Stirring up Trouble

I seem to have been stirring up a fair bit of trouble on the internet in the past week or two. I've been kind of growly in person, causing me not to pull any punches via the safety of the internet. I've been finding prosecutors' blogs and commenting on them, challenging their assumptions. In one case, I called the prosecutor absurd. Twice. I'm sure they've loved my blog if they followed my google profile over here. Especially the post that tells how I feel about prosecutors.

I've been getting involved in newspaper website discussions. All of the major newspapers in my region have fairly robust discussion boards. I try to stay out of it, but sometimes I just can't. I usually try to be very reasonable in my tone, but it seems lately I've been a bit more confrontational. There are a couple of commenters in particular whose schtick has gotten old so I've been calling them on it of late. I'm kind of turning the corner from being reasonable to just plain ranting.

Then my friend has a nice, sweet blog. Or it was until I showed up. Lately, it's gotten a bit more, um, active in its discussions. I kinda started that, albeit unintentionally. I didn't even think what I posted was all that controversial, but I guess it struck a nerve. She says she wanted to get her blog back into more political topics and she doesn't mind robust discussion. I hope she means it, because in my current mood I'm having a hard time letting things go. This is the same friend who calls me optimistic for getting into these internet discussions, so she probably does recognize my good faith motives, even if she doesn't agree with my statements.

I guess I'm doing what I set out to do when I started this blog: reach out beyond my choir of like-minded friends and co-workers. That's good. Reasonable discussion between people with differing views is never a bad thing. I just hope I can meet my goal of broaching those discussions in ways that don't just piss people off. Mostly. Some people really need to be called on their b.s. See, there I go again. Stirring up trouble.