Having recently been reminded of the test I decided it was time to take it again. I’m sure I’ve taken it a couple of times over the years, but again I’m unable to locate any entries where I mentioned it if I had. Still, some 7+ years later surely I’ve bowed to the conventional wisdom and become more conservative in my old age, right? Well, not exactly:

I'm becoming even more of a Republican's worst nightmare.

So much for growing more Conservative in my old age. I’ve jumped to a solid 5 on the Economic Left/Right scale and have taken on a much more anti-authoritarian approach to life. If I had to guess I’d say that’s largely thanks to the eroding of civil liberties by the government over the last decade of war. But just because I’m much more Libertarian than anytime in the past you shouldn’t expect to see me voting for Ron Paul anytime soon.

I was flattered to be considered on par with those folks, but the simple truth is I don’t have a lot of interest in being a leader, unofficial or otherwise.  I don’t know if one of the reasons is because I grew up a middle child and am just used to doing my own thing or the fact that I have ADD and find it difficult enough just to take care of myself let alone anyone else or I’m just an asshole, but it’s probably one or all of those things.

But that’s just part of the reason. The other part is there are aspects of human nature that I have a hard time dealing with that always seem to come into play when people start banding together into groups. These annoying tendencies show up whether it’s an official group like American Atheists or The Center For Inquiry or unofficial like the atheism movement in general. Even among a small group of people with a similar viewpoint on a topic there will be variations in the details of those viewpoints and lots of tangential issues that may come up in which a wide disparity of views ends up causing conflicts.

A recent example of this in the atheist movement is the whole ElevatorGate kerfuffle. That’s a shitstorm that’s still raining down all over the place and the incident that started it all happened months ago and it’s divided the community in a major way. The response from both sides in this dust up was astounding in its vitriol at the time, but there seems to be a large contingent of people out there who just can’t let it go. Rebecca wrote a blog post about this at the end of September that illustrates exactly what I’m talking about:

Someone Tweeted to ask if I get emails like that often, and I had to laugh. Ever since the incident that shall not be named, I get these emails several times a week. But more than that, I’ve now amassed a following of obsessive creeps who have seemingly devoted their lives to hounding me down and making sure I never dare to speak my bitch mind again. Their tactics? Scientologist-level private investigation to dredge up the deepest, darkest mysteries of my past combined with grade school-level name-calling. It’s impressive, really. Really. Really.

Someone started an Elevatorgate blog with the mission of having Watson removed the Skeptic’s Guide to the Universe podcast. The folks who run the Pharyngula Wiki added a section called the Slimepit which lists off “commenters regarded as personae non gratae at Pharyngula.” So then someone started up a competing wiki called Phawrongula Wiki which explains its purpose as follows:

Keeping the charlatans that are poisoning secularism honest. This is a resource to document systemic abuse of reality by self-described “freethinkers” and secularists who are actively harming these communities in the pursuit of personal interest and ideology.

I said back when I wrote about this topic that I thought it was badly handled by both sides and there was enough shit being tossed back and forth between them that everyone was looking pretty bad as a result. Hell, it even got the attention of USA Today. The name calling and trolling of the major players on either side hasn’t abated all that much either. The fact that a lot of people seem to holding grudges over this mess is something I just don’t understand. Rather than have a discussion on the issue brought up people spend all their time claiming the other side is destroying the movement.

Obviously this isn’t a unique phenomena among atheists/secularists. It seems to happen in any group that gets large and diverse enough in size. It’s the same reason that in the six years I’ve played World of Warcraft I’ve been in several dozen different guilds. For those of you who aren’t gamers, a guild in the game is an official grouping of players that offers benefits over going it alone. This is especially true in the current version of the game where in addition to guild banks (item storage that members of the group all have access to) there are perks that the guild can earn that grant more XP when killing monsters, additional loot, better chances at skill ups when crafting items, etc. that make being in a guild beneficial for everyone. Most guilds have a pseudo-military style of rankings that bestow more responsibility/privileges as you go up in rank.

The more seriously the members of the guild take these ranks the less likely I am to stick around for very long. There’s always that handful of people who are always vying to move up in ranking so they can feed whatever fantasy power trip they’ve got going in their heads and those guys end up trying to tell everyone else how to play. If you’re not geared to their standards or aren’t playing the optimal spec for your class or haven’t spent the gold necessary to have every enchant and gem that a hardcore player has then you get a lot of grief from these people. Oh, and don’t forget to show up for every raid they have scheduled or you’ll get more shit from them. Almost inevitably there will be a power struggle between those players or one of those players and the Guild Leaders and someone — often a lot of someones — either quit the guild or get kicked and it’s a crapload of drama I’d really rather not deal with. I generally don’t ask for a higher rank than whatever one I’ve been placed in to start because I really don’t care what my rank is. I’m perfectly happy to let someone else run around playing out his power fantasies while I concentrate on just enjoying the game. When the drama starts kicking in is usually about the time I quit and look for another guild.

There’s also the fact that I don’t really see myself as being a big fucking deal. As an example, I’m basically not like this guy who is wondering why he’s not been asked to speak at the upcoming 2012 Global Atheist convention:

Next year, in Melbourne, where I live and 2 hours from where I have been living over the past several years, the Global Atheism Convention will be held. I am an Australian practical atheist (and philosophical Agnostic, which will become significant in a minute), who has published in The Australian Book of Atheismand published many discussions and defences of atheism and secularism in Australia on this blog. I am a professional philosopher. I speak well and do not smell too badly or expose myself in public to the unwilling.

So, why am I not a speaker at this conference? Why wasn’t I one at the last one? Is it because (*gasp*) I do not fit the profile of orthodoxy that the present atheism movement seems to have adopted? Is it because I have defended accommodationism? One can only wonder. Maybe there are just that many public atheists in Australia I couldn’t be fitted in.

Bertrand Russell, Darwin and Huxley all held the position I hold: that we cannot rule out the existence of every kind of God, only the ones that are contrary to fact. Maybe they too would be considered as Unsound, as Sir Humphrey Appleby would have said…

Given my lack of funding, I will not be paying the $200 or more that it will cost to go otherwise.

As always, if this is the case, I fear the exclusionism of modern atheism as much as I despise the dehumanisation of the unbeliever that often gets pushed by theists.

I really don’t know who this guy is. Maybe he is worthy of speaking at the conference. Perhaps he has a lot of useful things to contribute. For all I know he could have some truly deep wisdom that many would benefit from if they could only hear him speak it. I don’t know. What I do know is that he seems to think he’s a big fucking deal.

Don’t get me wrong, I recognize that my own ego is probably over-inflated in that I’m narcissist enough to write a blog for 10 years because I think I have something worth saying, but I’m not suggesting that the whole of modern atheism is being exclusionary simply because I haven’t been asked to speak at an atheist conference. Some folks might think I think I am a big fucking deal, but I really don’t. I’m just some blowhard shooting his mouth off on the Interwebs that some folks find mildly amusing. Hell, I was slightly embarrassed when I attended my first (and so far, only) Skeptics in the Pub meeting and was introduced as an Internet Celebrity. If I were to be asked to speak at a conference like that I’d probably turn it down.

In the past at least one other atheist blogger that I look up to contacted me about joining him to do a skepticism talk at GenCon, which I politely declined. I really wouldn’t know what to say. I have a hard enough time coming up with things to blog about that don’t sound like the mumbling of someone who was dropped on his head as a child too many times. I have to beg you guys for topics for the SEB Podcast for crying out loud. There’s also the fact that I probably couldn’t afford to take the time off of work or pay for the travel to do these things either, but it’s mostly that I’m admittedly lazy and am happy to let others do the leading.

And laziness is another big part of it. Folks like PZ and Hemant are crazy-prolific in their writing and I just am not. They seem to knock out dozens of blog entries a day and whip up talks for the conferences without much effort. I’m sure they are working their asses off doing it, but they make it look easy. Meanwhile I’m content to sputter out an entry or two every few days or so and a podcast whenever ***Dave and I think to do one and our schedules don’t conflict too badly. It’s a nicely relaxed pace that allows me some time to do completely unproductive things like playing video games and sleeping in on the weekends. Plus there’s a benefit in not having to deal with the drama that always seems to come from being considered a leader.

This is long and rambling and I’m not sure I’m getting my point across the way I meant to, but the “too long; didn’t read” version of it is simply this: I’m content to babble away on my little blog and podcast where I don’t have to deal with the shitstorms everyone else seems to deal with and I really wouldn’t know what to do to be a bigger part of it anyway. Call it laziness or cowardice or what have you, but I’m fine with my spot shouting from the sidelines whenever something catches my attention. There are other, more capable, people out there contributing that I don’t see a void that needs to be filled by some loudmouth like me.

It’s also true that my blogging suffers over the weekend and for the same reasons. This is exacerbated when the weekends are longer than usual, such as this one. I make use of my weekends to forget that I have responsibilities such as jobs and schedules and crap-I’ve-got-to-do. Even after nearly 10 years, blogging doesn’t feel like a chore per se (at least not most of the time), but I tend to ignore what’s going on in the world over the weekend which tends to leave one with a dearth of things to blog about. Unless I’m suddenly struck with a thought such as this one.

According to Twitter I have 372 followers and they must be astonished at what a boring life I lead. My last tweet, some 24 hours ago, consisted of the following bit of wisdom:

How could humanity survive without such vital information?

I look back at it now and I wonder just who the hell I thought would give a shit that the wife and I were going to eat at a major chain restaurant? The tweet prior to that was even less informative:

Someone alert Ted Koppel! I don't care if he's retired!

Whoa, stop the friggin’ presses! He’s up early AND he’s going to play a video game? WHO COULD’VE GUESSED THAT?!?!

I think part of the problem is the character limit on Twitter. I tend to be rather verbose and Twitter just doesn’t lend itself to that sort of thing. My updates on Google+ tend to be a bit more interesting because, like Facebook, there’s no apparent limit on update length. It’s a bit more like a mico-blogging service and it makes sharing content pretty easy. However I find it somewhat ironic that my updates on reshared content tend to be concise enough that Twitter would have no problem with the length. I find that I’m using Google+ more and more as time goes on and the fact that I spend a lot of time in Google Reader where I can see when I have a G+ notification is probably why. So if you want to follow me on one of the services and not be bored to tears by my pathetic content then Google+ is probably where you should do it. You don’t even have to have a Google+ account to follow me as most of my updates are public, but if you want to sign up just click here and one of the 150 invitations I have can be yours. I imagine those will go pretty quick so don’t hesitate if you want one.

Truth is that even my updates there are probably less than revelatory, but they’re the most interesting of the major social media services.

Forty-four isn’t a particularly momentous year, I’ve already had the Over The Hill birthday (40) and I’m not quite half-way to 50 yet, so I suppose it’ll pass like most any other day. One difference comes from living in the age of Facebook and Twitter. Before I left the house this morning I had already had nearly a dozen Happy Birthdays to answer on Facebook thanks to the fact that the service tells all your friends that you’re having a birthday today. I’m not a huge Facebook fan, but that is pretty nifty. While Twitter doesn’t broadcast your birthday to all who follow you, the mere mention of it in a tweet provokes a cavalcade of good wishes from persons known and unknown that’s sure to make you feel at least a little special on your special day. But I must say that Google’s new attempt at social networking — Google+ — has both of those social networks beat with this:

My very own Google doodle! Click to embiggen!

You will probably have to click on it for the full-size version to see it, but the tool-tip on the doodle says “Happy Birthday Les!” and when I click on it it takes me to my Google+ profile page. Granted, this doodle shows to anyone on their birthday so long as they’ve input their birth date into their Google profile page, but it threw me for a loop when I first noticed it. “Huh,” I thought, “Google’s doing something about birthdays today. What a coincidence.” It wasn’t until I moused over it and it showed the salutation addressed to me that my mind was blown. Apparently if you don’t have a Google+ account, but do still have a Google Profile then that page will be dressed up with animated party streamers and a Happy Birthday message. Still, it’s pretty cool to pretend Google thinks I’m important enough to make a doodle for.

Which just goes to show that one thing I haven’t lost with age is my ability to be easily impressed.

This is especially true of politics. Between the Republicans not giving a shit about anyone other than themselves and their rich buddies, the Tea Party trying to force a dogmatic political ideology even at the expense of the country they claim to love, or the Democrats acting like a bunch of spineless pussies who give away half their bargaining chips before they even try to negotiate with the Republicans, I’ve become totally disenchanted with the whole process. Obama, in particular, has been very disillusioning to the extent that I am seriously considering — for the first time since I’ve been able to do so — not voting in the next election.

Maybe it’s because I’ve been blogging for too long and I’m just getting cynical about so many things. I started blogging because I had something to say and a need to say it and I wanted to contribute my voice to the national discussion on a number of topics in the, perhaps naive, belief that speaking up made a difference. I used to write to my representatives a lot more than I do lately as well for much the same reasons. But these days it seems the inmates are running the asylum and no amount of discussion will make a difference because they’re not listening, have no intention of listening, and you can completely forget about compromise. On top of that, the people who are ostensibly on our side either don’t have the political willpower to fight for our principles or just really aren’t on our side. Again, I’m talking about Obama who kinda portrayed himself as a progressive, but has in many ways been to the right of Reagan in many of the policies he’s pursued. Yes, he’s still probably a hundred-fold better than what a McCain/Palin administration would’ve been, but that’s little comfort when so many things he promised he’d fight for are the very things he caved on without so much as throwing a pillow at the opposition. Pointing this out again and again just seems so futile anymore.

That same is also true of the topic of religion. Even the amusement I used to get from rambling on about the latest bit of pareidolia has lost its luster. Credulous people are credulous and there doesn’t seem to be any shortage of them these days. It often feels like I’m repeating myself on too many of the topics in this category.

It doesn’t help that there are so many other bloggers out there dedicated to specific topics who are covering all of the stuff I used to rant about so much more thoroughly and better than I ever did. More often than not these days I find myself writing about a topic more to point out an angle or thought that wasn’t touched on by everyone else who wrote about it, but that’s an increasingly rare thing.

So my output has slowed and every now and then I wonder if I shouldn’t just hang up my hat and call it a good run. Nearly ten years is an incredibly long time to dedicate to one activity. Then I come across something that sparks my creative juices and I put out a few entries and I feel like I’m contributing once again and I think to myself, maybe I’ve got a little more I can do. And then four or five days pass without my writing so much as a sentence and I’m right back into that rut. I feel bad when I go more than a day or two without posting something because so many folks seem to drop by daily to see what small bit of insanity I’ve decided to share with them.

So that’s the state I find myself in right now. Less output because I’m trying to be somewhat novel in what I’m writing about. Even trying to get another bit of fiction finished so I can post that as a nice change of pace. Trying to be more than just that nutbag who’s always bitching about Republicans and True Believers™ on his blog. Trying to figure out how I can share more of myself in a way that’s interesting.