Question Time XVIII – Respect

This week I want to talk to you about respect. More specifically, the respect we have and show for our fellow bloggers.

A few weeks ago the nominations were announced for the Lammy Awards 2013. Lots of bloggers nominated made a post celebrating and asking their readers for votes in the final stage. It was brought to my attention that one blogger took a slightly different route. I don’t want to advertise their blog, so lets just say that he or she made a long post dissecting every category in the awards. He or she was so enraged he or she wasn’t chosen for ANY category, and decided to show his or her rage by sharing notes on all the blogs and bloggers nominated. Not stopping by just saying he (bored of the he/she game) was much better than everyone nominated, he went further and insulted blogs, mine included.

I’m sure it was just a ploy from an angry little blogger to try and get some attention. I can’t understand why anyone would openly insult so many people, especially fellow LAMB members. I tried to take the mature route and reply politely, but it lead me to this weeks question, and your thoughts on respect within our blogging community.

I’m sure we all rate our own sites and writing highly, and we want to be proud of our output. To see it shot down in public is hard to take, for me anyway. I would never dream of taking a swipe at another blogger. I disagree with a lot of people, mostly reviewers, and I openly invite people to disagree with my thoughts. But it is always done in a friendly and respectful manner. Sure, when I see Chris from filmhipster give another 100%, or Eric from Isaacs Picture Conclusions tell me Genesis is a phenomenal film, I tell them they are wrong but it’s all in jest. I would say we all have disagreed with someones thoughts at some point, and I have never seen any arguments from it, just people disagreeing. I’m not trying to say I should be immune from criticism, of course. I just don’t want to be told I’m a terrible writer (which I may be but I don’t need others posting about it on their blogs!). Or see someone else banded as a poor writer, with a crappy site, or running a crappy feature etc.

Changing away from the troll disguised as a blogger introduction (quote stolen, identity a secret 😉 ), to give another example of respect, I always find it hard not to jump in on a good religious post. I don’t just follow movie bloggers, and sometimes when a blog I read does a huge religious post, I have to bite my proverbial tongue and stop myself sharing my thoughts on religion. To me, this is a respectful choice, as something like religion is a huge deal to people, and I would hate to offend or fall out with a blogger because I disagree with their beliefs. I believe in freedom of speech, and our blogs are soap boxes to say what we want to say. However, going as far as telling someone their beliefs are wrong, or sharing negative comments about other bloggers crosses the line in my opinion. Maybe its just me, and in the same way we give a movie a bad rating, saying negative things about other bloggers is just fair game. I know I shouldn’t rise to it, but it’s hard not to react when someone insults my or other writers I like work.

So, do you always show restraint, or do you just let rip and say what you feel all the time, regardless of potentially insulting another writer? Where do you draw the line respect wise? And what do you think of people getting under your skin by blasting your site and work? Bit more of a rant than anything this week, but I’d love to hear your thoughts on respect within blogging.

If you would like to see all the other questions from this series, please click HERE and check them out!

Posted by Tysoncarter182 on May 2, 2013

https://headinavice.wordpress.com/2013/05/02/question-time-xviii-respect/