Honestly, it's just so goddamn tiresome how much people project onto me because I am the owner of an email list. I have been accused of bias in my management of the list by gay Republicans who don't like the fact that people who don't agree with them post legitimate items; by gay radicals who claim that my posting legitimate items is shilling for Kerry (even when the items themselves criticize Kerry); by gay pro-lifers who don't like that someone else posted off-topic about abortion during the ten minutes a day when I wasn't checking my email; by small businesspeople who aren't as clever as other small businesspeople and thus don't realize that there are ways to promote their businesses that are not technically advertisements. Then there was the time when someone posted something off-charter and inflammatory. I happened to be online at the time and took immediate action, and yet multiple people wrote to me just to tell me that the post was offensive, as if I had anything to do with it. (Others wrote to thank me for my handling of the situation, which I appreciated.) Members of third parties accuse me of shilling for the major parties even though they themselves are free to post to the list and do so and even though the list rules are clear. Socialists attempt to post things that are clearly off-charter, and I block them, and then they accuse my organization of hindering their "efforts." People decide I am their new best friend because they get list mail from me. I have to explain the same rules over and over and over to stupid people who can't read. I have to say no to people I personally like because they can't/don't read the rules, and I have angst about it nearly every time. People who do know the rules ask for an exception because something is just sooooo important. Others subscribe to the idea that it is easier to ask forgiveness than permission. It's tiresome. It really is. Luckily there are usually enough rewards from doing the work that this stuff doesn't usually get me too down. But I have a right to complain anonymously in a blog that perhaps two people on earth will read, so here I am.
posted by Mad Anne Rackham at 3:33 AM