EDITOR’S NOTE: This is an updated version of post on LA Progressive in 2010.
Like newspaper opinion pages, blogs feature by-lined opinion writers, often with the scribe’s picture. But a lot of reader responses are anonymous.
So naysayers can hide at their computer keyboards and snipe away. My guess is that most of them wouldn’t write what they write if they had to sign it.
Anyway, it seems like most anonymous ambuscaders dwell on the farther right-wing shores of American politics. So I wonder – when Barack Obama was president, were they scared those “black helicopters” would show up and whisk them off to a “FEMA concentration camp”? Nowadays, are they afraid that Democratic “Deep Staters” will abduct their kids?
Seriously, I don’t know why anybody wouldn’t want to sign what he or she writes. I spent more than a dozen years as a daily newspaper feature writer and columnist. I’m still a freelance writer. Maybe it’s just ego. But I want my name — and mug if possible — on everything I write.
To be sure, bylines beget responsibility. You’ve got to marshal good arguments in a signed opinion column. Otherwise, readers will take you to task for a poorly-written piece – and rightly so.
On the other hand, pen-names often beget bunk. You can say almost anything, no matter how false or absurd. Anonymity can be a license to lie.
Don’t get me wrong, getting slammed goes with opinion writing, whether for a newspaper or on the Internet. If blogs permit anonymous comments, so be it.
At the same time, the famous French philosopher Voltaire may not have actually written, “I disagree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.” But the sentiment was his and mine. And I would add “…your right to say it anonymously.”
Many people disagree with what I write on blogs. Readers often took exception to what I wrote in the newspaper, too. They didn’t pull punches, either.
A newspaper requires people to sign letters-to-the-editor, otherwise the letters won’t get published. So I gave my critics credit for at least having the courage of their convictions. They knew that their names would be in the paper, too, and that their letters would be fair game for criticism from other correspondents. (Most reporters don’t respond to letters-to-the editor, signed or not. Comments sections are for readers, not writers.)
I might not like what commenters on blogs say about me and my musings. But I give them credit for having the guts to put their John Hancocks on their opinions. So do other reporters and pundits.
But cyber-bushwhackers have zero credibility.
So, if you’re going to comment, sign your real name. If you can’t do that, then don’t comment. It’s that simple.
–30–