Catherine at Her Bad Mother has a thought-provoking (as usual) post about the nature of mommy-blogging, and whether or not writing about our children is inherently exploitive. Catherine was interviewed for an article on the subject, and – unsuprisingly, given the nature of journalism -is being pilloried by angry commenters who believe she has selfishly defiled the pure, unsullied world of motherhood.
My father was a Baptist pastor for forty years. And for forty years, my life and the lives of my siblings were constant material for illustrations and anecdotes from the pulpit. He told stories about us in his sermons, usually without our permission, and with only a glance at accuracy. The point he was trying to make in the sermon was the major consideration, rather than how we felt about the story.
And unlike Catherine’s daughter, I had to face the people who heard those sermons every day. They would talk to me about the stories. They would tease me about the stories. The stories Dad told had consequences for me, and I don’t think he always thought about that.
That experience has certainly shaped the way I write about my children. There inevitably comes a day when much of what we do will embarrass our children, simply because our existence is evidence that they are still not yet fully grown, but I do try to write my blog in a way that will not be fodder for future teasing. Each parent has to determine what these lines are. Some bloggers are willing to include details of their children’s lives that I would clearly mark “Mortifying -Do Not Use.” But the wider issue -whether writing about our children (sometimes for money! shocking!) is inherently exploitive – seems to me to be reasonably answered with a negative.
My father did what every pastor with children has done, every Sunday, for hundreds of years. So far as I can tell, there is no public outcry calling fathers in the pulpit “pimps” and “whores” who exploit their children. Sometimes I wish he had drawn the veil of privacy a little closer, especially in my teenage years, but I certainly never thought that he was an evil, money-grubbing defiler of childhood or a failure as a father because he used me for anecdotes.
I think, as some of Catherine’s commenters point out, that part of the reason this arouses such passion is that we are talking about mothers. We have a different set of cultural expectations about motherhood. Mothers are supposed to be unconcerned with anything but their children’s happiness. Mothers are not supposed to consider their own needs. A mother writing online because she needs the creative outlet, or longs to maintain contact with a community, or even (gasp!) wants to earn a few pennies (seriously, people – this is not major money for most bloggers) is not playing her part according to the script handed her.
I am not saying that mommy-blogs are never exploitive; some of them are. And I stop reading those when I find them. But I don’t expect everyone to share my precise standards of what should be kept private on the internet, any more than I expect them to share my standards about what should be kept private in conversation. Chances are I know more details about my friends’ husbands than they know about mine.
And in the vehemence of the angry commenters, I think there is something darker. The anonymity of the internet allows many people to be cruel in a way they would never manage face to face. I do not believe that cruel commenters really believe that there is nothing wrong with cruelty on the internet. Rather, they believe that this is the realm where they get to be unaccountable, where people “expect” bad behavior. And when mothers write about their children online – when motherhood and the vulnerability of childhood are included in the world wide web – it is a reminder that the rules of civilization apply here, too.
If motherhood exists online, then there is no place that is really free from it. If motherhood exists online, then the cruelty that is a violation of the nurture of children is still cruelty, even when it’s online. When the flamers rage that we should be protecting our children rather than “exploiting” them by telling cute anecdotes to each other online, I think the rage is really that our presence online just might mean that the flamers are still responsible for their actions, even here in the worldwide web.
Perfectly said, Veronica. It’s the presence of mothers online, *as mothers*, that they find alarming and – as you suggest, quite rightly – threatening. Far better to force mothers to hold to old (paternalistic) notions of privacy than to come up with their own definitions. Because then we might – gasp – make our mothering public. Make it relevant to *them*.
I really don’t care what those commentors think. I like telling my kids stories and, heck, they might actually get a kick out of it someday.
amen.
I wonder if I’d be able to recognize exploitation if I saw it. I hope so, but I’m not quite sure what it would look like in the mommyblogging world.
excellent…well said…and yes …I rarely read a blog that makes money or doesn’t and think of it as exploitive…
Great post. Well said.
So well spoken!
This fellow PK smiles with recognition – never quite having forgiven my dad for using my favorite stuffed dog as a sermon prop thankyouverymuch. I agree, that kind of storytelling and blogging are different – more in terms of audience-child interaction than anything else, I suspect.
[...] Veronica has a real knack for noticing and then articulating the subtext of a conversation. But then I already knew [...]
I enjoyed reading both the post and article you linked and your thoughts on it. I will say, this post makes me appreciate my husband. He is a pastor, and never uses any of us in his sermons without first asking permission.
I do agree with Catherine– my children’s stories are my stories too. The only thing in that article that shocked me is that people are making $40,000 a month with a blog. And I’m not shocked in a disgusted way. I’m shocked in a “dang, how exactly does one do that?” kind of way.
Another PK here whose dad didn’t always get his facts straight. I didn’t always like it, but I don’t think he exploited us per se–he never told anything really awful, maybe just a little embarrassing. (And now when I teach the adult class I can tell some things on him!)
Back to your post–I do try to think about how my kids will feel about what I’m writing when they’re old enough to have an opinion. If and when they ask me not to write about them, I will honor that request. Be that as it may, writers have always used the raw materials of their lives, whether they were writing fiction or nonfiction. Personally, I think my kids will want to read my account of what life was like from my perspective during these years.
[...] subject and it made me want to share this discussion with those who read our blog. I think that this blog post and many of the defending comments to the original article sum it up for me. In fact, my post [...]
:::applause:::
Well done, my friend. Well done.
Yeah, I think those critical commenters are tapping into some psycho sexist idea that women should be saints that never blink from total service to their children, never have an idea or life of their own. I mean, you’re supposed to raise children for years and years, but not talk about it?
Interesting and thought provoking – thanks.
brilliant.
I love the whole “Putting personal information out there for MILLIONS OF PEOPLE to see” complaint. MILLIONS of people are going to read my blog now? MY ad avenue is going to go THROUGH THE ROOF!
I think the rage is really that our presence online just might mean that the flamers are still responsible for their actions, even here in the worldwide web
Exactly. Just so. Yes, yes.
I have made similar conjectures about the “I hate children” vitriol that pops up from time to time around Teh Interwebs. Fark discussion threads (which are funny just often enough to keep me coming back for an occasional browse) often devolve this way. People go on and on about how having children in this “overcrowded” world is irresponsible, and anyway children are annoying and loud and messy and difficult to control and should be shut up behind locked doors until they are eighteen. Blah de blah de blah. My take on this is that the presence in a public space of children, who by their very existence– immature, vulnerable, and messy– make certain demands on us, is so offensive to these folks because it reminds them that at some point in our lives we need to place someone else’s needs and happiness above our own. And the very idea of submitting to that kind of unselfishness is an offense to many humans, because we as a race are pathologically selfish.
I’m a PK too, and my dad always told embarrassing stories about me, that were not always strictly accurate
I didn’t really mind though.
Great post BTW, I’m not a mum, but I love reading what you write, you have a wonderful knack for expressing thoughts in a clear, yet subtle way.
Excellent and thought-provoking.
I think the desire to write/speak/share about our families goes back to the beginning of oral tradition and story-telling. By speaking on the actions of ourselves and others, we attempt to make an impression on the world. Small or large, it is only human to record our days for posterity.
I think many of the flamers grossly overestimate the average blog’s reach. Millions of people have access to read my blog, but they certainly don’t. Millions of people have access to my street, too, but they don’t walk by my house.
I also think bloggers are inherently narcissistic to one degree or another. Many of the flamers are no doubt upholding their anti-”exploitation” stance as virtuous. It makes them feel like better mothers for holding close the deep dark secret that their baby had a poopy blowout at Target.
My father is a minister and used us in his sermons periodically. I only remember being embarrassed once, and what he said wasn’t all that embarrassing in actuality – only because I was young. Now, if he used me as fodder, I would love it. If people can learn from my mistakes, all the better.
One of the reasons I keep writing my blog is that my mom and I talk alot and I look to her for advice, but she can’t remember much of our childhood – not details, anyways. And scrapbooking doesn’t, in my opinion, share the details that I care to remember. I think the kids would like it. If they’re mortified because I occasionally talked about our potty training trials, then I figure I haven’t raised them right. I do draw a line for topics on which I will not post.
Personally, I think one of the best things about blogs is that you can “share” the anecdotes, but people don’t have to read them if they’re bored by them. You can’t do that in a face-to-face conversation.
I’ve loved hearing all the funny, mis-adventures I had as a child. However, the act of remembering the story, finding the baby book and the moment to write it all down can be a challenge and certainly was for my working mom. I wonder how many more stories I’d have about my childhood had my mother been a blogger? THAT’S what I’m giving my children.
I knew there was a reason I resonated with you — I too, am the daughter of a Baptist pastor. Props for admitting it in public.
Now that my husband is a pastor, too, I once again hold the mixed bag of having my life be exposed to the public like a bunch of bad Polaroids. It can be embarrassing, but it can also be motivating to live a life that’s worth talking about. I’ll take the trade-off.
We ARE our stories. You are giving your children a living history in a way many mothers have only dreamed of doing. And you’re probably helping them write a better story of their lives.
One of the reasons that I like to read blogs (and sometimes comment but don’t post much on my own) is that I feel like I have a connection to other women and other mommies. When you have gone from being in the working world for 10-12 hours a day to suddenly being home 90% of the time, it is a bit shocking to the system. Sometimes I want to commiserate with other moms about the baby stuff, or just STUFF. Phone is great, and play dates are fun, but we all have our hands full much of the time. Jen, from conversiondiary.com had a somewhat recent post about how the blogosphere is kinda like a community well.
And it is comforting to me to sit down and open my Google Reader and browse, just for a minute or two, and see that some other mom, somewhere in the Western (mostly) Hemisphere, is having a day like I am.
Also, weirdly, there is some comfort in the annonymity of the internet. I can read funny stories, and share some things, and talk about real stuff, all with women I don’t really know. And we can get down to the nitty-gritty.
I think that the commenters on the Globe article didn’t think deeply about it. But then again, that is one of the downsides to the internet. If they all had to write a letter to the editor, as used to be the case, the comments would have been nicer, or at least more civil. It is so easy to spew onto a comment box and press submit.
Just like I am going to do!
I have felt the compulsion to be a mom when when am surfing. I will stumble upon blogs when the person just needs someone to sit them down and give them a good talking-to. But I control myself. Unless they ask for advice I try not to lecture too much. And if they are really out of control, I choose not to read them. I wish the flamers would exercise that kind of self-control.
mmhm.
nicely said.
I’m so far behind. I realized today that I actually skipped an entire day of blog-reading, and look what happens! So I’m reading this post before Catherine’s, and putting two and two together a bit with some other posts I’ve read, and I think this is just brilliant.
I’m also struck by the varying reactions of the PKs here. Discussions of mommy-blogging often assume that the ultimate arbiters of the rightness or wrongness of it will be our children: if they “mind” then that proves we were in the wrong, and if they’re okay with it then we’re in the clear. But really it’s far more complex than that: different people will respond differently, and those responses will evolve over time. We have a responsibility to be sensitive, but there is also a responsibility not to be touchy: if it’s wrong to violate someone’s privacy, it’s also wrong to nurture minor grievances and elevate them to tragic proportions. If a teenager becomes enraged because he discovers a few anecdotes about his toddler years online, I’d say the moral fault probably lies with him, not his mother.
This was a great post Veronica. I have recently really started thinking about the stories of my children I have put on my blog. Some of the ones about my older kids I have deleted. Some of the ones about my younger kids I may need to. Now my criteria is “Is this a story I would tell to an acquaintance?” Not a friend, someone I don’t know. It’s really made me rethink my writing. AND stunted it. Since goodness knows, I don’t have anything else going on in my life.
B&P, my parents salute you.
Excellent post. I had never thought of the angle of the pastor using family examples in sermons, which I agree is probably extremely common across the world. That, and numerous other examples (successful mom authors? Comediennes? plenty more) show that telling stories about kids is nothing new whatsoever. The only difference is that on the internet, the stories are more persistent. This is certainly a concern, but one that each individual family has to address on their own. In other words, while it may be a concern for Catherine, Catherine’s decision is none of *my* concern, unless she were to ask others’ opinions on it.
One thing that has me a bit baffled in all this brouhaha is how seriously and singularly people have taken those Globe commenters. Those commenters and others of their ilk stalk media outlets like “giant stalking things.” (thanks, Blackadder)
They were there to annoy me two weeks ago when the pregnant Toronto teen was incarcerated and they have been lurking and splurting on every spun story the electronic version of the paper has put out. I agree with all you say about how blogging mothers are perceived and the anti-woman overtones implied by it. For that I hold the Globe accountable b/c they are the ones who spun that story and portrayed those bloggers in a given way. As for the commenters, I refuse to waste my time thinking about them.
I’m still stuck on forty thousand a month. (What?! You know I’m shallow.)
i’m late to this but it’s by far the most salient commentary i’ve seen on the topic…yes, there are lines to draw, and stories that would seriously humiliate their subjects – even if said subjects are not yet able to read – are probably best not published online. but the rest? part of being in a family is the interconnectedness of our stories, and i believe we all have the right to tell tales of our embeddedness with these other lives, so long as we’re considerate. most bloggers i read ARE considerate, almost universally.
and if the worst thing my child grows up with is the knowledge that i wrote about him and about being his mother online in an ancient blog, and that once i mentioned he pooped all over me at five days old, he’ll be a lucky, happy boy indeed.
Why is it if a man tells stories about his kids online or even in front of a group, he’s praised — people think he’s a good father and is active in his kids’ lives… But if mommybloggers to it, we’re exploiting… Geez.
I talk about my little guy alot. One of the reasons I started a blog was because I have a cousin with cancer. And I know a few other people who never really got to know their moms. They wonder what their moms were like. And I wanted to (and still do) record what he was doing and how I was feeling so that if something were to happen, he’d have an idea of what his mama was like — what she thought about and so forth. Morbid? I guess. But I wanted, and still do, to leave him with a piece of me. And my blog is a big piece of me…. For better or for worse….
Your perspective as a preacher’s daughter is very interesting one. I’m glad you wrote about this.