As I prepare for #Twitterless2020 — my John Green-inspired decision to sign off Twitter for the year — I’ve been pondering how to strike the right balance between two competing impulses.
On the one hand, I know myself too well to think I’ll be happy without an outlet for publishing stuff when I have something to say (or a joke to tell, some photos to show off, a link to comment on, etc.). Decades of experience suggest that trying to completely “go dark” for a year, #lastman-style, would surely fail; I would inevitably cheat on my resolution, and/or stumble into some poorly-considered Twitter substitute. Thus, in order for #Twitterless2020 to be sustainable, I need a “safety valve” — a pre-planned Twitter alternative(s) that makes sense for me.
On the other hand, I don’t want my Twitter alternative(s) to undermine the central purpose of my New Year’s Resolution to go Twitterless in 2020, which is to create a guardrail of sorts for my mental & emotional well-being in the coming election year (and impeachment-trial year). Now that Trump has the powers of incumbency, and the GOP fully in his grip, this is going to be the WORST. ELECTION. EVER. If I’m not careful, I’ll be drawn to its gross excesses and outrages like a moth to a flaming dumpster fire caused by a train wreck. And Twitter has a unique ability to crystallize the worst of all that, condensing the resulting anger and anxiety into its raw elemental form. So the primary goal of #Twitterless2020 is to reduce somewhat my exposure to political angst, rage and toxicity — self-generated and otherwise — and make it easier for me to be intentional about my consumption of news in 2020.
It isn’t that I’ll completely ignore politics in the new year, of course. That would be both impossible and undesirable. But I want to consciously decide when to pay attention to politics, and when to set it aside, as opposed to getting unintentionally sucked in to the toxic vortex of bulls**t by the Twitter Outrage of the DayTM, or by the inexorable need to argue with some Wrong-on-the-Internet rando in my mentions.
You’re wrong on the Internet! And YOU’RE wrong on the Internet! EVERYBODY’s wrong on the Internet! pic.twitter.com/uBELn7RJaj— Mile High Brendan (@MileHighBrendan) June 29, 2016
Anyway… my original plan was to use Instagram (which is, for me, the least-toxic, least-political social media platform) as my main publishing outlet, with YouTube and Tumblr as fallbacks if I have something lengthier to say or write. But when I explained this to Becky — who thinks #Twitterless2020 is a great idea, but who also emphatically reminded me that I’ve always had an urge to publish stuff somewhere — she asked why I would use Tumblr rather than just going back to blogging, on a blog that I fully own and control, like in the old days (before the dark times…before the Trumpire).
I hadn’t considered that possibility, in part because I’d gotten it into my head that I officially shut down this Living Room Times blog in ~2013-14 (like I did with the Irish Trojan blog back in 2008). But, in fact, I never did shutter the LRT blog. It just gradually fell into disuse, as I explained on February 24, 2014:
As you may have noticed, this blog has gone completely dormant over the last year. I’ve been slow in setting up redirects, but if you’re looking for an Oscar or NCAA pool, go to my Tumblr page . . .
I’m not formally shutting this blog down — who knows, maybe I’ll pick it up again at some point — but for now, all my online energies are focused on Tumblr and Twitter.
Well, that “some point” as arrived. I’m picking it up again. I’m gettin’ the blog back together.
Sort of.
The thing is, I’m not planning to blog “hyperactively,” like I used to. I don’t even really intend to blog regularly (though we’ll see what happens). So I don’t want to over-promise here.
At present, I’m envisioning this space as an outlet that I can use occasionally, whenever I feel like it, much like how I used my Tumblr. So I can post here when I have something I want to say, and then if I don’t blog again for an extended period of time, that’s fine. There will be none of the old pressure to “feed the beast.” That’s the hope, anyway. 🙂 Time will tell.
But what’s really important is avoiding the uniquely toxic nature of Twitter in the current political era. Even if I end up blogging about politics here from time to time, the longer-form nature of a blog naturally lends itself to a bit more thought, a few extra moments to consider if I actually have something worthwhile to say — or if I’m just pointlessly raging & arguing, screaming into the void, and in the process, generating toxicity from INSIDE THE HOUSE.
Basically, just as swearing off Twitter should make it easier to be intentional about my consumption of news, posting my thoughts in blog posts (rather than tweets) should make it easier to be intentional about what I’m saying. Hopefully.
So anyway, that’s what’s happening with the blog.
Oh, and also: I’ve imported all of my Living Room Tumblr posts into the blog’s WordPress back-end. So, in essence, I’m merging the LRT blog of 2009-2014 with the LRT Tumblr of 2011-2019, and moving forward into 2020 with this blog as my primary publishing outlet (or co-primary, alongside my @MileHighBrendan Instagram account.)
And then we’ll see where it goes. ¯_(ツ)_/¯