Misanthropy Today

Leaving funny comments is a lost art.

It was once practiced in public restrooms across this nation, then gang members and lonely homosexuals ruined it for everyone.

Later there was the CB radio, and still later the online chat room. These innovations allowed for snarky comments, but because they inherently rewarded volume over substance, quality took a dive too.

Part One: Getting Started

Now we have websites and blogs. There are a few types of comments I really enjoy, they are:

1) funny or witty comments

2) comments that are funny because they are interesting and point out something I missed

3) Straight-ahead interesting comments

4) Comments that handle me roughly or call me a fool or a liar or worse

5) A simple “I was here. I read this.” and maybe your city or name or a link to who you are that read this

A writer for a website once asked me: How do I get more people to comment on the things that I write?

My answer was it’s either simple or somewhat complex:

Simple: Be a reasonably attractive girl with a clear path to a picture of yourself.

See Romi41’s Example of this below, easily found on her “about me” page:

Notice something else: 77 GD comments!

This is not to say that Romi isn’t an interesting girl, she is, but being a girl with a picture sort of helps lonely male bloggers think that they’ve connected with a girl, on her blog.

Without looking I will say the comments are 70% male (probably including me) when her blog is patently female oriented. This is the blog equivalent of a pack of horny assholes approaching an obvious “Girls Night Out”, only to be used as fodder for why “Girls Night” is important and why men are horny assholes.

Complex: Write something where you take a clear stand on an issue. Be iconoclastic inconspicuously. Don’t try to take down the big targets: intolerance, uneven distribution of wealth, celebrity worship– no no, aim lower: your town, yourself, your friends, the stuff you guys like.

Kill your idols.

Part Two: An Introduction To Player Hating

There’s an old advertising saw that goes “if you want to people to love you, you must first decide who hates you”.

Find your enemies.

Note the title of this blog is Misanthropy Today, which means sort of a disdain for humankind in general. This is hyperbole but feel free to hyperbole away.

The chart below may assist you:

WRONG! Now You’ve Got It!

PETA Members Furries

Women Bitches

Democrats Pants-Wetting Liberals

Someone Who Disagrees w/ You Pedophile

George Bush Hitler

Handsome Actor Homo

Heiress Who Drinks/Sex0rs About As Much As You Whore

Jerk Shithead

(Feel free to fill in your own. Giggle to yourself if they are hypocritical. This is a blog, not a church!)

Also, you’ll find that most bloggers are not great writers and will make it clear early that their only qualification is their willingness to try. If you have even marginal writing skills, go to their blog and make fun of them in the comments section.

This is Step 3 of my simple 3 Part System to get comments on your blog.

Not to put Romi on the spot again, but i’ve wandered around to all corners of the blog world, and she comments on just about all of them. There’s not a sewer drain in Chinatown that Romi wouldn’t rappel down, strike a match and leave a comment. Do this from time to time if you want some good rabid traffic.

Quick Blog Comment Review:

Wrongo: lol. great post, perhaps check out my little nook on the web sometime

Correcto: This post about that obscure “Leave Britney Alone” video really rocked my world. I have a prediction: one day, an internet website will host such videos for all to see and comment upon, and this video join the internet canon and it’s stupidity will be known to all. Thanks for being a pioneer towards that end!

Note #1 is friendly and earnest; straightforward. All wrong.

Now #2 is sarcastic and world-weary. It doesn’t have time for this crap, but does have time to comment about why it doesn’t have time for this crap. It’s those who know that something is stupid and worthless once it has attained the highest level of fame and popularity. Rather than share a cheap yet unifying pop-culture moment with our brethren we run to safe distance to make fun of our brethren. It’s you and me.

Part III: Be Yourself

Next: when you sit down to write, your first instinct will be to expose the obfuscated, share universal truths and experiences, right the wrongs; perform self therapy.

Again, this is all wrong.

Observe my post titled The Time I Heard Ashley Olsen Rip One In Whole Foods Supermarket.

Now, is this account true? Well it depends on what you consider true. If we’re talking universal or absolute truth, then it may be. Ashley Olsen may have indeed farted in Whole Foods that day I took the picture, and at this point it would be difficult to prove or disprove.

But the fact of the matter is, i’m a blogger (and a pretty bad one at that) and my job is to get asses in the seats. 100k or so individuals read that story. If success is measured by eyeballs, then: lie away.

The idea that bloggers need to tell the truth is a pernicious lie, only meant to handicap them into the same playing field as reporters and dissuade meddling into the world of fiction writers, who require Masters degrees in English and uncomfortable childhoods in Connecticut or Massachusetts where they were urged to be doctors or lawyers but rebelled by being best-selling authors instead.

Conclusion:

While I stated that this post was about blog comments, it’s probably more about blogging on a whole. This blog began out of boredom, as an exercise to test a few internet marketing ideas I had, and reasons I mentioned before in the part about stupid reasons for blogging.

From this blog I have culled:

• A fancy Nokia N series phone, compliments of Nokia, for writing a negative diatribe about the iPhone. I looked at it in the box, decided I didn’t need such fance and there it sits.
• Two seats at exclusive film screenings, which I could have probably gotten just as easily through my employ at an online media conglomerate
• A few random female admirers: one of whom lives in Kansas City, the other in Dubai. Both have said i’m probably their soul mate and they’d marry me or at least give me incredible sex, should I ever visit their locale.
• A few wacko emails from people offering me lackey writing jobs to requests that I write nice things about their products (i’m looking at you Nokia, among a few others)
• Ok– it was pretty fun, altogether.

The first post I ever wrote was ironically enough, titled “blogging”, here it is

Chin up, and all that stuff.
-AF

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