Chris Brady has posted what really is a fascinating piece that deserves, I think, wide, wide attention and serious interaction. After describing how he approaches writing and public speaking, Chris writes

On the blogs I have at times tended to be even more timid, for all the reasons we might reasonably consider: it is a semi-permanent record, avoiding confrontation, and, perhaps my most crippling fault of all, not wanting to be misunderstood. I don’t really mind conflict or contradiction so long as my position is accurately understood. So I wonder if others wrestle with this as well.

I think timidity in general stems from a certain fear of being held accountable. Not just in Chris’s case but in all cases. What I mean is that when one writes or says something one is instantly opening oneself to not only misunderstanding, but intentional misunderstanding, misrepresentation, and conflict. Many fear this and so avoid saying anything ‘controversial’. It’s decidedly not the case that they don’t have an opinion or an insight on the matter; it’s that they simply don’t wish to open themselves to the consequences of that free speech.

For instance, I’ve let my opinion about home schooling be fairly well known. In consequence, not only have home schoolers actually stopped by my house and given me pro home schooler literature and cd’s, I’ve also become the object of a vindictive and personal attack within the blogger community itself by a so called scholar. For my stance on the tenure question of Nadia abu el-Haj I was accused of vile antisemitism. For my belief that the Palestinians deserve a homeland of their own in the land of their ancestors, I have been derided again as antisemitic. For my remarks contra Christian Zionism I have, again, been denounced as antisemitic. And because I think homosexuality is a deviation from the Divine plan, I’ve made not a few enemies. And the cases could be multiplied. One blogger several years ago, in good academic fashion, told his readers to avoid me.

I’m willing to accept the consequences of my free speech. I know that I won’t be invited to represent the Home Schooler Association. I shan’t be allowed to enter Hagee’s pulpit. And gays around the world won’t feel warmly towards me. But timidity is inappropriate for me. It isn’t who I am and quite frankly anyone who doesn’t want me to be myself, doesn’t want me as I really am.

Chris continues

It is a question of what pressures or constraints, internal or external, do we feel when we set down to write.

He continues suggesting that I feel no constraints- which is in sum correct. He opines that Mark Goodacre and Jim Davila are very narrowly focused in their blogs on purely academic issues- which observation brings me to my second point: bifurcation too is impossible for me.

Don’t get me wrong, I love Mark Goodacre. As a person and as a scholar. But unlike Mark and others I cannot compartmentalize my life or my interests. I find no fault with those who can and do- but I simply cannot. I don’t have an academic side and a pastoral side and a personal side and a private side. Such bifurcation, such compartmentalization, is, for me, a falsehood. One is who one is and the compartmentalization of life is timidity.

After describing his approach to blogging and preaching, Chris concludes

So what is the blog? Pulpit, classroom, water-cooler, or …?

Blogging is the setting forth of one’s ideas in interaction with others as part of a wider community with the goal of achieving understanding and the communication of perspective. Anyone who cannot or will not be him or her self in their blog has something to hide, feels ashamed of something they think, or fears that others won’t ‘like them’ if they say it.

I conclude by saying that I understand completely why some people are hesitant to be themselves on their blog. That’s fine, by the way. But the reason they don’t say what they really think is because they have a financial interest at stake. The young blogger hopes to get a job one day, and with google they know that their potential employer will read what they have written. So they either blog anonymously (which is really just cowardice, no matter what face it’s painted with), or they say nothing at all worth reading because what they say has already been said before. Hence, they don’t comment on news stories, they just mention them. And instead of writing what they believe, they write what they hope their future employer will believe.

I on the other hand don’t imagine I’ll be looking for a job. And if I do, I don’t think Wal-Mart really cares what its greeters think about Home Schooling. So I’ll continue to write what I think and should I ever find myself in the position of a job seeker, I will hope that whoever hires me will want the real me and not the pretend me of a pretend blog which is nothing less than pretense.