Afraid To Speak

As I continue writing and continue to look at making things on the web versus what is already there, when it comes to publication -- either of my own writing or my own website, whatever -- it all feels like the risk is too high. I mean that was part of the appeal of websites like Twitter, where one can just fire off thoughts without thinking about them too much before they're gone to the aether, or even just sit there repeating someone else's thoughts, therefore they may not even be your fault. But in the end I still ended up going private because of the danger and now I do not even go on Twitter at all. On sites like Reddit and Tumblr there is still the usual deluge of garbage that one is very likely to be buried under but still one can be Found and that is still terrifying and leaves me making new accounts, shuffling around my words and deleting posts all the time.

The urge to speak and the urge to stay silent out of terror are just at war all the time within me, and even saying this is difficult. It is not even a matter of privacy but rather an expectation of hostility if one expects to be In View Of The Other at any time. I think for some bizarre reason I got it into my head that text is better, but it isn't, and it's not just because there's no reading comprehension, it's that physically being present you can sometimes intimidate or shame them into silence but without that there's no shame. I mean, they don't have any. I still have plenty.

And all of this is why, I think, the idea of a space to write things deliberately is hard. If all the time and space in the world means that whatever you write is what you really mean, is that not the most vulnerable thing?