An American Asshole’s Rules For Blogging

Welcome to the rantings of a traditional Asshole. An American one.

The type who wants to ask questions but rarely wants the answers, who seeks the truth but fears it because the answers to questions and the Truth are usually stupid, scary or cannot be known because the world has been overcome by lies.

See? Who opens a blog post like that? Me, that’s who. To be honest, someone keeps ragging on me because I call myself an asshole. She means well, and that should make me happy. I should find it encouraging. Or at least touching.

I don’t. I must be honest. I’m a Christian who will step no foot inside church, a writer with only a GED who consistently failed English classes, a doomsayer who sees the world as it is, a place of toxins and destruction, and, finally, a man haunted by a past that he cannot make peace with.

I came here after attempting to post on other sites of mine in which I separated different topics. But it didn’t work, and I deleted those.

But then: someone shows up with a link to my deleted site. My deleted WordPress site!

That…is scary AF.

I was given the usual warning when deleting those sites. You know, “Your information and content will be deleted and this will be permanent.”

Ha. I was too naive to not believe it.

Why Believe Those Who Come In Sheep’s Clothing?

Blogging Rule Number One:

Nothing Gets Deleted

Everything you do, every site you visit, and every word written anywhere at any time, from your first day logged into the webverse, has been saved. Nothing is gone, deleted, lost. All can be retrieved. It’s too late to worry over it now. The best you can do is be more careful, but in the end, asshole me is fucked. That’s why I’m honest. A man with nothing to hide has nothing to fear. And a man with nothing to lose has nothing to hide. I admit my sins and mistakes. And those I must apologize to will hear it. I’ve removed posts after reflection, finding that I was engaged at the time in wrong thinking or under the influence of warped news articles. I’m emotional and I write from what I feel as well as what I know. I’m imperfect and I’m always going to be.

Blogging Rule Number Two:

Be Who You Are

Following the tutorials offered by WordPress is wise if you want to build a solid following. I’ve never done this, because I’m an asshole, so much so that I insist on being honest about my life, even it’s painful to be so, and often painful for others to read about. Our lives are very different, but we often share the same experiences. I know this, and therefore I know that I have several kinds of followers. Some may like my writing, as crude as it is, and reading anything raw may give them some inspiration, or, conversely, an example of what not to do. Some have read my posts on the many horrors of abuse, PTSD and mental illness. I don’t know if they have helped someone; maybe one of the many silent victims who need to read about the possibility of breaking that silence. I tell you, silence has killed, and far too often.

Some may have been struck by my take on current events. You can scroll back in time and see what I wrote about something and try to pick up something you find striking, or particularly wise. Although I’m an asshole, even men like me stumble upon the odd piece of wisdom on occasion. I hope that you are able to find what you need here. It’s why I do this. I just want to help. To let people know that they are not alone.

Rule Two is, look through the tutorials, picture what you really want, with some kind of formula. Do not use me as a template. I may get two “likes” on a post I spent days writing, while your Reader feed brackets me with other’s posts with hundreds of little blue stars. If you want stats that depress you, then don’t be like me. I freewheel. I write when I can. I write what I’m moved to, not what I think I’m supposed to write. I’m a rambler. That can tend to throw readers off.

I’m happy to have built up over one hundred subscribers, but it has taken years to do it. And that’s because I write for free; no Patreon, no sponsors, no societies for a cause; no advertising will ever appear here which in any way profits me. I have no control over ads and have no clue what you might see here.

Having sponsored sites is a fine thing. If you can afford paying for your site, getting started is difficult but hooking up with help is okay with me. I used to follow one such blogger, but her full page photograph at the top of every post grew to annoy me. The writing beneath the picture was often superficial, and I came to realize that I did not enjoy superficiality or shallowness. If you’re beautiful, that’s wonderful. But your blog is only as good as your sincerity and openness; you have to live up to being a real celebrity, because with thousands of followers, that’s what you are, and when you let any one of them down, they’ll turn on you. If you can handle that, go for it. Just know that at my level or the one you reach, not every post will be liked or even read by all of your followers, and that some likes will be obligatory, automatic and perhaps given by someone who never bothered to even read the first sentence.

Blogging Rule Number Three:

Beware Those Who Come In Sheep’s Clothing

You can’t know who follows or subscribes to your site. To attempt to is a violation of trust between you and someone reading your life. However, that bit comes with a stern warning: some will follow because they like what and how you write. Others, not so much. They know you better than you think they do, as evidenced by the deleted post someone retrieved from a deleted site. You could very well have picked up a stalker, and one with that kind of technical experience is to be regarded as a threat. Someone to be feared.

Let me say that another way: I was meant to see that post. It had the feeling of being a threat. No blogger should believe otherwise. When comments become too personal, or even if no comments are there at all, you could be in someone’s cross hairs. You’re a potential target for just about anything. At that point of realization, you may panic. You may begin looking over your shoulder. And you have nothing to tell law enforcement. Only that creeping feeling that you might be in danger, and they can’t do anything about that.

I’ve tried to discover who’s been murdered because of their blogs. The search was fruitless as most bloggers I read about were victims of crimes of passion, or were killed because of politics or revelations about crime cartels, or speaking out about their repressive government.

One thing I did stumble upon was an insult to every blogger ever: it dated to 2012 or 2014 and declared the blogosphere devoid of all the novices and their typo-filled nonsense, and more serious writers would take their place. This appeared on a well-known news site, one whose articles I’ve often found full of nonsense and typos. So to them I say, “Shut the fuck up.”

Someone I suspect of retrieving the deleted blog wasn’t on my radar at all. Then, yesterday, I saw a woman who looked exactly like the picture on her own site. I can’t trust my eyes, so I stared as she moved across my path, looking askew at me, and smirking. What may be and probably is a coincidence can also be something more. In this world, you can’t always be so sure. I’ve been stalked before, both before the internet and on it. It’s some scary shit, and the police never believe a man can be threatened by a woman, not stalked, not harassed, nothing. They don’t believe you. Cops can be dense in such situations. Sometimes it takes a homicide detective to look the cop who ignored the pleas of terrorized people to say, “Well, officer, maybe next time you’ll fucking listen.”

This, of course, is the dark side of blogging. Bad things can happen to any of us. When I write from darkness, I know that it’s possible to attract a dark soul. Usually they’re harmless. But I might also attract the well-meaning soul who wants me to, in turn, follow their own work. Sometimes they think that they can fix me. Or maybe use me as an example to others of a lost soul.

That’s nice, but it can go south faster than a tornado can blow apart a particle board house.

Of all the people on this Earth, I fear no one group except for Christians. I do not fear Jews or Muslims, people of color, Russians, not even Nazis. But those on the far right, the Evangelicals, the fuckers who call for democrats or liberals to be persecuted, targeted for violence, those who hawk vials of “miracle water” and plastic buckets as flotation devices (!), yes. I fear them. I want nothing to do with them and their greed, hatred and false doctrine. I believe in the Holy Trinity, but unlike Christ, some Christians are as evil as humans ever get. If you write about them, be ready. They have every bit the power and resources to track you and hurt you.

Blogging Rule Number Four:

Be Grateful For Readers

It’s fine to ignore this rule if you like. But the blogger I cited as shallow at least answered comments graciously and with sincere thanks. It showed. I get few comments, few likes, few views, fewer visits. The very idea that I get any at all has given me the only moments of happiness I’ve had since my son passed. I’m grateful for all of you and encourage you to show gratitude to your readers as well. You don’t have to, but they don’t have to read, either.

Other than these, my Asshole’s Rules for Blogging, I have no advice, and I’m sorry. I wish you luck, though, and will end only by encouraging you to use your site for good things. Photos of scenery, tales of adventure and the things you need to pass on to others.

We all want to be noticed. We all hope our visitors will like what they find. And we want, sometimes more than anything, to make a difference. Just don’t be like me, and you’ll do great things.