Blog P.I.

Warning: This post contains “language.”

There are perhaps as many ways to read Daily Kos as there are registered users (over 100K as of last week). I bet casual readers stick to the front page. Regular community members might dig into the diaries first. Righty bloggers looking for outlandish statements probably stick with the most-recommended diaries along the left-hand side.

But my favorite point of entry is the page collecting all diaries tagged GBCW, an initialism meaning “Good Bye, Cruel World.” dKosopedia, the dKos community’s answer to Wikipedia, defines the tag thusly:

The “Good Bye Cruel World” diary is when a Kossack decides that DailyKos has become too (fill in the blank) or isn’t nearly (fill in the blank) enough for him or her to continue visiting the site. General chaos ensues in the Comments as other Kossacks agree, disagree, wish the diarist good luck or good riddance.

Some of these are amicable splits; just the other day, Mike Stark from the right-wing talk radio-baiting blog Calling All Wingnuts announced he is taking some time away from the blogosphere. Like almost all bloggers who quit, he’ll be coming back, but unlike most bloggers who quit, he actually says so. At his own site,  in fact, he has posted eight times since the initial announcement.

But primarily, the GBCW category is where the rejected and the dejected, the angriest of the so-called Angry Left, can be found posting one last screed before they walk away for good (or so they promise). Most have been rated trolls one too many times and have finally given up. Their suicide notes, if you will, are often widely-noticed and tend to attract hundreds of replies.

It would be foolish to actually compare them to suicide bombers, save for how “suicide bloggers” rolls off the tongue, but you could at least say they drag a lot of other people into a really bad scene on the way out. For example, here’s wintersmute signing off with the artfully-titled “FUCK DAILY KOS!”:

Ok so it’s Monday. After a long weekend of research on the Democratic Party, I’ve decided to no longer support the party. My choice right? Damn right. So I’m heated. I need to vent. Where do I decide to vent?.. on a thread backing Democratic elections. What do I get? Turned into a troll.

Imagine that. And so it also happens to the more traditional trolls:

Seriously, sooner rather than later, you guys are all going to beg for forgiveness for being so f_cking wrong.  9/11 was an inside job and it’s coming out. … This site is totally bogus.  Sorry to say, but it’s grown to be apart of the 9/11 cover up whether you know it or not. Thanks for the helping hand in making the world a terrible place.

Some ”suicide bloggers” have sought to end their time at Daily Kos peacefully. Take jmgotham, who in late June requested an assisted suicide. To his mortal frustration, most respectfully declined:

“If you really wanted to be troll-rated … you’ve got to be a lot more vitriolic, and spell a lot of things wrong, and really make up a whole lot more shit. You were too nice. You could also just leave.”

Others understand this intuitively. Take for instance a GBCW post from just this month. Short-term community member ErrinF fought not just with the community for supporting Democrats above progressive values, but also with the blogware Scoop, which doesn’t allow users to delete their accounts. Hence the  infamous title: “Delete my fucking account, Kos” (the word seems to come up a lot in GBCW diaries). One memorable passage goes:

The amount of blind conformity that goes on in America is what fuels the corrupt two party system. DailyKos exemplifies blind conformity, and I regret any and all association I have had with it. I should be allowed to delete my account and go; Why should I be forced to stay amid this pathetic cult of personality? The herd mentality that goes on here sickens me now, AND I WANT OUT. Regardless of my personal experience here, EVERYBODY WHO SIGNED UP TO THIS WEBSITE SHOULD BE FREE TO DELETE THEIR ACCOUNTS IF THEY SO WISH TO. For Kos to deny us this is downright fascist.

The post picked up some 1800 comments, a large number even by Daily Kos’ standards. dKosopedia called it one of the “most famous GBCW diaries in the history of Daily Kos.” Veteran Kossack YetiMonk recently summarized the flare-up and subsequent fallout well. The diary inspired several parodies, the best of which is probably “Paint my fucking house, Kos”:

I want out of this farce of a website. I thought this was on open forum for painters to discuss their brushes. Instead, it is little more than the internet wing of the Housepaint Duopoly machine. Now that I want out, a fair minded and liberal website would let me paint my house and go.

Sometimes the suiciders complain about “censorship,” sometimes they complain about the advertising, and sometimes they just seem like they want to cause trouble. The vast majority who grow disillusioned probably just fade away, never to be heard from again. But what’s the fun in that?

If there’s as many points of entry at Daily Kos as there are registered users, there’s certainly as many points of exit as there are abandoned accounts.