Are Bloggers "White-Male Bigmouths"?

On the Internet, no one knows you're black. Or white. Or purple. Or a cross-dressing Canadian who likes needlepoint, chili tacos, and rockabilly bands. All of these things are irrelevant and unknown to your potential audience — unless you make it a point of telling everyone. And in that case, who cares? It's not the color of your skin that counts, or your sexual identity, or your taste in music or your food preference; your opinions do, and how well you put them into words.

That's what strikes me as so patently absurd about Steven Levy's handwringing in the current issue of Newsweek. Levy bemoans bloggers' lack of diversity, noting that a recent Harvard conference on blogging and the media was attended by quite a few A-list bloggers — "a list dominated by bigmouths of the white-male variety," as he puts it. (Hmm. Harvard. Big mouth. White male. Larry Summers had better stay out of this one.)

Unlike the traditional news industry, where the old-boy network has long kept talented women and minorities on the outside looking in, blogging is the ultimate meritocracy. There is virtually no barrier to starting a blog. No one can keep you from writing and publishing exactly what you want, down to the last comma and exclamation mark. Even economic disparities don't really determine whether or not people can join the blogosphere. Computers are cheap and ubiquitous, and plentiful free blog space is the norm rather than the exception.

Not everything has to be seen through the prism of race or gender. In fact, few things do. Assuming the mantle of the victim (as Keith Jenkins does on behalf of African-Americans, and Rebecca MacKinnon on behalf of the worldwide sisterhood) is just silly politics, as transparent as it is tired. You want a successful blog? It has nothing to do with the hue of your face or whether you possess a penis. The secret to a blog's success is simple: make sure you're informed, have something to say, then pour your heart out. Publish and be damned (or celebrated). Tell others what you're doing, ask them to spread the word, and never waver. If you're any good at all, readers will find you, and — this being the 21st century — almost none of them will give a single thought to the shape of your nose or the curve of your chest.

Blog on!

Comments

[Poustman]

The other good thing is that there is no access to a captive audience. Anyone, everyone, no one: your blog can be read by all or none or anything in between. It's not like when the networks ruled, and you had 3 channels to choose from. It's not even like a paltry 400 cable channels. This is millions of websites. Only people's desire to read _you_ will bring them to your site. No amount of 'I just want to read a blog and this is all I could find' will occur.