Well, Hello Mister Fancy-Rants.

[digitaldiscipline]

I could make a meta-rant about second hand rantpreciation, decrying ranting as a dying art that's falling into disuse because fewer and fewer are shouldering the ranting burden and serving as a sort of socio-something shorthand for the ranting public. Do we have a modern Jonathan Swift or Mark Twain or Ambrose Bierce, not merely willing and able to lay open the public consciousness with an incisive bit of rhetoric, but who is actually in a position where their rantings would actually be a blip on the public consciousness?

If everyone ranted, someone would have to notice, wouldn't they? Barstool prophets and armchair quarterbacks and barbershop demagogues. . . they're not gone, they're just not famous.

I realize that the assholes-that-be, the powers that actually affect public discourse, don't pay attention to the cogent rantings of the digerati, they'd much rather spoonfeed the public mouthpieces that rant to the passive mass-holes (limbaugh, o'reilly, hannity & colmes, ad fucking nauseam) to disseminate their ideology of nonthinking nonrantitude and claim that their hands are clean.

Two kids in "Ender's Game" shaped global policy by bitching prolifically on the net - yeah, it's ludicrous bullshit. But it's a start.

Nobody would be more surpised than I would be if something I ranted about became widely read and a subject of discussion (or resulted in a visit from the SS in the dead of night for my seditious rantings).

I like reading when others rant well, regardless of whether or not I agree, disagree, or give a shit. I hope that my own heated bloviating is similarly received. But to make change, it needs to go beyond the ripples in the puddle of our circle of acquaintences. We need to throw stones into a larger pool to start making waves. Maybe someone will hurl a meteor into the ocean and send a cleansing wave across the political moraine that gets ever stickier and more pervasive.

Maybe that comet will be me. Or you.

Rant on.

Comments

[axissilverhand.livejournal.com]

This has needed saying for some time -- thank you!

[etcet.livejournal.com]

I saw a great band sticker on the trunk of a car the other day.

STRIKE ANYWHERE

Terrorist dogma, or just really well-engineered matches? *grin*

[hellsop.livejournal.com]

Interestingly, the two kids in Ender's Game were on the equal of USENET, back when USENET was something that pretty much EVERYONE on the net knew about, if not actively participated in. There are many forums to be *published* in on the net today, but very few to be broadcasted from.

[etcet.livejournal.com]

I wonder if the mirror image of the rss feed, something that will push content, is tenable, and if so, how that would work.

i can envision a pay-to-post arrangement, but don't know if it would get traction, or how it would differ from conventional broadcast media.

the fractionalization of the blogsphere allows for both great flexibility and great granularity, and it's hard to reach out across the chorus of agreement to try and plant seeds of thought among those who most seem to need them (on the sly or overtly).

[hellsop.livejournal.com]

That's exactly the issue: So long as there's an ability for someone to go off and create a new thing, new things will happen and splinter away audience. When blogs started, they were all over the place, and it was virtually impossible to find them except by word-of-mouth. Then LJ appeared, with a single integrated means of collecting and meshing together many blogs. And since there was an opportunity to get some more audience, shortly thereafter there was DeadJournal, Greatestournal, and I'm sure a whole bunch of other FooJournal sites and all of a sudden it wasn't integrated anymore and the whole integrated Friends List thing is shattered. Broadcast needs a hegemony of sources.

[singingwolf.livejournal.com]

See, there is a difference between ranting and raving.

Ranting, no matter how angry, tends to have logic and reasoning.

Raving... well, doesn't. It's anger venting, usually incoherent with a bunch of profanity thrown in.

One gets my respect (even if I don't agree) the other one doesn't (although I might pick up some new terminology *grin*) I'll leave which one is which for you to figure out.

[etcet.livejournal.com]

I rant. Darling Nicki raves. ;-)

[ex-xn667.livejournal.com]

If everyone ranted, someone would have to notice, wouldn't they?

That's why I try to egg others on as well. I don't want agreement. I don't want to preach to the choir. I don't want the occasional "me, too." I want something I say to stick in someone's craw so badly they have to vomit forth their own. One voice alone isn't even a whisper. 10 of us ranting should get 100 of us going, 100 should get a 1000. Somewhere along the line it's just *got* to produce a resounding roar. If I failed to believe that I'd just stop watching the news and unplug my computer.

Nobody would be more surpised than I would be if something I ranted about became widely read and a subject of discussion (or resulted in a visit from the SS in the dead of night for my seditious rantings).

Erm, me too! Though I think I'd be even more surprised if mine got any serious consideration, heh. You, at least, have a penchant for coherence. I seem to go for the double-barrelled bluster.

Maybe that comet will be me. Or you.

For being such a disagreeable bastard, I still find it hard to disagree with you, ;) I keep hoping that comet will come forward as a result of the continual offenses against decency with which we're continually bludgeoned in our daily newsfeed, but if that hasn't happened yet, I don't know what it will take. Kristallnacht v.2 perhaps?

I don't want to wait until it gets that bad myself, so I try to get under people's skins. I have doubts about the power of sublimity to inspire people to action. I would love it if style and substance were enough, but polls show (apparently) that our beloved American public doesn't respond well to either. If they did, Sen. Moynihan, for instance, comes to mind as an excellent example of someone who would have had a far greater impact. So I take the negative approach. Perhaps if I can spout just enough of my own brand of lunacy someone else will *have* to pipe up and say "*That* jerk doesn't speak for me! *This* is what I think." Rinse. Repeat. Loud roar.

Just for the record, you're still one of my favorite ranters, and I love the fact that yours actually get responses :)

[nener.livejournal.com]

You should read my friend, iskender. He gives good rant.

[etcet.livejournal.com]

Eeeeenteresting. . . thanks for the tip!

[whomajigi.livejournal.com]

I think the problem is simply that people can generally rant better verbally than when they sit down and try to write it. There ARE the people who feel more comfortable behind the keyboard or with a pen in hand, but they are hard to come by (unless you know where to look).

Judging by what I just wrote, you can tell I'm the verbal ranter...

[david-deacon.livejournal.com]

Do we have a modern Jonathan Swift or Mark Twain or Ambrose Bierce, not merely willing and able to lay open the public consciousness with an incisive bit of rhetoric, but who is actually in a position where their rantings would actually be a blip on the public consciousness?

Christopher Hitchens?

[david-deacon.livejournal.com]

Also:

If you don't have an FBI file, you're not trying.