Anti-Blogging Bias (?)

The July 8th issue of The Chronicle of Higher Education (page C3) has an article by a regular columnist (who uses a pseudonym) and denounces both blogs and the revelation of them in the interview process. Three examples are given from job candidates who ultimately were weeded out. OK. Everyone is entitled to opinions on blogs: the good, the bad, and the less-than-attractive. There is a lot of "stuff" out there one might rather not know about. That may be the case right here.

But let me get this straight: An anonymous columnist who writes regularly (with sometimes cranky observations) for the major weekly in higher education criticizes job candidates bold (or uninhibited) enough to share observations, gripes, opinions, and inner life in cyberspace? Do I sense a contradiction?

Apparently, the anonymous writer has no inner conflict about including the goofs and gaffes of job candidates -- who may recognize a trace of themselves in that very column.

I am aware that blogging can get quirky, blunt, ungrammatical, and informal. I have been doing this only a bit more than a month and have swung back and forth about eight times on using my name in my profile or not. Now, visitors may see it -- and at other times, they won't.

Blogging is like journaling in a public space -- electronic graffiti or stream of consciousness. It destroys no trees. Some of us may use it as a form of narrative therapy. Some people jog in public and don't mind others seeing them sweat and pant. I'm too shy for that. However, I have no qualms about writing in public.

As a listserv co-manager of an international group for close to four years, I learned a great deal about human cybernature -- even with the occasional headaches and heartaches. Some days I cried pretty hard. And other days I felt really connected to a community across the globe. Spontaneity is not a bad thing. I remember thinking: being able to write like this will destroy my meticulous revision processes. Perhaps it has at times, but the plus side (I hope) is the increase in fluency.

I don't know the candidates alluded to in the column, and I surely don't know who the columnist it. But in a world where pretense reigns, I think that discovering someone has a blog is like learning that someone keeps a journal. If a candidate is bold enough to share it, fine. If an interviewer does not want to look at it, fine. A job candidate could offer to share pictures from a family album. If a hiring committee does not want to look at them, fine. There is a rhetorical difference in this type of communication and p.r. and journalism. Of course. As a society in which public and private is blurred all the time, and creativity is sometimes suspect, and people have to monitor what they say . . . would it be best if every job candidate pulls down his/her blog before applying?

I feel that unless what one discovers is downright sinister, mean, false, or hurtful, perhaps as a reader it is possible to keep an open mind and heart.