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Kathleen Parker On Blogs, Then And Now

Columnist Kathleen Parker triggered another round of MSM animosity in the blogosphere this week with a blog-bashing piece titled "Lord Of The Blogs."

While the article offered some pointed criticisms that no honest blogger could fairly refute, its over-the-top comparison of bloggers to the tribal, "murderous barbarians" of the classic movie "Lord Of The Flies" understandably riled the blogosphere. Parker's elitist praise for "professors, lawyers, doctors, philosophers, scientists and other journalists who also happen to blog," and her rash dismissal of those who don't fit her ivory-tower mold of acceptable bloggers also sparked a backlash.

LaShawn Barber posted an excellent and thorough response to Parker's column, including a reaction from Parker herself. You also can get your fill of outrage, sarcasm and reactionary rhetoric at blogs like Ace of Spades HQ, Daily Kos, Mark in Mexico, Outside the Beltway, PoliPundit, Right Wing News and Think Progress.

I found it more interesting, however, to compare what Parker has written about blogs in the past with her latest screed. As Parker acknowledged in the new column, she has praised blogs. More to the point, she defended bloggers against a journalistic colleague who ridiculed them as a bunch of undisciplined folks in pajamas -- a charge very similar to the one she is now making.

In one column, Parker spoke positively of bloggers being the "big bang of the information age." But in "Lord of the Blogs," she ridiculed blogs as "the big-bang 'electroniverse' where recently wired squatters set up new camps each day." While Parker proclaimed herself a "fan" of blogging back in the summer of 2003, you would never know it from the column she just wrote.

Curiously, other than an explosion in the number of blogs, nothing significant has changed in the blogosphere from the time Parker first lauded them until now. The justifiable criticisms that she leveled in the latest column -- "untempered by restraint and accountability," "undisciplined," and sometimes lacking "maturity and humility" -- have been true since bloggers jumped defiantly onto the political stage.

As The Anchoress said in a 2005 roundup, "The point can be made that some blogs are better than others, and some bloggers more temperate and serious than others, but so what? That's just life." It's also quite true of journalists, as Parker herself knows and has shown time and again in her columns.

So why did she turn on bloggers now? I don't really know -- and the explanation she offered LaShawn Barber doesn't really answer the question for me. But turn she did, as the quotes from "Bloggers Knew!" (Sept. 15, 2004) and "Blogs Breaking Logjam Of Journalism" (July 13, 2003) clearly show.

See the excerpts for yourself in the extended entry.

Lord Of The Blogs
-- Blogs are "the less visible, insidious enemies of decency, humanity and civility -- the angry offspring of narcissism's quickie marriage to instant gratification."
-- "There's something frankly creepy about the explosion we now call the blogosphere -- the big-bang 'electroniverse' where recently wired squatters set up new camps each day."
-- "Bloggers persist no matter their contributions or quality. ... [M]ost babble, buzz and blurt like caffeinated adolescents competing for the Ritalin generation's inevitable senior superlative: Most Obsessive-Compulsive."
-- "These effete and often clever baby 'bloggies' are rich in time and toys, but bereft of adult supervision. Spoiled and undisciplined, they have grabbed the mike and seized the stage."
-- "Plenty smart but lacking in wisdom, they possess the power of a forum, but neither the maturity nor humility that years of experience impose."
-- "Each time I wander into blogdom, I'm reminded of the savage children stranded on an island in William Golding's 'Lord of the Flies.' Without adult supervision, they organize themselves into rival tribes, learn to hunt and kill, and eventually become murderous barbarians in the absence of a civilizing structure."
-- "When someone trips ... bloggers are the bloodthirsty masses slavering for a public flogging. Incivility is their weapon and humanity their victim."
-- "[W]e should beware and resist the rest of the ego-gratifying rabble who contribute only snark, sass and destruction."

Bloggers Knew!
-- "Bloggers love fact-checking television and newspaper reporters and commentators ... and have proved themselves both energetic and competent on both fronts."
-- "All these discussions [about phony National Guard memos] took place after the blogosphere had worked its magic. ... Such was the spark that began the flame that grew into the wildfire that became the conflagration that threatens to consign journalistic credibility to history's ash heap."
-- "Make that yet another victory for the nerds, but not nerds in pajamas , as former CBS executive Jonathan Klein said in an attempt to impugn bloggers."
-- "The beauty of the blogosphere is that it is self-igniting, self-propelling and self-selecting, a sort of intellectual ecosystem wherein the best specimens from various disciplines descend from the ethers, converge on an issue and apply their unique talents."
-- "Though virtually newborn, the blogosphere has blossomed exponentially in a matter of earth-time seconds, from a few random voices to a mighty and diverse chorus of sometimes spectacular talent. Bloggers are the big bang of the information age."

Blogs Breaking Logjam Of Journalism
-- "I'm not an expert on blogging, but I am a fan. As a regular visitor to a dozen or so news and opinion blogs, I'm riveted by the implications for my profession."
-- "[W]hat I once loved about journalism went missing some time ago and seems to have resurfaced as the driving force of the blogosphere: a high-spirited, irreverent, swashbuckling, lances-to-the-ready assault on the status quo."
-- "[B]loggers are building bonfires and handing out virtual leaflets along America's Information Highway."
-- "The best bloggers ... are like smart, hip gunslingers come to make trouble for the local good ol' boys. The heat they pack includes an arsenal of intellectual artillery, crisp prose, sharp insights and a gimlet eye for mainstream media's flaws."
-- "[T]he blogosphere may help more than hurt. The view from my bunker suggests that blogs can't be anything but good for journalism. Just as a new restaurant is good for established ones, competition is good."

Posted by | 11:34 AM

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