![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Context
I haven't been paying too much attention to a lot of posts recently. For one reason or another my time has been spent on other pursuits. I have taken to skim-reading posts and just going into detail on those that catch my eye. It's nothing personal, I daresay I'm doing nothing that most of you don't do from time to time.
The downside of approaching LJ in this manner is that sometimes something happens and I miss it, so another entry crops up and I have no immediate context. This can be annoying, but it is generally easily rectified by a quick bit of delving through the relevant journals.
What is interesting, though and very illuminating, is how sometimes the lack of context highlights character. When you have the context it is easy to see why someone reacts the way they do, why they say the things they say and so on. Context is the paper on which we write and from which we read and it allows us to explain behaviour, see reasons and forgive transgressions. In doing this we mask the essential nature lurking behind the persona of the writer. This person is reacting thus because of this, and has said X because Y happened.
Context is a double-edged tool with which we chisel and polish the personality of the writer and imbue it with our own perceptions. Strip out the context and we see in sharp relief highlighted aspects the essential person. No mask.
It's quite instructive. I am beginning to see some of my friends in quite a new light.
The downside of approaching LJ in this manner is that sometimes something happens and I miss it, so another entry crops up and I have no immediate context. This can be annoying, but it is generally easily rectified by a quick bit of delving through the relevant journals.
What is interesting, though and very illuminating, is how sometimes the lack of context highlights character. When you have the context it is easy to see why someone reacts the way they do, why they say the things they say and so on. Context is the paper on which we write and from which we read and it allows us to explain behaviour, see reasons and forgive transgressions. In doing this we mask the essential nature lurking behind the persona of the writer. This person is reacting thus because of this, and has said X because Y happened.
Context is a double-edged tool with which we chisel and polish the personality of the writer and imbue it with our own perceptions. Strip out the context and we see in sharp relief highlighted aspects the essential person. No mask.
It's quite instructive. I am beginning to see some of my friends in quite a new light.
no subject
As people who like to write, participation in this web site requires us to say what we mean and mean what we say, and to be jolly careful about it if we are conveying something we deem important, and part of the fun of reading each others' posts is getting to know one another over a period of time - from a safe distance. For instance, from my own recent anti-sports rants, you'd think I was a mean-spirited, grumbling git intentionally goading those who love sports. No, actually! However,
A lot of LJ pages out there are no more interesting than "had eggs and bacon for breakfast, went to work, fancy my boss." The writer probably really is more profound than that, but either doesn't know how to express themselves on the keyboard as well as they can verbally, or is reluctant to in front of millions of people. Maybe a lot of participants are here just in order to stay in touch, "let's meet at the pub on Friday, 7pm."
Thank goodness, most of the entries I see among this circle of LJ users are more interesting. If I want to skim-read an entry here and there, that's fine, but when I read someone's comments and find them funny or interesting, it's most illuminating to trawl through their journal and see if they're someone whose friendship I might want to cultivate.