A few weeks ago, when I was thinking about launching this blog but keeping it anonymous, I did a little web surfing on the subject. I smiled when I read or heard things like, “Sure, you can blog anonymously, but it’s harder to make a name for yourself that way.” I thought, Uh, yeah, no doubt that’s true…and I’m not looking to make a name for myself. That’s kinda the point!
Anyway, it’s got me thinking about the whole phenomenon that is anonymous blogging, and why any person (including this person) might want to do it…
Like most people who do this, I suppose, I’ve resorted to anonymous blogging because the anonymity of it frees me up to speak my mind without fear or inhibition, which enables me to write out and share things I wouldn’t if it had my name on it.
I’ve become a big fan of the podcast “Song Exploder.” On a recent episode, recording artist Porter Robinson is telling the backstory behind his song “Get Your Wish,” and he explains why he used a particular vocal effect that altered the sound of his own voice beyond recognizability: “I put on this pitch manipulation thing, and once I gave it this, like, very feminine, cute character, it really helped me. I felt like I could say anything. It felt like I was wearing a mask, you know, and I could really tell the truth about what I was feeling, because it was too scary for me, I think, to sing openly in my real voice. So putting on this mask of this voice processing effect, this was a step towards being able to be as openhearted as I want to be.”
I heard that, and I thought, Amen. I get that. I blog like that. Obviously, in his case he’s not recording music anonymously. It’s not quite the same as what I’m doing. Everyone knows that it’s him, and that those are his words. But the way he describes it touched a nerve with me. It rang true. I thought, Yeah, I can relate to that.
To be sure, there’s a kind of uninhibitedness that’s reprehensible: I mean, hiding behind a cloak of electronic anonymity in order to say things that are despicable. (There’s plenty of that online these days.) But it is possible to blog anonymously, not for the purpose of posting what’s shameful and getting away with it, but for the purpose of creating the freedom to post what’s meant to be thoughtful and helpful. And I do hope this blog has already become a forum like that, and will stay that way. Rightly or wrongly, because of my job, and my relationships, and other considerations, there are some thoughts and experiences I’d rather not share with my name on them.
And even if no one else out there ever reads this blog (and I realize that’s a distinct possibility!), it’s still good for me to be doing this. I’ve already found that it’s been helpful to me personally to take the time to think these things through and come up with the best words I can to articulate them.
All it would take is one person—just one (1)—in my circle of family and friends who knows that I’m The Unvanishing Man, and at that point this project collapses. (Or at least changes radically.) For that matter, it could even be a perfect stranger who’s managed to make the connection and break through the secrecy wall. So long as I’m aware of it. Because at that point, whether I realize it or not, whether I admit it or not, whether I like it or not, I’m writing for that one person as the audience I want to please, I’m writing as a way of performing. Which brings to an end the freedom and uninhibitedness I’ve needed to make this work.
Perhaps the reply is, “Then don’t be such a people-pleaser. Your problem isn’t being known; it’s being fearful of others’ opinions.” Which may have some truth in it. But I don’t think it’s entirely true. You don’t have to be a people-pleaser to think, I’d rather that others not know I’m the author of these little essays.
In any case, I want to be careful not to claim too much here. There are plenty of valuable, thoughtful, helpful blogs out there whose authors are known, and even well known. So it’s not like blogging anonymously is the only way to go. But it is, I believe, the only way for me to go. And so I’ve gone there.
A few further reflections…
One, I need to be careful about my own weakness. It’s easy to be naïve about ourselves. I can tell myself all sorts of noble, high-minded things about why I’m doing this anonymously (to create the freedom to be helpfully candid and so forth), but there’s always the temptation to slip into doing exactly what I’ve repudiated: which is, using anonymity to say things I should be ashamed to say.
Two, even when I tell myself, No one will ever know this was me, no one close to me will ever know I’ve written these things…it’s hard to shake the sense that someday they will. Like I said, it would only take one (1). Which makes it hard to shake the sense that I am writing for an audience of future readers after all.
Sigh. Maybe it’s just inevitable.
But I’ll keep going anyway.