Not too long ago, I wrote a post that I thought was funny. It was a review of a place I ate at in NYC, which I found terribly disappointing. When I was writing the post, I was striving for humorous commentary to go along with my negative restaurant review. I included what I thought were funny comments about someone that was with me. In my mind, I thought they were funny comments because they were never meant to be taken seriously. My characterizations were a bit outlandish, and I wrote it thinking everyone would realize it was supposed to be outlandish. I published the post, without another thought, thinking it was pretty decent. I have never been so wrong in my life.
About a week after I hit the publish button, I discovered that the person who was mentioned in my post was not happy with me…and with good reason. I was initially surprised because I thought that I had attempted to write something that was funny. I immediately went back to analyze my work, thinking that perhaps the post had been misinterpreted. After reading it over and over again, an unsettling feeling came over me. It wasn’t as funny as I remembered and it was downright mean in a few places. What was meant to be a funny story ended up being a story that made fun of somebody. And God knows that was never my intent. After re-reading it for the millionth time, I rewrote it, removing every hurtful word about the person that was originally included. I was ashamed of myself because I knew that I had hurt someone with my words and hadn’t realized that I had done so until it was pointed out to me. That concerned me, because I like to think I’m pretty smart and I had completely missed what I had done.
I’ve been doing a lot of thinking the last few days and I realized that there is a VERY fine line between trying to be funny and ending up being mean. As bloggers, we have to be cognizant of that difference, especially those of us that like to use humor or tend to have a sarcastic tone. We have to remember that our words are being read by anyone that happens upon our post, not just by an English professor who asked for 1,000 words on some topic that no one else will ever read. There are some bloggers in the world who don’t care what they say or if they hurt other people with their words. I am not one of those people and hope to never be lumped into that category again. In the future, I will be much more careful about my words and remember the type of power that they have.
To the person I hurt: I am so very sorry about what I did and hope that you believe me when I say I didn’t mean to do it. I know how idiotic that sounds, but it’s true. And I know that only time heals some wounds and I hope this apology will help with the healing.
Godspeed,
