Tuesday, June 26, 2012

Bumper Sticker Politics

Remember one of the very last things I said here before I left you for facebook, blog? Remember how I said that life was too nuanced to have a 150 character limit? Scroll up, it's there.

Reading facebook in an election year is enough to bring me back to the land of the paragraph.

What I like about facebook is the ease of sharing articles, the wider audience, the conversational interchange. What I'm seeing, however, is a rash of bumper sticker politics. I'm completely over the deep thinker who posts a quote and says "End Standardized Testing!" or the pontificator who doesn't bother to share what has her riled about the State Senator, just calls him a racist fuck. And for the record, I give standardized tests and don't like them and I know the Senator...and he is sort of racist. But how 'bout you prove you've done the homework? How 'bout you recognize that I'm on facebook to see pictures of kids and condescending Willy Wonka (*snort*...he's funny) and realize that I can't end standardized testing? How 'bout you get off facebook where it's safe and you can just spout and go WORK to make change? Or RESEARCH your opinions?

Now for the record, when I went to look up the number of characters allowed in a fb post, I came across an article showing that this limit has been raised. Significantly. Anyone want to vote on whether or not it raises the level of discourse? Bet it won't, but I'm totally posting it anyway.

1 comment:

finijo said...

There is something about an election year to bring you back. I actually started my blog in 2004 in large part because of the election. I didn't post anything for about a year (didn't even check it during that time), but I came back yesterday. Glad I am in good company. I also found commonality in our loss of a sister. Mine died of brain/lung cancer the year before I started my blog and I think that writing so much back then kept me busy enough to not dwell on the loss. I'm sorry to hear about your sister, but congratulations on the fiance and the cat :)