censoring myself
I have censored myself on Essin-Em.com.
For the first time. Ever.
When J and I broke up, I didn’t censor myself. Yes, I knew he was reading. Yes, maybe I phrased things slightly less vitriolicly, but I still wrote about it. I needed to write about it. J understood.
When I rant and rave, I rant and rave, even if it makes me look like an idiot. If I need to further explain myself, I do. But I put it out there.
I make up names for people – I never give identifying features. In fact, very few people I know in real life even read this. Most of you are people in know in the blogosphere, or people I don’t even know at all. J was the only person I’ve had sex with that I’ve ever GIVEN this link to.
Well, now I’ve censored myself. You may have noticed that there was a post up this morning that is no longer up. It was redeeming myself for the negative and bitchy post I wrote after New Year’s. In fact, it was the first real “sex blog” post I had written in what, forever? Detailing my sexploits of New Year’s Eve…the hunt and the chase…the fact that I suck at flirting…the difference between Femme wiles and feminine wiles (and a call for help on learning how to flirt), and finally – the sex! Which was actually good, despite what I said (again, welcome to me focusing on the negative). And a bullet point list of what I had learned about myself. And all the positives I got from the experience (and the negative – sore nipples for days…which really was a positive, because finally, someone who could keep up with me!)
Anyways. The subject of the post had apparently found my blog. He messaged me (not on here – via another social networking site). And he asked me not to post anything about him, because it might ruin his rep. So I took it down. I am a polite person. I was asked to do so, and I did. I suppose if I ever wanted anyone to not say something about me (not that I would really care, as long as they didn’t use my name…since many things have been said about me), I would want them to be respectful as well.
But I feel angry. And dirty. And like someone has taken away a significant freedom in my life. I know it is silly to feel this way. But I do. The thing about a blog is that I should be able to write anything I want, and say whatever I want to say (especially when it’s a fucking POSITIVE!!!! god damn it), and not worry about people emailing and messaging me to tell me not to. I mean, it’s one thing to start debates in the comments; that’s fine, I like debates. I support that. If I say the sky is blue, feel free to say it’s purple. But there is a reason I blog as Essin’ Em and not as my real name. And there is a reason I don’t use other people’s real name’s on here. It’s so people DON’T FREAKING MAKE ME CENSOR MYSELF. Gah.
What do the rest of you bloggers do? I know AAG recently had a break-up like situation where her former lover was reading her blog…I should ask her what she did. What about everyone else? How many of you have had to censor your posts?
That is all.
Essin’ Em
***Here is the first part of the post, up until the part the person who would like not to be posted entered. After that, it is truncated***
I was at a party with people I didn’t know.
No, that’s a lie. I know my best friend, and her boy friend. We were at his snazzy loft apartment in downtown Denver, welcoming in 2008. We walked in, and I was immediately draw to this cute girl, kind of an emo andro-ish hair cut, wearing a rainbow sparkly tie over a blue button down shirt with a black vest. Of course I asked my best friend, “well, is she queer?”
“I don’t know…um…I don’t know who she is, but I don’t think any of my boyfriend’s friends are…but she might be! You should go talk to her!”
I started pouring drinks. The derby girls on my old league told me I was an excellent bartender…and before I knew it, the hot girl’s friend was coming over, asking me what was in my blue concoction, and if I’d make her one. Soon, the object of my attraction was on her way, and we were all chatting about my hair and hair dying, and of course, sex toys. Unfortunately for me…straight. Although the friend’s sister was a lesbian, and incredibly hot (according to cell phone pictures), she wasn’t there. At least they made for good conversation and drinking partners.
Then out came the Wii, and I don’t mean anything naughty. I’m usually quite bad at video games, but this one at least was quite interactive, and my best friend and I played the cow racing game for quite some time before other players showed up and we played tennis and bowling.
———————CENSORED——————————————–
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I’ve had to censor myself too, it’s not fun.
Actually, one of my exes, with whom I had maintained a friendship, stopped speaking to me ~6 months ago because he didn’t like a few posts I’d written that referenced him (anonymously of course). Since he was already not speaking to me, I decided not to bother taking down the posts because I thought they didn’t exactly portray him in a bad light and still served a good purpose illustrating a point.
Deciding to censor yourself or not, and if so, how, is always tough. Personally, the biggest rule I write by is that I won’t write anything I wouldn’t say to someone’s face.
The only thing I can think of that I wrote that turned rather negative, was the situation I had with Marcus, and even then, the actual post I wrote simply said “This is what happened. These are the actions that took place, and *this is how I FEEL about them* though later, there was some mudslinging. But I refused to take it down.
I have once or twice taken down details, when asked, but generally those were identifying details the person I was writing about didn’t want to share. I mentioned one gentleman blogger’s race, which he asked I change, as he doesn’t want that detail shared, and when my former flatmate asked that I not mention him or his girlfriend again, I stopped – though I chose not to take down anything already written. Though, when I first started writing, my ex and I were not in a happy place, and I wrote a few things I decided I’d rather he not hear, at least not through a blog, and when he started reading me, I went back and phrased them a bit more delicately.
As for people in my real life reading – many of my other friends, and several lovers, are sex bloggers. Both my sisters, and my female cousins read my blog. My BFFs read my blog. My favourite Aunt also has the address, though I don’t know if she read. Two of my ex lovers read me, and I think all of the people I currently see read me as well.
Since even IRL, I prefer to use the name Wendy, and I use my Wendy email address, my new lovers are given the link in emails, and go or not, though I always let them know that I may or may not write about them, and they are welcome to read if they want. If I know someone is going to be staying around for a while, I usually ask permission, and ask if they have anything they don’t want me to share, but it hasn’t been a problem for me. I was wary, at first, to write about Sebastian, since he’s very paranoid about every outside the sex scene finding out about his love of pegging, but when I told him I was writing about him, he was pleased – and just reconfirmed that I wouldn’t share any identifying details, which of course I wouldn’t.
Of course, I could at any time toss this out the window. I absolutely refuse to let anyone tell me what I can or cannot write. While I try to be nice, and not intentionally hurt people’s feelings, I refuse to be censored because someone didn’t like something I wrote about them.
I get a bit militant about censorship, but then again, I *am* planning to be a librarian. :)
This guy sounds like a total fuckwit.
THERE YOU GO DUDE, ONLINE REP RUINED, OH NOES!
That said, I have been in the position to censor myself before. Not at the behest of someone else but more how much RL information I wanted to put out in the world. I feel your pain.
Frankly, unless you mentioned the guy by name, I can’t imagine how it would ruin his reputation (and exactly how does it ruin a male’s reputation when he’s slept with someone, let alone you in particular? That’s rather insulting of him!) to be anonymously spoken of on a blog where, if I am not mistaken, you’re being semi-anonymous anyway.
After all, most people probably don’t think your real name is “Essin’Em”.
I think it’s rather polite of you to censor yourself at his request, but rude of him to expect that you censor yourself for the sake of his “rep” – while your blog seems well-read, how many people, exactly, will connect all the dots and find it to be negative?
I can’t imagine that this is an especially good way of encouraging you to still like straight men, either, given the way his attitude comes across.
I think “censor” might be the wrong word here, though I’m not really sure what the right word is.
When we write about ourselves, not all is revealed, even when things are written as they are happening, on a blog. And often lots is revealed between the lines, in the unwritten. Just important things to remember.
When you write about other people, in many ways you take away their agency. Sure, they can comment publicly or privately, they can start their own blogs, etc. However, many people feel violated by being written about. This is a real things that writers have always faced, but the immediacy and public accessibility of blogs amps this up a few notches.
“No identifying details” and the use of pseudonyms are not really fool proof – not by any means. These are kind of flimsy arguments, in my opinion.
And I know it’s your blog, your space, and their choice to read, but I think that’s overly simplistic.
This isn’t to say that you should stop writing what you write, but that you should think about it. Believe me, I’ve been there and done all that and it’s tough stuff to come to terms with. Several years ago I had a bf who didn’t read my blog, which was mostly about him and our sex life, and when we broke up and he read it, he said that he felt like I was having a different relationship than he was. Just a fun little anecdote from my bloggy past!
Dacia – I respect what you have to say. And yes, that *is* why I took it down, because I do respect him as a person as well, and I don’t want to take away any of his rights. I don’t want to hurt anyone with this blog – that’s not my goal or intention.
However, it wasn’t that he wanted me to take down previous posts, it was that he didn’t want me to write anymore, including this one (which portrayed him in a very good light), which just seemed so weird to me. If you’re going to ask me to…”moderate” (since you don’t seem to like the term censor) what I write, it seems like an odd way of going about it.
More over, he KNEW I was a sex blogger. During sex in fact, he asked me what I was going to write about him. It wasn’t like I was being sneaky about it.
I don’t know. I don’t run a blog about my sex life. In fact, very little of my blog is written about my sex life (possibly because I really don’t have one, but possibly because I find so many other things to write about). I just don’t like some person I don’t know who really didn’t treat me that amazingly to begin with coming back into my life to say rude things to me about how “busy” I’ve been at school and how I must wonder what else he’s learned about me (should I take that as a threat?) and taking away my ability to write whatever I want. There are exactly 3 people who know who he is (two who were there, and 1 who I told), and anyone else who he told doesn’t read my blog…and 2 of those three people got full details (fuller than the post) from me anyways. So I just feel…completely constrained.
Yeah. I have homework. Leaving now.
Dacia – I respect what you have to say. And yes, that *is* why I took it down, because I do respect him as a person as well, and I don’t want to take away any of his rights. I don’t want to hurt anyone with this blog – that’s not my goal or intention.
However, it wasn’t that he wanted me to take down previous posts, it was that he didn’t want me to write anymore, including this one (which portrayed him in a very good light), which just seemed so weird to me. If you’re going to ask me to…”moderate” (since you don’t seem to like the term censor) what I write, it seems like an odd way of going about it.
More over, he KNEW I was a sex blogger. During sex in fact, he asked me what I was going to write about him. It wasn’t like I was being sneaky about it.
I don’t know. I don’t run a blog about my sex life. In fact, very little of my blog is written about my sex life (possibly because I really don’t have one, but possibly because I find so many other things to write about). I just don’t like some person I don’t know who really didn’t treat me that amazingly to begin with coming back into my life to say rude things to me about how “busy” I’ve been at school and how I must wonder what else he’s learned about me (should I take that as a threat?) and taking away my ability to write whatever I want. There are exactly 3 people who know who he is (two who were there, and 1 who I told), and anyone else who he told doesn’t read my blog…and 2 of those three people got full details (fuller than the post) from me anyways. So I just feel…completely constrained.
Yeah. I have homework. Leaving now.
He asked you what you were going to write about him and then asked you to take down what you’d written?
o.O
I really don’t like this guy. :P
I was ruminating generally, but it seems that specifically, in this situation, this dude definitely sounds like a bit of an indecisive douche bag.
Here’s the setup: a former friend and I post on an erotic story site.
A couple of years ago, she was acting as my tantrika. We had an intimate encounter as an exploration of sacred sexuality. A few days later, she sent me an email recounting that moment in explicit detail.
Last month, I found that email posted on the story site we both frequent. She had created a second identity and posted the story last June.
I was outraged. When I let her know that I’d found the story, she took it down. She said “you weren’t supposed to see that”, as if that was any sort of explanation or excuse.
I have bypassed the problem by not letting anyone in my offline life read my blog or know anything distinguishing about it. I don’t let them know the site I work for that links to my blog. I try to keep it hidden because I never want to face this dilemma. It’s complicated. It’s your blog; it has to be near impossible to hold yourself back. I commend you on being so respectful as to honor the request, as ridiculous as it may be.
As someone that has been blogged about negatively, and incorrectly, I don’t find that his request is very unusual. I made the request myself and was blown off, and as a result no longer trust or respect the person. For you to not blog about him anymore is a sign that you do have some respect for him. Blogs are one sided, not withstanding comments, and often show the negative of any given situation. Yes, they are a place to rant and rave, but an awareness is needed that you may not have the full story or that it is seen differently by the other person.