You may have noticed the neo-earth map on the right-hand sidebar, and marveled at it, as I have at a website I frequent. I got it because I thought it was pretty cool. As I have looked at the map over the course of the past couple days, however, my emotional response to it has changed from fascination to awe in its most basic form - a mixture of wonder and fear.
Many years ago, I learned the toughest lesson of my life from a man whom I still admire - indeed, if a picture and bio of an individual were needed to describe "integrity", I would use his above all other people I have known. Part of that lesson was that I had, through a combination of arrogance, ignorance, and naivety, lost the respect of someone I admire (nothing, except perhaps losing a close family member, could hurt more than letting down someone one is trying to emulate). In the course of a conversation with me, this person said something I have not only never forgotten, I have actually tried to incorporate into my life; I fail as often as I succeed, but at least I still struggle with it. He told me that we should always use caution and care and circumspection in our dealings with others because we never know how our actions are going to effect others. It is quite possible that something we do or say, to which we attach little significance, can turn out to be of utmost importance to another, and that, in its turn, can cause ripples that spread all around the world reaching us again, years later, in a chain that is almost difficult to perceive yet very real just the same.
Taking in the implications of the map to the right, I wonder - what does someone in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia or Singapore think of what I have written? What do my protestations of faithful Christianity mean to someone in Seoul or Birmingham? What, exactly, is the impression I am giving to those who read this blog, even once?
These are not casual or insignificant questions, but go to the heart of this whole project called blogging. I present to the world a snapshot of myself with each and every post, and I cannot but be concerned about the impression others have of that snapshot. Just consider, as a not-mundane example, the heading I have given to the George W. Bush reverse clock, "Countdown to Freedom". What does someone from as tightly controlled and authoritarian a society as Singapore think of that? There is little doubt that George Bush's administration presents a clear and present danger to our historical freedoms; but how does that threat look to someone living under practically no freedom whatsoever?
On another level, what about my self-professed Christianity? How do I reconcile that with some of the posts I have put up? Are nuance and complexity just a thin reed upon which I justify to myself things I have written that have no place on a site dedicated - still - to both progressive politics and faithful Christianity? I submit that these are questions to which I have no answers, but I think keeping them in mind in the future - keeping that map in mind, and all the yellow dots on it - will make me a better blogger, and I hope a more honest and integral blogger.
