Complaint

[poliphilo]

I've been on a drive to add more friends.

Here's a complaint: Too many American kiddies seem to think it's witty/ironic/Pythonesque to pretend they're blogging from some foreign country. I think, au contraire, that it's silly/disrespectful/patronising. And it makes a nonsense of LJ's grouping of bloggers by region. If I want to find a friend in Bangladesh I don't want to have to wade through half a dozen American high school teenies first. Listen up, guys- overseas isn't intrinsically funny and what you're doing is a dilute form of cultural imperialism.

Comments

[solar-diablo.livejournal.com]

I wasn't aware this sort of thing went on, but I guess it isn't surprising. Can't see the entertainment value in it, though. My life here in the States is surreal enough, thank you very much. I doubt pretending to blog from Istanbul would improve it.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

It's not that these people keep up the pretence. They're not taking on secondary personae or anything interesting like that. It's just that they think it would be amusing to have Bhutan or Myanmar on their info page.

[red-girl-42.livejournal.com]

Then that's even stupider.

I can see there being something amusing about creating a whole other persona and trying to keep up with it on LJ. But why lie about something if you're not going to go all the way with it?

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Well, yes, these people are indulging in a one-off joke; That's all.

I'm full of admiration for those who use LJ to sustain a proper, fully-rounded, fictional persona.