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March 5, 2008 Free speech isn't cheap 
Dear Readers, I so wish I could tell you my dating stories. Some of them are the funniest things that have happened to me in the last five years (Frances moments excepted) and it's painful to know that I have an audience who might enjoy the sensation of spitting coke out their nose in unison, but can't be let in on the secret, because--well.... The url. Again. I don't know about all of you--actually I do since almost all of you are married and thus have been spared the particularities of these dilemmas--but one of the first things I do when I get someone's full name just before or after a first date, is google them. (While I'm on that--if any of you have stumbled here because you're about to go on a first date with an Andrea McDowell and you think it might be me, hello!) And let's say I were to google this person and find out they had a blog on which a scathing portrait of a girl who bore a striking resemblance to me just happened to have been recently posted, just for a supposing, I'm inclined to think I wouldn't enjoy that too much. So I'm inclined to think that I really ought not to post anything about a boy until, say, such time as I am reasonably sure that he will never have my full name. Which is a crying shame. Because--well, because: You have received an email letting you know that you have a new message on a dating site, and you check in to read it for a few minutes before supper. A small person is hanging off your right arm begging to play Memo (Nemo to everyone else) on the computer; meanwhile, her macaroni and cheese is reheating in the microwave. All of which is to say that you really just wanted to check in, read the damned message, and get on with life until later in the evening. Someone who seems to always be on while you are on there, leading you to believe that they might in fact just be on there all the god-damned time, IMs you to say hello for the 30 millionth time in the last week, even though you have never replied. Their profile specifies that they smoke like a chimney, have no interests, a decided weakness for cliche--oh, and a photo gallery of 500 photos of themselves posed provocatively on various pieces of furniture. Despite never having said hello to this person you are now intimately familiar with their crotch in a way that really ought to be reserved for at least the second date. TS: hello Apparently I am still learning a lesson I ought to have learned when I was fourteen, to wit: it is useless trying to be polite to an idiot. You just have to cut loose and be a bitch. Fuck off, I should have said; I've already seen more of your underwear than I ever had any mind to. Still, this is my choice. I have chosen to restrict my speech here about dates because I am trying to be considerate (within reason--see above). I have chosen to place kindness (of a sort) above my right to freedom of expression. I chose as well with the blog gag order. When I saw it in the separation agreement, without any mention of it having been broached at any negotiation, I laughed for three hours. Beside putting a time limit on it (the initial gag order was in perpetuity and I put in a clause limiting it until Frances is an adult), I let it alone and signed it, because one possible alternative was a lengthy and expensive court battle which, besides being unpleasant for the adults involved, would have been traumatic for Frances. Still, I chose that; and I believe that if I had fought it, I would have won. But no one else had ever better make that choice for me, or try to. Now, I understand that in any civilized society there will be reasonable restrictions on what sort of speech can and will be permitted in the name of the greater good--e.g. the famous "shouting 'fire' in a crowded theatre" (or these days perhaps "shouting 'bomb' on a crowded subway car"). Sure. We've also chosen to restrict hate speech, believing that when weighing one group's ability to speak against another group's potential ability to work, get housing, be free of harassment and violence in public, and so on, that the speech is less important. Well and good. Completely different from arguing that people ought not to be able to hurt someone's feelings on the internet. I've been flamed. I know all about getting yourself stomped on on someone's blog. I called her a bitch and crossed her off my blogroll. It's not fun, no one's signing up for Internet Flaming Cruises, no one is ever likely to. But that shouldn't make it illegal. That shouldn't give a court the ability to stop someone from flaming me unless it is libellous, defamatory, or interferes with my ability to be employed/housed/etc. I have rights, but the right to make everyone like me all the time is not one of them. Nor is the ability to make me be nice to you one of your fundamental human rights. I can snark at you from now until next July. The moment that stops being legal is the moment that western civilization is done for. The thing is that free speech isn't free. It's expensive. Hurt feelings are the least of it. That's not a license to be cruel for no reason, but the simple fact is that in a free society, your feelings and my feelings and the feelings of random anonymous boys on the internet are on occasion going to be bruised--hopefully in the service of something larger than any individual writer's ego, but then again, maybe not. So I would love to tell you about how vastly dating has changed in the thirteen years that I haven't been doing it, and what forming relationships is like in the era of facebook, and how having a blog has changed even that--and one day I will. For now all I'll say is that there are days that make me long for the times when all I could do was obsess over why he wasn't calling. ~~~~~ (This post is part of Julie's hump day hmm this week.) Posted by Andrea at March 5, 2008 8:49 AM under EMAIL this entry (comments fields are below this section) Comments Just because we can write something doesn't always mean we shold. I'm rethinking this a lot lately. I discuss folks I'm close to but I ask myself should I be doing so? Posted by: LauraJ at March 5, 2008 11:36 AM
Good post! Posted by: Liz at March 5, 2008 11:46 AM
Very well said. Yes, it does come with a cost. We have to weigh that cost, personally, and decide what is worth it to us. But as you said: nobody better make that choice for me. And yet? Courts, employers, and more are, increasingly. Posted by: Julie Pippert at March 5, 2008 12:02 PM
I love your line about "the days of just wondering why he wasn't calling." The era of being in constant communication has brought on new paranoias to be sure. If we fail to call ahead to inform loved ones we are running late, it can be a great cause for alarm even if the only reason is "Oh, I forgot my cell phone" or "My battery died." Twenty years ago, running late in traffic was just something to be explained upon arrival (and hopefully accepted and understood). I definitely know where you're coming from about feeling limited at times in blogging, too. It's like not feeling right about telling a great joke in mixed company because certain parties in earshot might not appreciate the humor. I have certainly learned to beware what I type and make public (even in email) because of the backlash that can come from it. Such is the way of the modern world, unfortunately. Great post. Posted by: Robert at March 5, 2008 1:02 PM
I, for one, am bereft that we are missing your dating stories. They sound highly entertaining for the parties not involved. I don't know enough about what's been done in regards to blog speech to make an intelligent comment about it. In general, though, I'm all for saying what you think, even when it's unpopular or just plain wrong. Restricting speech doesn't make the ideas go away; it just forces them underground where they fester and grow and mushroom without public knowledge. That seems way more dangerous, in my exceedingly humble opinion. But that doesn't apply here, to the circumstances you are describing. Posted by: Gwen at March 5, 2008 3:03 PM
I agree that some things just shouldn't be put on a blog. However, we shouldn't have to have someone else tell us what shouldn't be put on the blog. Posted by: le35 at March 5, 2008 3:38 PM
It's a pity you can't post -- not just for us. Because, truly, so often dating is not fun, and is hilarious only in retrospect, and in my experience a good percentage of those dates can be only enjoyed by relaying them to your friends. In fact, I remember during some of the real doozie dates, I'd be practically narrating the date as it played out. Posted by: M. Lucy at March 5, 2008 5:19 PM
Oh there will be dating stories. One is coming up next week. And yes, I've had one or two where I was practically turning it into blog fodder as the evening progressed. Posted by: Andrea
When you've got the blog post written in it's entirety (in your head) within the first 10 minutes of the date. Stop dating. Voice of experience. ;-) Posted by: Treena at March 5, 2008 10:18 PM
This was a great post. Good luck with the dating. It is truly a different world, with different rules than when I last dated. I can't wait to read the stories that are fit to share with us! Posted by: Cloud at March 6, 2008 12:41 AM
You could always post them in Her Bad Mother's Basement (as long as she wasn't the one flaming you...) and leave clues for those of us who are nosy...um, interested in your dating stories. I joined an online dating service after my divorce. There are some Freaky McFreakbags out there. Posted by: Major Bedhead at March 6, 2008 10:11 PM
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Change is God (Octavia Butler, Parable Series) “I expect to pass through this world but once; any good thing therefore that I can do, or any kindness that I can show to any fellow creature, let me do it now; let me not defer or neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again.” Email Frances! frances AT athenadreaming DOT org You can email her mother too (that's me):
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