic will no doubt bring to mind to some admissions which were made by the writer Gore Vidal regarding his strategic preparations before his own joint appearance with William Buckley as ABC guest commenters covering the 1968 Democratic convention in Chicago.
Buckley went prepared to offer color commentary on the proceedings; Vidal studiously prepared for and then arrived aiming to offer derisive commentary targeting Buckley.
It seems to be the way of the left. And given their metaphysics, perhaps it should be expected to follow.
I was a regular commenter at Althouse for years. She seems to have had two possible reasons for ending comments. One might have been pressure from Google, which had given her some trouble about ads a few months ago. Maybe she was worried about being deplatformed, as Conservative Tree House was right around the election. The other possibility is she is drifting left, hence her complaints about “right wing squatters.” She conspicuously avoided the topic of vote fraud.
Interestingly enough, a lot of her former commenters are reassembling the salon at a site called “Discord.”
Neo, thank you very, very much for keeping comments.
She’s A Beautiful Troll:
https://www.pngfind.com/mpng/xbiRTi_she-s-a-beautiful-troll-tumblr-rh-tumblr/
Althouse has not entirely deep-sixed comments; those desirous of commenting may send her an e-mail and she may or may not add it to the original post. It’s only been a few days, but she already seems to have given way to feminist whinging. (Just my opinion.)
I also find it pointless for a blogger to simply post with no opportunity for feedback from others. The posts here and the commenters are high quality and something I look forward to each day. Thank you, Neo!
I think Althouse made a mistake, but she had good reason to stop the comments. It took up too much of her time and people were going OT and it was bugging her.
A blog ain’t the same without comments.
Neo: many thanks for keeping comments going. Your comment threads are my first and last stop of the day. On DNW’s point, I have revised my thinking on some major topics after reading comment threads on this forum. Or at least questioned my thinking. Thanks too for giving us room to vent occasionally and for being sparing with the hook.
I had recently returned to Althouse’s blog after a many-year hiatus. Her own contributions were rarely interesting, insightful, or informative. The comments had the real takes. Now that they’re gone, I take a peek over there and see that – as RNB points out – it seems to be headed towards feminist tripe. I’m sure she’ll appreciate her new echo chamber. It is her name after all, so I don’t begrudge her.
But I have never fully gotten the impression that Althouse was entirely honest, particularly when it comes to her commenters, or the blog in general. The excuse of people being “intimidated” or put off by the comment section is particularly feeble. If you don’t like the comments, don’t open them. Don’t read them. Claiming “intimidation”, and publishing those accusations is just being manipulative. Please.
Some people have called her out on this (and more), and I suppose that’s “misogyny”.
The “right wing squatters” comment was what turned me right back off from her blog again. No comment about her absolutely poisonous lefties that love nothing more than tossing grenades into discussions. Nope, it’s just evil righty keeping the delicate flowers of the Left from gracing her comments. She’s always been a Lefty, and thus is class obsessed, and wishes to be in good graces with the bien pensants in her twilight years.
Thank you for keeping your comments open when everyone else isn’t.
Blog comments are one thing that doesn’t seem to ‘scale’ very well…once the typical threads get to be more than maybe 50-100 comments long on a given blog, dialogue tends to get both obnoxious and trivialized.
I read both Althouse’s blog and Neo’s blog every day. I commented more at Althouse, but that is mostly habit for the most part. I have been writing blog comments for over 20 years now, and I have never really commented regularly on more than one blog at a time, and that blog will change after every 3-4 years. I read Althouse almost from the start in 2004, but I didn’t write my first comment there until 2007, and I probably didn’t write two comments in any month there until around 2015.
My impression of Althouse’s blog is that her actual posts have become less interesting to me over the years while the comments section has become more interesting. She used to devote a lot of the posts to legal matters, court cases, etc., but since her retirment there is far less of that and more regurgitating stories from the big east coast papers. While her take on such stories is always with a critical eye, it just isn’t interesting after the 50th or 60th iteration.
See RNB’s comment above about the feminist whinging post Althouse put up earlier today. While was reading that particular post a few hours ago, I thought it basically proved everything the discussed “misogynist” commenter, rhhardin, had written over the years. A sense of irony seems to be lacking in some folks.
I predict she will reopen the comments within 6 months. Comments via e-mail isn’t going to work- her direct feedback from readers will be scanty right from the start, and will eventually dwindle further. I also predict that her readership will decline by at least 80% by the 3rd or 4th month. I am already down to one visit a day, and based on today’s posts, I probably won’t go back more than once a week.
Althouse has asked about what to do with regards to the comments section multiple times in the last two years. I realize that the tools Blogger gives are inadequate to make the moderation both easier and more thorough. It was suggested to her multiple times that she needed to upgrade to a more modern blogging platform. She even had offers from multiple people to do the work for her, and for free. She refused.
Neo:
After Neo changed to WordPress, I recall an extended thread that got me annoyed at 2 commenters because they both moved the goalposts, and in the case of one commenter, often did not correctly identify whom he was replying to. Shortly after I noted that Neo shared my annoyance, as she banned them.
Several years later, one of the banned commenters made a comment at Neo: “I was banned, but I’m back.” I decided that ignoring the comment was the best response. As far as I can tell, that was the last time the banned commenter reappeared.
For all of Althouses’s complaints about right-wing commenters stepping out of line, it seemed to me that lefties had their fair share of trolls. Such as “life-long Republican” Chuck.
One of the things that I love the most about this blog is the quality of the comment threads. The reason that I rarely comment myself is that often by the time I gather my thoughts to post a comment, I find that someone else has already expressed what I had to say much better than I would have. Either that, or I will read a comment which forces me to rethink my viewpoint.
Thank you for what you do Neo, reading your blog has become one of the high points of my day.
I’ve been banned from the Bluejay Underground (Creighton sports fans message board) for the fourth time. It is because I’m conservative and I don’t toe the liberal line.
My last identity was as “Mr. Tuxedo” which was an homage to deceased CU bb coach John “Red” McManus.
I posted in a thread about former player Christian Bishop (and on Twitter) that I didn’t respect this player’s decision to transfer. I wrote that unless he transferred to Kansas or Kentucky, it would be a step down. (He did transfer to Kansas and he is from KC area.)
I was roundly criticized for having the temerity of even questioning his decision given the fact that the Creighton staff turned him into a good player.
I got one prank call at work. And this,
“What an attention-seeking, racist, piece of shit. And before you predictably say, “It looks like you’re stalking me” – No. Someone PM’ed it to me, laughing at you, but didn’t want to get involved. I’ve proven for years I’m not afraid to humiliate you, so here we are again.
You’re not a victim, CUFF [my prior identity]. You are an awful human being. You got booed at this event. You are an embarrassment to the Creighton fanbase. Not because you’re conservative or Jesuit-educated or Catholic, as you claimed victimhood for on another platform, but because you’re a terrible human being.
By the way, let’s not gloss over that. In Nebraska – this oversized pair of clown shoes claimed people are mad at him because he’s Jesuit-educated, Catholic and conservative. IN F#&KING NEBRASKA!!!!
You are just not a bright guy. Racist, yes. Bright, no.
Get a hobby. You have 200 followers on Twitter, with nearly 20,000 tweets. You get booed at political events. 95% of Creighton fans despise you. Maybe this tidal wave of disdain isn’t so sinister or politically motivated. Hell, most people in my life are Jesuit-educated, conservative and Catholic. Good folks! It’s quite simple. You’re dim. You’re ignorant. You’re racist. And life didn’t deal you a good hand. Go fly some kites or do some jigsaw puzzles. Stop embarrassing yourself.
If any competing college program or fanbase ever wants to paint Creighton with a racist brush, they can point to Coach Mac’s plantation comments – which I believe is unfair because I believe he made a terrible mistake – and they can point to you. I have no defense there. It’s a fair point on their behalf.
vivid_dude”
People have gone completely crazy. We can’t talk honestly about race. We can’t talk about the failed Black culture in this country which, unfortunately for many, is wrapped up in drugs, crime and out-of-wedlock births.
The Fake News is completely dishonest (see the Chauvin trial) and they just stoke the fires and mislead or coverup.
In the last comment thread at Althouse, one person noted how horrible it is that the election was stolen and it seems to have been forgotten. I’m incensed about it and, unless fixed, we are completely doomed.
Which brings me to China. I meet a resident of China in Santa Monica. At the time the CCP was beginning its crack down in Hong Kong. I asked him what the Chinese thought. He said that the Chinese people don’t like the Hong Kong people. I took that to be typical tribalism. The other thing he said that as long people are making money and can go on vacations, they don’t care about the government. I think we are rapidly approaching that place in America. Bread, dope and circuses.
I am extremely upset with my interactions with Creighton alums. Zero critical thinking and uniformly liberal. Two CU theology professors wrote an op-ed in the local paper that it was morally acceptable for Catholics to vote for Biden-Harris because of climate change. CU is selling its oil and gas stocks.
And, of course, America has totally botched its covid response. IMO, the CCP did it intentionally to get rid of Trump. And now the CCP is laughing with Biden in office. And millions of Americans are okay with Biden simply because he’s not Trump.
Unless the filibuster holds, we are totally screwed.
I’ve had Althouse in my RSS feeds for a long time. But — unfortunately — she’s become less interesting, particularly in the last six months. I confess to being a member of the patriarchy, I guess.
I love this blog, Neo. I read every post, although I don’t engage as often as I would like to. Lots of smart commenters here, too.
Cornhead,
I imagine it must have been wild when the whole McDermott plantation story was going down at Creighton.
I am not inclined to be as critical of Althouse as many who comment here. She posts what interests her, and while it is true that most of it is from NYT, NewYorker, WP and a few other leftist pubs, she is critical of their stories and does not regurgitate leftist talking points. I find her interesting to read, though I often don’t agree that she reached the right conclusion. I think she stopped the comments for the reason she gave, which is that it is too much work. I don’t think that Glen Reynolds reads all of his comments, and he also has help posting at Insty. I’m glad that Neo is willing to manage her comments section.
Living in an extreme liberal environment (90%+ Biden vote in my town), I have become more and more isolated as the leftward push has accelerated, and here it accelerated markedly during the Orange-man-bad years. My transition from tolerated minority view to pariah has closeted me, a very interesting experience if I view it from a dispassionate distance, going from mainstream to disapproval to outcast in my life trajectory. I imagine common sense political conversations with my local friends, who have no idea of my political leanings, and know in my heart they would be bitter disappointments. So where can somebody like me find community? With the few “safe” associations I still have, but mainly online. With the commenters on this blog, particularly, I sense a certain camaraderie, and it is comforting. For me, it is a port in the storm, and a crucial feature of your blog.
David Begley,
Embrace letting sports go. It just isn’t worth it any longer to support or follow a sports team at any level beyond high school, and only then if your children or grandchildren are playing.
Not sure if it matters to you but getting from other commenters drop the comments the hits will drop off.
I know I like to see the thread content and what others think of that subject.
A one person blog can be a handful, but it’s part of the culture we have these days.
Keep writing and I’ll keep reading, and commenting occasionally.
I also think that Althouse’s comments section has become more chatter lately and less cogent comments that I can learn from. But maybe as someone said, that is because she doesn’t post about court cases as much anymore.
Yancey Ward,
I’ve been a huge sports fan my entire life and it was something my dad and I had in common. As a 7-8 year old kid we went to the Seahawks first game in ’76 and the Mariners first game in ’77 and it has been a part of my life ever since. That my dad passed before the Seahawks won the Super Bowl still makes me sad but I have lost my enthusiasm for them the last few years. I still follow them and do care but it’s not the same.
The one sport that has done better in the keeping politics out is golf and I can still very much enjoy that.
Well neo…
If you ever do away with the comments I will likely regain about 20% of my waking hours and most of the folks here would be the better for not having to read my half-baked theories (or, more likely, skip over them)! 🙂
But I am very glad to read you are keeping them.
In all sincerity; I have learned a great deal from the commenters here and greatly appreciate their taking time to share their knowledge, opinions and personal stories.
(And welcome Althouse exiles. You’ve made a great choice!)
I never comment here, but have been a committed follower and reader for at least 3 years! I am sure there are others like me! Great minds congregate here and it is nice that they share their wisdom
Interestingly enough, a lot of her former commenters are reassembling the salon at a site called “Discord.”
Great. I was a lurker and not a participant at Althouse. I did check it daily.
It’s her site to do with what she wants. That having been said, some of her remarks were puzzling. She complained about the attacks on the posts she makes, which is odd because her remarks are seldom a target of any of the regulars; they are conversation starters. The one who did explicitly slam her has been the twit from suburban Detroit who uses the handle ‘Chuck’ (always upper case, not to be confused with lower case ‘chuck’) who she had specifically asked to stop commenting on multiple occasions. She specifically praised one particular leftoid participant whose posts consist of red-herrings. And what would be a ‘right wing squatter’ as opposed to an ordinary starboard poster? Or did she consider all of you ‘squatters’? As for her complaint that they were making others ‘unwelcome’, there were a half-dozen leftoids who were persistent participants. Having perused the site for years, I can identify one starboard poster (‘drago’) who was excessive in his use of the stiletto against one of the others (the aforementioned ‘Chuck’).
All of which is to say her complaints were excuses, not reasons. (The one that I’d guess was on the level concerned the time sink involved in scraping out the trolls and the spam).
Griffen:
I was completely taken aback with the number of people calling for Coach McDermott to be fired. It really upset me. He’s a good man and good coach.
YW:
I’m totally invested in Creighton basketball. I love the college game and CU is my alma mater for better or worse. My family has been associated with Creighton for over 100 years. The first Begley graduated from CU about 1920.
I’ll just mentally separate the basketball program from the wokeness and liberalism. I’ve done that with the Catholic Church and the sex criminal priests.
“The other thing he said that as long people are making money and can go on vacations, they don’t care about the government. I think we are rapidly approaching that place in America. Bread, dope and circuses.”
And the ancient Romans can tell you how well that worked out. I’m struck by how much magical thinking has metastasized among the elite. I’ve seen repeated references to the “coming economic boom” by several different people, all of whom worked their asses off to ignore good economic news under Trump, and it’s pretty clear they no longer can connect economic performance to actual public policy choices.
Mike
I commented at Althouse some but visited almost daily quite a few years. I don’t comment much for the same reasons (in a general sense) she “stopped” for the time being.
It takes time for me to write, to write well. And unlike many or most anymore, I am not sitting at a computer for extended periods of time. I don’t want to be “tied” to having to, or feeling a need to respond to others who might comment on what I said. Longer form suits me better, generally, but I’d like to be able to respond as succinctly as others do, who are generally better at it — and which I admire in many other commenters.
I only started reading comments on her blog in greater detail in the last couple of years. I thought they are pretty good, maybe the best, but in part because of Blogger, it takes a significant investment in time to understand (like who is saying what). It is probably easy for people who have previously invested that time — like Althouse and long-experienced commenters — to underestimate the amount of time it might take for the uninitiated.
Like the layout of letters on a keyboard, and on boards such as this, it is somewhat path dependent who is posting there. This also relates to what she was saying about the first comments on a topic.
Regarding shorter comments more generally, I believe the rise of Twitter has had a negative effect. I’ve seen a message board go to pot, as if is now a wholly-owned subsidiary.
People link Tweets as if they are somehow authoritative (when they are not). And if they comment, it is typically brief, and like most Tweets presumes they are correct, no effort to cite actual authority or make a logical case — such that it would persuade anyone who doesn’t already agree. Or if you disagree, you might actually learn something.
The comments here are pretty good. I might comment more but I don’t much to begin with.
I’ve read your blog, Neo, probably about the same length of time as Althouse, but this is my first comment. I cited a post of yours once, on one of the only two or three comments I’ve ever posted on PowerLine.
Dare I say that sometimes I enjoy the commenters more than neo herself?
it seemed to me that lefties had their fair share of trolls. Such as “life-long Republican” Chuck.
I think Yancey Ward said he had identified who Chuck is in meatspace and that he is indeed who he says he is – a professional Republican who has been in a snit the last 5 years over the Republican electorate’s refusal in 2016 to eat the sh!t Republican donors served them and their persistent refusal to think ill of Donald Trump.
‘Chuck’ has been a troll in the strict sense, introducing into every thread he enters his personal hobby horses, even though his preferred subjects may be tangential to the topic of the post or irrelevant to it. His hobby horse is his resentment of the president and his constituency (which, as it happens, is about 90% of the Republican electorate). So, the moderatrix offers a critical remark about some Democratic pol, he responds with ‘what about the time Trump said…’. Or she remarks on some event in the news cycle, he responds with ‘I notice Althouse studiously avoids calling attention to Trump’s statement last Tuesday…’. I suppose it’s a window into the mind of Republicans who’ve been on the payroll all these years. (Which John Boehner and the odious Mr. McConnell will also give you from time to time). These careerists could improve the quality of public life by leaving it.
Art Deco,
Yes, I figured out who Chuck really was (99.9% sure- he had given, over the years enough biographical information to make a detailed Google search fairly easy), and he was a legitimate Republican according to everything I saw.
I love reading your posts AND the commenters here, Neo. It’s definitely one of the highpoint of my day, and I hope you continue writing and having commenters for years!!
I read (as of now, past tense) Althouse too, but without comments I’d wonder what some of my favorite commenters there would say, so I think I’ll pretty much avoid her blog now. I’d probably read your posts even if you had to stop comments (say, for instance, because things got nasty with Cancel Culture)—and I wonder if worries about CC were part of Althouse’s rationale for stopping comments.
Most days, I’ve skipped a few of Althouse’s posts, but I can’t remember a single time I’ve skipped one of your posts, Neo, or the engendered comments, and I’ve been reading your blog almost since it started!
I’m deeply grateful to you—and for the commenters you inspire—for giving me so much joy and so much to think about.
I imagine common sense political conversations with my local friends, who have no idea of my political leanings, and know in my heart they would be bitter disappointments.
Committed liberals in our time are emotionally invested in humbug (‘white privilege’, ‘mass incarceration’, ‘voter suppression’, ‘Russian collusion’) and in trivia (‘very fine people’, etc). You cannot have a productive conversation with them any more.
Art+Deco, that is an excellent comment. I have suffered with Chuck while reading Althouse as well. I don’t know what kind of personality disorder it takes to spend so much time bitching on a blog whose commenters are people you disagree with. Why not go somewhere else? (I hope he doesn’t come here).
Embrace letting sports go. It just isn’t worth it any longer to support or follow a sports team at any level beyond high school, and only then if your children or grandchildren are playing.
I agree with this. I had USC football season tickets for over 50 years. No more. I’m not even interested. Plus, I moved to Arizona to escape the crazies.
It’s great you’ve kept comments so civil and interesting both. For the last couple of years I’ve even read almost all of them, tho in the last few weeks I’ve been too busy on my own intellectual journey for all of them.
I’ve long been an off-and-on reader at Althouse, and only a very seldom commenter. She always struck me as a more honest liberal Dem, knowing that the NYT, which she generally loves and faithfully reads, is still often full of BS. I like her ability to point that out.
One reason to comment so little there is the usual over hundred comments, much of them not adding much thinking. As this blog goes over the hundred comments more often, I’ll probably be here less, too — and while I like that some commenters have conversations & back & forth, and even with me at times (always appreciated! sometimes days later), my main style of comment is to think about the post the most.
He would cry out on life, that what it wants
Is not its own love back in copy speech,
But counter-love, original response.
In my other favorite blog (ASKblog by Arnold Kling), he focusses on how humans learn mostly by copying others. So I was thinking of some Copy Quotient, with the ability of people to copy others. This CQ would be different than IQ, tho related – and high IQ autistic people have low CQ. Many quite successful people have high CQ, with enough IQ to know when and how much to copy others.
I love to think, and even think about thinking – so Neo’s blog, with such interesting thoughts, is naturally attractive. Her commenters, You All (us!), do make it nice to be here, for minutes or even hours at a time.
(The 5 minute edit is also fantastic!)
I’ve seen repeated references to the “coming economic boom” by several different people, all of whom worked their asses off to ignore good economic news under Trump, and it’s pretty clear they no longer can connect economic performance to actual public policy choices.
Trailing p/e ratios being what they are right now, we can look forward to a 50% decline in share prices even if nothing untoward happens. That should induce a demand shock which would generate a recession in ordinary circumstances, though not necessarily a bad one – 2001 was quite mild. We’ve been in a wretched recession the last year or more, along with the rest of the globe. And our public sector balance sheet looks godawful.
I Callahan,
IIRC you were also at Protein Wisdom back in the day as they say.
I don’t know what kind of personality disorder it takes to spend so much time bitching on a blog whose commenters are people you disagree with.
I bicker with people online as a matter of course, so I must have the same disorder. What was evident with ‘Chuck’ is that he had no discernible interest in public policy, no discernible interest in the willingness of federal bureaucrats to carry water for the Democratic Party (see Lois Lerner), no discernible interest in the abuse of process by employees of the DoJ, no discernible interest in the escalating harassment of Republicans in every social venue, no discernable interest in the vertiginous decline in ballot security, no discernible interest in the horrific spike in crime, no discernible interest in the metastasis of politics into every conceivable social organism. He would also say flagrantly false things about Michigan politics. The man has a White Whale, and the White Whale is Donald Trump. That’s a mentality I do not understand.
I believe that, back when Mark Steyn and Ezra Levant were having trouble with Canada’s intrusive wokeaucracy, it was discovered that one of the ‘cats would post vile stuff on a blog and then the government would fine the site.
So I suppose it’s worthwhile to be cautious about your comment threads even if, as Insty says, “somebody set us up the bomb.”
Looked at Althouse’s blog a handful of times because Neo referred to it. This was with regard to legal issues wherein she was presumed to have, and showed as far as I coukd tell, some expertise and critical capabilities.
So, no strong impressions taken away from the postings I looked at; apart from the rough idea that – aside from a presumed technical competency in the law – she exhibited a level of indignation coupled to a subtle plaintiveness which looked to me like the expression of a certain level of inherent timidity: a competent yet morally uncertain person trying to be brave, but likely to fold under pressure.
The other impression was that the comment section functioned as a platform for, among other things, the display of snark and irony by a crew of regulars.
Probably not a fair assessment based on about 20 minutes cumulative total.
But when I see well-practiced techniques of irony and sarcasm being habitually deployed , probably as credentials of a sort, I just tune out.
Life is too short.
“That’s a mentality I do not understand.”
Imagine you find out your wife is not only cheating on you but cheating on you with someone you consider to be socially and culturally beneath you and your wife simply refuses to be embarrassed or ashamed of it. Now imagine you are not a terribly masculine man in any way and your emotional development ended shortly after adolescence.
Mike
Dear Neo, It’s heartening to see some Althouse commenters migrating to your blog. Let’s hope all keep it civil, cogent and on point to the topic you pick. I think the traffic is about to pick up for you, so let’s hope everyone is respectful of the (your) rules of the road. Aggressive drivers should receive the Scott Adams treatment, banishment from the discussion and the blog. Good discussions and fun times are ahead. Here’s hoping you aren’t overwhelmed, Neo. Good luck!
This blog is a treasure. I’ve long referred to it as a “salon,” and just now looked up the meaning of that word (yeah, Wikipedia, but sometimes they get it right).
“A salon is a gathering of people held by an inspiring host. During the gathering they amuse one another and increase their knowledge through conversation. These gatherings often consciously followed Horace’s definition of the aims of poetry, “either to please or to educate” (Latin: aut delectare aut prodesse). Salons in the tradition of the French literary and philosophical movements of the 17th and 18th centuries were carried on until as recently as the 1920s in urban settings.”
I have done little commenting since 2016. I realized that my insights were time consuming to write. And, I thought that my fawning approvals didn’t add much. My absence is not disinterest. I am as fascinated and admiring as ever by this blog.
This particular posting is a great example of Neo’s open-minded and deep thinking and brilliant expression of it.
More power to you, Neo!
I don’t know what kind of personality disorder it takes to spend so much time bitching on a blog whose commenters are people you disagree with.
Chuck and a few others (like Shouting Thomas, whose nom de blog I recognized from when he used to comment here) were the main reason why I never commented on Althouse’s blog, although I was a regular lurker for years. Too many threads degenerated into back-and-forth pot shots between two or three commenters, and I usually bailed on a thread when that happened. I didn’t mind Althouse’s citations from the NYT and the WaPoo because they saved me from having to subscribe to these so-called papers of record. I did, however, very much appreciate the wide range of topics she found interesting and blogged about; and I think she was wise to resist pressure from some commenters to blog on subjects (or incidents) of their choosing.
In addition to Neo’s blog, I enjoy commenting over at Gerard’s American Digest; it doesn’t surprise me that he puts in a guest appearance here from time to time. Both blogs are havens of civility in an increasingly contentious time– refreshment for the spirit in a cultural desert and political wasteland.
Althouse decided to completely shut down her blog’s comment section and announced that in the middle of the comment section of an Easter Sunday post. The post itself was just a poll, asking commenters to vote on various ways to keep or alter the comment section.
By the time I realized that decision had been reached, it was too late to have any input or to say my goodbyes—I planned on offering up your blog as a suggestion for a place where the thoughtful, polite commenters could migrate, but I never got the chance.
Several commenters tried to come up with alternate places to congregate in the few hours they had before learning that the lights were about to be turned off, and one of those Althouse commenters suggested Neo also. It would be a positive thing I think.
Art+Deco wrote, “I bicker with people online as a matter of course, …”
No, you don’t! (Now, that’s bickering. 😉 ) I’ve seen you argue and critique, but I never seen you bicker here. (BTW, you constructed that paragraph very nicely.)
.
I sincerely think the commenters here are a very distinguished group. I look forward reading and learning from you (very plural) every day.
In the end she stopped commenting because she was getting more grief from her lefty friends and she didn’t really like us anyways.
I have tons of respect for bloggers. I’m a careless writer and the time it takes for me to make a quality comment can take hours. So I understand that running a blog with quality posts can take awhile. But stream of thought comments don’t take much effort, so that’s what I do when I can.
I understand what Althouse is doing. Sure, some people’s read of Althouse is more accurate than mine, such as Yancey mentions of rhhardin, but then, it is not like Althouse hides who she is. Yet, I’m sure it gets old to click on your blog, look forward to interacting in comments, believe in free speech, and then read how much you suck because you don’t think the way others want. Heck, I was annoyed enough with Morgan yesterday even suggesting that I’d be surprised (as if supportive) of Dr. Wen. Uh, no. And responding just causes you to redundant.
Althouse is ready to enjoy art and express her opinion for those who want to do it. I find it less interesting and she’s given me a reason to move on. As I wrote in my last comment there, I appreciate that time is a commodity. I’m happy to have my time back and excited to use it elsewhere, such as here.
Wow, lots of Althousians here 🙂
Neo gave me permission via email to offer the following: if you are an Althousian or a regular here at Neo, and would like to join the Discord to continue the conversation with other Althouse regulars, please email mis placed pants at pro ton mail dot com.
We’re off to a great start and would love to pull in as much of the diaspora as we can. The idea is not to bash or praise Althouse, just to have a place to post links around the web (including but not limited to Althouse posts) for discussion among folks who are bright, funny, interested in the world, and don’t behave like trolls. For now we are just keeping things manageable with Althouse regulars, and Neo’s readers are welcome too, but maybe in the future we can grow.
Art+Deco,
Yes, equities are very overpriced, regarding historical measures, but there is a lot of money in the world and it has to be invested in something.
Along with price/earnings ratios one has to consider how many dollars have been pumped into the system. I don’t know how to accurately gauge it, but certainly a lot of higher U.S. stock prices are a function of the devaluation of the U.S. dollar. If I remember Econ 101 correctly; inflation is too many dollars chasing too few goods.
However, I do have a sense you are right that a correction is eminent, but I feel less certain as time goes on. No doubt one will turn up in the future (one always does), I’m just less certain that future is as soon as I thought it was about six months ago. I’m of the mindset land and some other, select commodities might not be a bad place to park dollars. It’s hard to imagine dollars won’t continue their devaluation trend.
I often learn things from the comments here, and I appreciate the general tone of Neo’s posts and the comments.
I found that the comments were the most interesting part of Althouse’s blog. She generally posts a quoted section without too much commentary, so it was in the comments that the meat of the discussion occurred.
But there are two other comment boards that have mostly become a waste of time. The Federalist, which attracted a thousand comments per article, had to kill its comments because Google threatened to remove them from its searches. That wasn’t a big loss, since no one has time to wade through a thousand comments.
The other place that has become unreadable is Reason’s comment section. It attracts comments in the hundreds, but between the “make 1000s at home” and the resident trolls, who number in the dozens, the interesting commenters, like “Ken Schultz” and “Diane (Paul) Reynolds”, along with some familiar names from this blog, are too far between.
I use to blog at Conservative Treehouse but sooooooo many of the commenters were negative nellies, meme blurbers and “burn it all down” doomsayers that I quit. I go read the comments when there is a real breaking story with good analysis.
Strategypage back in the Afghanistan/Iraq stage of the War on Terror was good until the same type of non-contributors showed up there. So I am here and at “Meaning of History” doing the bulk of my commenting.
Althouse back in the Obama term and the Russian Collusion Hoax was good but runs in the morning don’t do it for me.
Geoff B – that was me! I miss the Jeff days, but I do follow him on Twitter. Glad to see you here!
Well, I’m the 70th commenter (counting repeat commenters) on this thread. I’m very late to this party [this thread], but I do wish to record a couple of things to say.
– A few times over the past many years I have remarked favorably on the quality of commenters here. That has not at all changed. I appreciate the insights, friends. On a personal note, I appreciate very much the kind words that many (including neo) had for me when I mentioned my kidney transplant. No, we’re not one big happy family (as that would be hyperbole), but we’re a great gang here nonetheless. Again, much, much appreciation.
– Almost no need to comment on the quality — and quantity! — of neo’s offerings. I appreciate
— the painstaking, detailed research neo devotes to her topics;
— the writing, in the sense of laying out the subject logically and coherently;
— the writing, in the sense of neo’s well-crafted prose;
— the expression of what is generally my point of view in a manner that helps me express it, should the occasion arise.
Boatloads of appreciation, neo.
– I’ll take a separate paragraph just to welcome refugees from Althouse. I looked in on Ann occasionally, but that’s all.
– Finally, if some-to-many of our new arrivals shift the conversation here a little to the left of where it had been before, I’m okay with that, even if I generally lean right.
I have no use for left-leaning snark or left-leaning reality denial or left-leaning condescension . . .
y’know, gotta admit, I confess to having *some* use for right-leaning snark (a failing to which I have to admit), but it can get tiresome very readily, and I have no use for right-leaning reality denial and even right-leaning condescension: if our commenters are intelligent, civil and respectful, hey-all, let’s talk things through!
. . . (and now, for the balance of my interrupted sentence) and I look forward to respectful give-and-take with the Althouse refugees. See y’all aroun’!
Neo I’ve read your blog for many years. Your writing has sometimes been inspirational to me (came for the change story, stayed for the range), and the commenting community is the best. I’m in Australia, with far flung family and my view of the future is losing pixels like an old screen. Bless this space.
I Callahan,
I followed him too until a few months ago when Twitter decided I was a bot and could only prove I wasn’t by allowing Google free access to my computer system. I declined and haven’t been on that platform since. Can’t even delete my account since I’d have to login to do that and to do that I’d have to prove to them I’m not a bot.
Q/E has flooded the system with so many additional dollars since 2006 that I’m not sure anyone has an accurate accounting. What the Fed has dumped in during 2020 alone, I think almost equals the past 12 years combined. At no point in that time has the Fed attempted to reduce the amount of extra money in the system. When you consider that the CPI’s methodology has been toyed with substantially (mostly to keep Social Security propped up) over the past thirty years, it’s almost impossible to gauge reality.
I’ve seen reasonable estimations that inflation is really anywhere from 9-12% if you use more traditional CPI methodologies. This would certainly make sense with my own personal observations. As the calculations of GDP have also undergone major revision, I have no idea how any numbers make any sense to anyone. Given TPTB’s addiction to intervention with no effort at correction, I can’t see how it ends well.
I will jump in just to pile on the praise for Neo for having the best-moderated comment section AND generally the most well-thought-out and best-written posts on the ‘net, particularly for an individual blogger hitting 2 or 3 main subjects daily – if there were Oscars for Blogs, you would get our votes!
Plus we aren’t limited to political punditry, but get music, dance, art, dog videos, and Jell-o1
Seriously, longer comment threads are challenging to moderate and to keep up with, so to all those here, please be charitable if others miss something you said somewhere along the line and thus make an inept reference or repeat your observations.
BTW, I wonder where our assigned trolls have been transferred to?
Now that they have forestalled the Armageddon of a second Trump term, are we no longer worth their attention?
I thought the comments made the Althouse blog. That said, there was a lot of pointless name calling and bullying in the comments that developed into habitual bickering. Like an old couples who just can’t shut up, not cool. If commenters could have been limited to two or three comments per post things things would have been better. It may also be the case that Althouse writes for herself, some do.
DNW said:
I’ve only dropped in to read Neo from time to time over the years, but never (at least to my decaying recollection) commented or read the comments. The few comments I’ve seen of yours have stood out to me. This observation is incredibly perceptive, and I look forward to more of your insights. If this is indicative of the quality of commentary here, I regret never having dropped into the comments here before. She seems to have drawn together a community as excellent as her posts.
As for the snark, and back and forth others have mentioned, I’ve certainly partaken far more than my fair share and honed it well over the course of about 25 years of internet commenting, but in my defense, I generally don’t go there unless provoked. A more restrained person would simply avoid that sort of pettiness. Mea culpa.
Looking at threads here, that doesn’t seem to be a concern, so it will be nice to read and comment in peace.
Small “c” chuck here. Why would anyone want the be bothered by Chuck? He was completely clueless about how he affected people, I would put him somewhere on the spectrum. It wasn’t worth getting bothered about.
Neo: I’m trying to give MisplacedPants a helping hand. She’s having problems posting comments on the blog. She said she cleared this with you earlier.
Hey guys, Pants has started a Discord server for the Althouse Refugees, invite only. If anyone wants to join just drop her a line at misplacedpantsATprotonmailDOTcom (just replace the AT and DOT with ‘@’ & ‘.’). All are invited, including Neo, if she so wishes.
ETA: If you had an Althouse specific screen name, please mentions it in your email.
Neo-
First off I come here to read yours posts and the comments. I think the entire experience is entertaining.
But I also think Althouse had a problem primarily of her own making.
She routinely would state she was espousing “cruel neutrality” When it was quite obvious from her phrasing and comments she was anything but. She often was purposely obtuse in an attempt to hide her feelings. And may times it just set off people in the comments. Who called her on this. As her feeling crept more leftward (as seems to have happened with liberals in general). She became more at odds with those who were long term commenters
Her shtick began to wear on everyone involved. I never commented over there simply because I thought the game she was playing was generally disingenuous. Even when she offered some insight. She is basically a blog version of the MSM claiming to be something she is not. And it became more obvious over time
Part of me believes best literature is participatory. Homer, oral narratives and poems. Shakespeare and the immediacy of live theater with actors speaking the words and audiences, intimate, responding as the dramas unfurl.
And yes, certainly Neo has precise and perfect pitch in her inclusion and valuation of blog comments. It is rare and wonderful when blogger and commenters lift dialogue to something unexpected and uplifting.
I do not know a better place to experience that then here.
Alan French:
Wonderful post.
Muz pretty much said it for me: “…came for the change story, stayed for the range”.
I used to read several blogs, have narrowed it down to Neo’s and Powerline, but this one has always been the hands down best for posts and comments, and thanks so much for both.
There must be so many others like me, a changer who has no other changers in my life, and so this feels like home. Of course politics brought me here, but I love it when you veer off into music, dance, literature, whatever gets your attention. It’s perfect just the way it is.
Althouse.
Neohouse.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hBlB8RAJEEc
So many ch-ch-ch-changes (which as they say is Life’s(TM) only real constant)….
Bonus(?) from…where else…:
https://dailycaller.com/2021/04/06/california-prison-inmates-transgender-transfer-women-gavin-newsom/
H/T Blazingcatfur blog
I have for some years now read both Neo and Althouse on a daily basis, Neo for the posts and Althouse for the comments. Althouse always seemed to be a rehash of whatever the MSM was saying at the moment, although in fairness it saved me from having to read them directly. Neo, on the other hand, is interesting even without considering the comments. Now, with comments gone from Althouse, I find myself reading comments here, and wishing I had started sooner.
Jeanne:
If White-armed Nausicaa dared to venture here, Art-Deco would whip out a Pantone Chart quicker’n you could say ‘Out, Damned Spot!’
Comments Maketh the Blog.
BUT: It takes a rare talent to grow and nurture a blog and get people commenting away (mostly) productively. It’s a wonderful thing Neo has wrought. All hail our gracious and detail-oriented Hostess!
88 comments in I will just add my support for comments, for all the reasons you and the other commenters mention. Personally I get a lot out of the comments – trolls excepted – often learning a great deal about a topic or situation, and also often affirming my point of view. It is great to see many of the Althouse commenters I came to respect and enjoy are popping up here.
Ann Althouse is the most egotistical blogger I have ever read on a regular basis. Four out of five Althouse posts either deal exclusively with herself, or somehow amazingly pivot back to her. For some time, I have thought she should rename the blog “Song Of Myself.”
See, for example, the post discussing her decision to end comments. She tells us she made it after her morning run. Because, you know, as she has told us over and again, she’s a runner! And makes decisions during and after running!
She claims that reader comments indicating they came to the blog more to read other comments than to read her gave her greater resolve to end the comments. I believe it.
Althouse used to be my first go to blog in the morning. No more. If I can’t comment, why bother reading her thoughts. I haven’t been back since she stopped. Not sorry. Her loss!!
gmmay70 said “The “right wing squatters” comment was what turned me right back off from her blog again. No comment about her absolutely poisonous lefties that love nothing more than tossing grenades into discussions. Nope, it’s just evil righty keeping the delicate flowers of the Left from gracing her comments. She’s always been a Lefty, and thus is class obsessed, and wishes to be in good graces with the bien pensants in her twilight years.”
And that was Althouses middle finger to her commenters. When she gets cancelled, and she will, I hope she realizes what a mistake she made in judging the right, the wrong way….
I do think that newspapers should turn off comments. A bunch of internet bullies and psychos tend to control the comments sections of the Washington Post and New York Times. I love this blog – a lot of highly intelligent and literate people post here. I must admit I miss the old Little Green Footballs (until Charles Johnson turned hard Left after Obama became president). I also enjoy Powerline and Victory Girls. I do not feel like arguing with Leftists because they do the Stalinist technique of heaping vile abuse on opinions they do not share.
I’d almost stopped going to the Althouse site in recent months, not much caring for her posts, but I occasionally stopped by because the comments were unusually interesting. Since she’s turned off comments, I doubt I’ll ever go there again.
I like the comments section here, but your blog has the added advantage that your posts are worth reading!
Like others here, I’ve been reading Neo and Althouse for years (among others) and though I’ve commented here only a few times, I’d been pretty much a regular commenter at Althouse (under a different name). It is odd reading Althouse without being able to comment on the posts- which are often quite good topics to wrap your head around. Not sure I know what to do with it now, except for this: I suspect I’ll simply be spending more time thoroughly reading and commenting over here. FWIW.
}}} Perhaps I’m unusual in that regard, but to me a blog without comments is a lonely lonely place.
I generally do not pay much attention to sites that don’t allow comments. Not only is the secondary information usually positive and contributory, but it also allows the author to respond to questions, requests for clarification, and challenges to their position.
One author (Warren, @ Coyoteblog) virtually never responds, and I respect that, but find it annoying, as sometimes there are things he should respond to.
One reason you are one of my two or three first goto sites in any given day is because of the comments (another is the clear, obvious effort you put into researching your subject/topic).
What’s nice is that it’s not such a popular place that the comments become overwhelming (i.e., hundreds of responses the norm) but popular enough that there is good, insightful comment being made.
I would observe, an alternative to shutting down comments would be to arrange for an assistant to moderate them for you. I’d bet there are multiple people here who would consider it for free. THEN the only concern is keeping enough of an eye on them to be sure they aren’t letting it go to their head (one FB page for an SF author I like quite a bit, the moderator is an ardent fourth-wave feminist, made the preposterous statement that the lack of pockets in women’s pants was some male-derived oppressive measure. Laughable, but she was actually serious!! When I politely but clearly trashed that idea — I knew she was a mod — she threatened me with banning if I didn’t shut up. Needless to say, I told her off — still politely — for making such a threat. Banned. :-/ Whatever. Like there aren’t a thousand other places I can contribute to?)
One of the biggest dangers to any site is moderators who think their shit doesn’t stink.
@ gmmay70,
Thanks for the overly generous evaluation. With regard to any powers of perceptivity I might possess, bear in mind what they say about a blind squirrel. You might have just spotted an aphorism briefly come to life.
@ Hubert,
Well, that is because you apparently suffer the defect of rationality, and value nearing the truth more than burnishing an ego. I personally find it easier to deal with challenges to my opinion when it affects some issue I don’t care enough about to have made any previous ego investment of my own. For better or worse, tbat represents a good slice of reality.
For example, I could stand correction on the operational qualities of Ford flat head V-8s all day with perfect equanimity. If someone were to try and blow smoke up … regarding Heidegger, though, I might react immaturely. Not putting up with it! Not after I read all those damn books! LOL
Oh, one thing I should mention – which has little direct to do with comments but which bears on the subject in a way I can’t quite define at the moment – is the privilege I have had in being “schooled” when I was wrong or ignorant, by fundamentally generous and well meaning men: whether it was by an older hunter, an elderly farmer, an academic advisor, or a senior machine design engineeror master mechanic. It’s amazing what you can pick up once you realize you don’t already know it all.
Being thrown into environments where I was initially totally adrift, and knew it, may have been a blessing in disguise.
Hell, the first time I got in the woods with a rifle, I realized didn’t know which direction deer tracks in the snow were actually heading. “Huh, do the points lead the way, or follow like an aerodynamic water droplet”. I could not remmember the orientation of the one or two sets of whitetail hooves I had briefly seen. It seemed like points forward, but … what if I follow in the wrong direction for an hour?
After explaining my admittedly deficient understanding of a jet engine, an associate laughed and said “You have just described a fan in a tube”.
I initially thought all white birch was soft, because I had only cut dead wood with my chain saw: which even if it was standing, had gotten somewhat punky beneath the bark..
Brother, the notions you can get into your head …
Ditto all the praise for Neo on her blog and comment policy/approach.
Chuck already just mentioned (24 hrs ago!) the concept of limiting the number of comments per commenter. I gather that at Belmont Club (Richard Fernandez; PJMedia) they have instituted an informal rule of 4 max comments per threat. It is up to the commenters to adhere to this, and not all do, but the flavor and principle seem to be accepted. The commenters also seem to take an active role in policing and blocking trolls.
If the Althouse group coming here become problematical, then something along those lines might need to be considered here, too?
A blog without comments is a diary.
I’m very late to the party, but here goes anyway. I used to comment frequently on the Althouse blog. As far as I can tell, my earliest comments there were in 2005 or 2006, around the same time I started commenting here. More recently, I’ve pretty much stopped commenting there, though I’ve kept on reading the blog and comments. The main reason for disengaging myself was the tone shift in the comments, which took on a locker-room quality, full of back and forth snark and one-upmanship that too often sounded like a bunch of high-school boys and that crowded out thoughtful discussion. Almost every thread seemed to devolve eventually into personal attacks and name-calling by a few weirdly obsessed regulars against a few regularly singled-out scapegoats. Who needs that? Althouse often begged her commenters to cut it out, but the guilty parties ignored her, and Blogger’s lack of controls made it impossible for her to police. On the other hand, there continued to be many smart, knowledgeable and often funny commenters at Althouse, so you could pick your way through the snark to find things worth reading in almost every thread. But it got tiresome — apparently, not just for the readership, but for Althouse herself.
I’m glad to see the arrival of many of Althouse’s more respected regulars here, as they have much to offer. But I’m also hoping that the Althouse-blog commenting style won’t be imported along with the commenters, and that we’ll be able to keep the more civilized, idea-focused, relatively snark-free culture that has prevailed here for many years. I think our hostess has set the tone for this, both because of her care, attention and years of hard work in comment moderation, but more importantly because of who she is. Her straightforward, thoughtful, carefully researched and analyzed posts are very different from the more cryptic, Socratic and even provocative approach that Althouse often took. (Not to mention ballet, close harmony, makeovers, animal and rescue videos, and jello!) With any luck, the Althouse refugees who flourish in this culture will be the ones who stay, and those who enjoy the Althouse style of commenting will go to the new Discord site instead.
I do want to say that I greatly admire Althouse for her fair-mindedness and courage. She comes from far-left academia, lives in a far-left redoubt, and is at least liberal and maybe moving leftward herself. It’s vanishingly rare to find someone with that background with anything close to her brand of fair-minded fearlessness in pointing out her own side’s warts as well as those of her opponents, not to mention keeping open a comment section without viewpoint controls for as long as she did. I’m thinking, for instance, of her coverage of the Madison protests back in the days of Walker, or much more recently, her frequent posts pointing out unfairness in the treatment of Trump by the WaPo, NYT and such — even though she clearly didn’t support him herself. This approach takes a considerable amount of bravery, and I wouldn’t blame her if the growing pressure of the cancel culture was part of the reason for her decision to shut down comments. But having recently retired myself, I completely sympathize with her frustration with the time sink of comment moderation. Retirement brings with it an overpowering awareness of the precious and finite nature of time. It’s exactly the time of life to quit doing things that don’t have meaning or bring joy. More power to her for making that choice.
I hope that never happens to you, Neo. If you see it coming, please let your commenters know early, so that we can help in any way that may be possible.
I have been using the pseudonym “Bilwick” for many years, at Althouse and Instapundit and elsewhere. For mysterious reasons my Disqus account (used by Instapundit and Lileks) was suddenly no good, so I changed “Bilwick” to “Tilwick.” For me the Althouse comments section gave me sadistic glee as some of the stupidest lamebrains of the Left commentariat beclowned themselves. I pretty much ignored “Chuck,” who seemed like just a head case, and a good example of the saying “you can’t reason someone out of a position they haven’t been reasoned into.” My favorite punching bags were Inga, surely one of the stupidest commenters of all time, and some guy whose pseudonym I forget but who just seemed out to tweak the noses of those of us in the pro-freedom camp and just ended up being a nut job. It’s good to remember Buckley’s obituary for Eleanor Roosevelt: that her life was one unending war against the syllogism. Nowadays that war has been carried on by the Left in general, and the Althouse commentariat reflected that.
DNW,
It’s more a matter of being able to recognize topics about which I am irrational. In those cases, rationality is a possible but not a guaranteed outcome. This blog helps–especially the back-and-forth in the comments and well-stated arguments that challenge my assumptions. Occasionally uncomfortable, but always useful. Being able to see things clearly is a survival skill.
Like you, I have benefited in many areas from expert guidance generously given by people who know a lot more than I do.
On this thread’s topic: I used to read Althouse, but haven’t in years. This is now my go-to blog, along with Meaning in History, Instapundit (but less frequently than before), Powerline (ditto), Legal Insurrection, and several others that shall remain nameless for the same reasons that Frederick gave on another thread.
This is a superb blog. You are doing a wonderful job.
I would never start such a commitment. Too much work. My brain keeps switching interests….I switch around to engineering and science mostly. I guess desultory is the right word.
Thanks for all your work. Here is praise.
I have always respected you for allowing people to disagree with you. Sometimes stridently.
You are a beacon to a cancel culture nation drowning in deceit and censorship.
Q/E has flooded the system with so many additional dollars since 2006 that I’m not sure anyone has an accurate accounting. What the Fed has dumped in during 2020 alone, I think almost equals the past 12 years combined. — gmmay70
Here is the official record of the Federal Reserve balance sheet. Notice that the balance sheet did start to come down a little in the middle of Trump’s term. Then, Kaboom. Exploding up again with COVID.
Is it safe to predict that the Biden multi-trillion spending binge will be mostly monetized and added to the fed balance sheet? With these new spending bills have we become Japan?
This is indeed a great blog, thanks Neo for what you do. I only comment here occasionally, mainly on the music posts (keep those coming, please).
I had become a recent commenter at Althouse and was definitely more drawn to the commentariant there than to her as a blogger. I get why she’s booting the whole commenting thing, but for me as a reader it’s just not that interesting any more if I cannot participate and especially read the other folks’ comments, as it is just a richer experience for me, and for most others, I would bet. Here is where the goals of the blogger and the reader conflict. Oh well, it is what it is.
A good blog with good commenters is SO much better than reading any of the crap the MSM produces. It’s not even in the same universe.
There seem to be a lot of hurt feelings that Ann Althouse has closed down her comments. If she didn’t appreciate all you folks she wouldn’t have worried (several years ago) that moving to a different blog platform would possibly mean losing comments. What she’s worried about now (only my opinion) is losing her blog completely. Today she published an email from a liberal supporter that says in part “I was disturbed by the people you seemed to attract.” And that’s what worries her (again just my opinion) – that she will be deplatformed for the readers she seems to attract. We have some tough years ahead of us.
Eva Marie:
Thing is, though, I can’t think of another major blogger – especially one with active and plentiful comments – who didn’t leave Blogger/blogspot many long years ago. Many of us started out there and left when we saw all the problems. For me, it was especially the problems with comments, and that became very apparent about fourteen years ago. I don’t know how she managed to deal with it all those years. I know that at one point she said the comments wouldn’t migrate to a new site. But mine did, and other people have said it could have been done with the Althouse blog. I have no idea whether that’s right or wrong,; all I know is that my experience was otherwise.
Or, she could have kept the old blog active without writing new posts in it – mine still seems to work after all these years, and it’s free (unlike this one) – and just started a new blog at WordPress or elsewhere. Then she would have a great deal of power to ban anyone she wanted who didn’t follow her rules.
Just wanted to add “dittos” to the praise for Neo’s blog and the commenters, who make it my go-to blog. Thank you Neo for your work providing this wonderful site!
Also want to praise the design– clean, attractive, elegant and user-friendly!
Neo, you’re right. She made a bad decision. As a result today she’s worried (again just my opinion) about the future of her blog. Then again I may be wrong about that. BTW I followed your link to your old blog, then I found your archives on this blog. Your posts are really informative. I’m planning on revisiting the Iraq War through your blog.
I rarely comment; I comment only when I have something useful to say. But I read most comments and find them very very valuable. The posts are very interesting and well thought out. I especially like how you express yourself in a way that’s both straightforward and interesting. I come here every day and value what you do highly. Thank you!
I know I’m late to the party here as I had no time to comment when I first saw this post and Althouse made the change but her blog instantly became less interesting and I have yet to go back.
Don Surber is the other “still on blogspot” blogger I often read:
https://donsurber.blogspot.com/
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