Last week Michael Arrington wrote an important piece in Techcrunch, Blogging and Mass Psychomanipulation. It details how as bloggers we play to our readers for positive regard. We give ‘em red meat.
I think there’s social health psychomanipulation. Many of us indulge the obvious social health memes. We universally bash pharma, blindly buoy the empowered, and champion just about anything at the intersection of digitally democracy and health care. Too many want to be accepted, retweeted, and linked by an evolving hierarchy of power brokers looking to advance one self-imposed new standard.
And every now and again I fall into the trap and offer bread and circus.
If you’re preoccupied with traffic metrics and the blind need to belong, go ahead and jump on the bandwagon. Push those big red easy buttons of social health. Contribute to the echo chamber. Then read Michael Arrington’s piece and look in the mirror. Who (or what) are you really trying to advance?
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This is interesting and somewhat unfair. Anyone can say anything. And yet- it takes a little of the REAL and DEPTH out of the PASSION that people have. It reduces the HONESTY AND INTEGRITY that some people still engage in online. It PRESUMES that we are all out there SEEKING APPROVAL. And yet- some of us ARE GROWN UPS.
Some of us are not shills. Yes?
I’m calling the BULLSHIT CARD. AND I’M NOT PANDERING.
xx
Melissa
Now that’s what I like… By the way, the post applied to everyone but DS
This was so good, I only wish you had said more. I completely agree there’s some groupthink out there and some of it gets quite militant. I have to admit I waffle on this. I’m torn between feeling the need to try to sound more intelligent on Twitter now that people like you and kevinmd are following me, and wanting to just speak from the heart. It’s easier on my blog–on Twitter I find myself just wanting to be clever sometimes. But even there, I want to be true to myself and speak to my experience or beliefs even if it involves being a bit politically incorrect. Like tweeting about the sappy group song that will be an annoying part of Stand Up To Cancer instead of just saying Yeah! Stand up to Cancer!!!! Rarrh!!! I think what dr. snit said is true–it’s gotta come from passion–but I think both of you do that and I try to do that too. Everyone says the key is to be authentic, and I think that’s what appeals to me so much about social media.
I was serious about what I said at the beginning of my comment, I really hope you get into this in more depth sometime.
Thanks, Jackie. The post was considerably longer but I pared it down so as not to uniquely offend or single out any one group. People are very sensitive. I’ll think about expanding, however.
Tell me about it! I’ve seen Dr. Rob unintentionally offend some in the chronic illness and autism camps in his blog, and I ran afoul of it myself when I took on the empowerment issue (I called it consumerism but it’s related) on kevinmd. I just wish the disagreements could be less ideological and based more on the specifics of what we say, or that people could see what was intended. Oh well, a girl can dream, right?
Hey–your truncated blog doesn’t prove your point, does it? ; )
Unfortunately social health is evolving into handful of cottage industries with influence, money, and ego fueling the fire.
I’m working desperately to make my point in the fewest words possible. It’s kinda fun, actually.