TimmyHThe Confessional Culture
July 22nd 2008 04:50
At a recent Blogging conference in the US, “Blogpher,” a young mother read one of her blog posts aloud for the audience. She was incredibly mentally and physically distraught during her recent pregnancy and deliberately overdosed on pills during her third Trimester. Most bloggers use memoir or other personal insight when writing blog entries, often using the perpendicular pronoun “I.” But increasingly, personal blogs are a huge hit with online audiences. While many young people like to bare their souls online, it’s outside the comfort zone for a significant proportion of others.
The most famous case of a personal blog becoming a huge deal is the now infamous “Tuck Max.” Tucker’s stories are incredible in that the portray the destructive womanising of a young alcohol abuser with too much time and not enough women to satisfy. And it’s hilarious.
But personal blogs are indicative of what is becoming known as the “Confessional Culture.” So much of the average Gen Y’s life is now online that they have become accustomed “public life.” In essence, we have become a generation of exhibitionists. We have become perfectly at peace with putting our entire lives on display to the global public. The fallout will come, someday with a future partner, employer or worse yet…our children!!
But it isn’t just Gen Y’s that are obsessed with confessions about their “private” lives in the public sphere. The trend didn’t start with teenagers, that dubious honour was reserved for the producers of MTV’s “Real World” way back in the distant 1990’s and the proliferation of reality television. Blogs began as personal public diaries after emerging from the memoir publishing genre. Even the New York Times admits that we are in the midst of a “Sharing Explosion.” And it’s an interesting cultural and social phenomenon, that we are so open with one another online, yet our social skills in face-to-face conversation now need the assistance of various mood altering substances.
Teenagers who are content to exhibit themselves online are only reflecting the nature of the society they have grown up with. Anyone who blogs online or puts anything into cyberspace shares the associated risks, not just Generation Y.
The most famous case of a personal blog becoming a huge deal is the now infamous “Tuck Max.” Tucker’s stories are incredible in that the portray the destructive womanising of a young alcohol abuser with too much time and not enough women to satisfy. And it’s hilarious.
But personal blogs are indicative of what is becoming known as the “Confessional Culture.” So much of the average Gen Y’s life is now online that they have become accustomed “public life.” In essence, we have become a generation of exhibitionists. We have become perfectly at peace with putting our entire lives on display to the global public. The fallout will come, someday with a future partner, employer or worse yet…our children!!
But it isn’t just Gen Y’s that are obsessed with confessions about their “private” lives in the public sphere. The trend didn’t start with teenagers, that dubious honour was reserved for the producers of MTV’s “Real World” way back in the distant 1990’s and the proliferation of reality television. Blogs began as personal public diaries after emerging from the memoir publishing genre. Even the New York Times admits that we are in the midst of a “Sharing Explosion.” And it’s an interesting cultural and social phenomenon, that we are so open with one another online, yet our social skills in face-to-face conversation now need the assistance of various mood altering substances.
Teenagers who are content to exhibit themselves online are only reflecting the nature of the society they have grown up with. Anyone who blogs online or puts anything into cyberspace shares the associated risks, not just Generation Y.
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