GIP and stuff

Look at this awesome icon relevantpink made for me! She picked "shipwrecks" from my interest list and gave me this great multi-purpose icon.

I'm still hunting for my current political icon. I've seen a couple of good candidates over at liberal_icons. I hate to give up the Kerry icon, but I'm reaching the point where I sit there debating over which icon to delete every time I get a new one, and that's just sad. But, you know, you don't want to get rid of the nice ones people made for you... I did delete a Munch icon a while back. See? It has happened.

Oh, forgive me while I indulge in a moment of "told you so":

Drilling approved for Alaska oil reserve

I'm sorry. I'd like to be writing politically insightful things, but right now I'm still trying to figure out what the hell I can do to make a difference.

In the meantime, I'll probably just write fluff.

no more ms. nice kellinator

When I first got on LJ, I got in the habit of friending everyone who friended me. It seemed like the polite thing to do. I've pretty much kept that habit, and I've hardly ever made friends-list cuts because for the most part, I like my friends list. I don't really have time for it, but I like reading lots of different people, and I've gotten interested in your lives.

But for me, LJ is supposed to be fun. I do my thing, I read your things, I make friends, I'm here for the people. What I'm not here for is being told I'm wrong all the time. I post about the things that are important to me, which frequently include venting about politics. I make no secret about this, or how I feel about them. What you see is what you get. I generally don't go into other people's journals and tell them they're wrong. One, because I'm stubborn enough to know that you're not likely to change my mind, nor am I likely to change yours. Two, because lots of people seem to think arguing is fun. I'm not one of them. I'm fine with civil discussions of politics, including the stuff I post (what's the point of posting it if you don't want people to think about it?), but I'm sick of constantly being told I'm wrong just for the hell of it, especially just because people like playing devil's advocate. I especially find it obnoxious when someone on LJ tells me to "open [my] mind" on some political issue. Look, if I want to open my mind to something, I'm sure as hell not going to start on LJ. LJ is not a good place for objective information. I don't know everything, but neither do you. I realized today I've seen some people who will never admit to being less than an expert on everything, even when confronted with the flaws in their information, and I'm sick of it. I'm also sick of people condescending to myself and others in my LJ with no more authority than "because I said so."

If I drop you, it doesn't mean that I don't like you or don't want to hang out with you. What it does mean is that I find your posts and/or your responses to my posts more stressful than I can deal with right now. If reading your journal makes me scream at the monitor, I'm going to drop it. I've got enough stresses in my life without spending extra time reading about why I'm a piece of shit and/or not as deep as you.

People keep LJs for all sorts of different purposes. Mine is not a debate journal. You want that, go read debate. If all you do here is pick arguments, there are better journals to read.

And in a postscript to my previous entry, I really don't understand why so many people are having trouble understanding why I think drilling for oil in a wildlife preserve is a bad idea. Wildlife preserves are called that for a reason -- they're supposed to be preserving wildlife. No one has adequately explained to me how drilling will not disrupt wildlife, probably because it will. And as for the "it's just a tiny bit" argument -- yeah, this time, and the next time, and so on. That's one of the few slippery-slope arguments I'll buy. We're going to destroy something irreplacable for a few million barrels of oil? Whatever happened to figuring out what we're going to do once we run out of oil? Because it will happen.