Blog P.I.

Promoting what sounds like an insufferable new book in the New York Times Magazine this weekend, ex-blogger Lee Siegel submitted to Deborah Solomon’s insufferable questions:

Did you feel that you were doing something ethically questionable when you posted, for instance, a comment by Sprezzatura that carried the headline ‘Siegel Is My Hero’? Every man is a hero to his alias. No, it never occurred to me at the time that I was doing something wrong. There are other people who appear anonymously on Web sites; they do battle with their detractors. Anonymity is a universal convention of the blogosphere, and the wicked expedience is that you can speak without consequences. What was wrong about it is that I did it under the aegis of The New Republic, as a senior editor of the magazine.

As I have written before, what he did wrong was blending multiple online personalities — one identifiably Siegel and one claimedly not-Siegel, and had the latter defend the former as if they were distinct individuals. This would have been equally wrong had he done so under the aegis of a free Blogspot account.

Moreover, it’s not just the ethics of the ’sphere that confounds Mr. Siegel, but the wisdom one needs in order to make sense of it. Consider:

[Siegel:] Obscurity is the new poverty. People don’t seem able to bear being unknown. But obscurity and struggle are the artists’ Harvard and Yale. Anonymous bloggers are also saddled with obscurity, which I doubt you would similarly glorify. That’s right. In their case, anonymity is obscurity’s rash. At least for those who practice incessant character assassination, which represents a good portion of the blogosphere, they vent out of the pain of being unacknowledged.

Leaving aside the fact that it’s probably more correct to say obscurity is anonymity’s rash — if it even it makes sense to say such a thing — let’s ask whether or not “incessant character assassination” constitutes a “good portion of the blogosphere.” But what’s a good portion? Is it bigger than a breadbox?

If you spend your time wading through the comment section vitriol at Eschaton or LGF, you don’t really have the right to complain about it afterward — that’s what they’re like. But if you choose your bloggers wisely — the folks at Volokh Conspiracy, Obsidian Wings, The Corner and Tapped are just a few of many who fight fairly — the chances are much better you’ll decide the blogosphere has something to offer. Evidently, Siegel prefers denunciation to conversation.

Even if we grant him this assessment, it must be said, the blogosphere is what you make of it.