You Are a What? What's a Blog?

I had a post about telephones ready to go, but then Twitter went all 'OH NO SHE DIDN'T' all over an article in The NY Times with the snarky title 'Honey, Don't Bother Mommy.  I'm Too Busy Building My Brand," and I had to stop and read all the furor and posts in response and so on.

I am not going to respond to the NY post, far better writers have done that...read Mom 101's response to the article or Kelby Carr's piece where she sums up nicely why the main stream media treats bloggers who happen to be mothers this way:

"We get marginalized for a few reasons, including:

• We are women who are, perhaps for one of the first times, far better at something than men in many cases and far better in an industry that is making a major impact. I should explain that I know many, many men who are talented, brilliant bloggers, but that isn’t surprising. For women to stand out in an industry that major corporations are clamoring to get involved with just sits wrong with some people.
• We are excelling in the media landscape, which doesn’t sit well with traditional media.
• We are turning our backs on the mold that has been created for us.
• We are threatening to traditional publishers, mostly old white men who couldn’t write a blog or use Twitter if you put a gun to their heads.
• Newspaper circulation keeps declining, while blog readership and authorship keeps growing.
• Writing snarky articles about mom bloggers encourages mom bloggers to share links and drive readers to the newspaper’s web site. (Here’s a hint, New York Times… we would share positive coverage just as much, if not more).

We are trying to make a living by creating content, and for that we get demeaned, criticized, talked down to, made fun of, and stereotyped as unethical money and swag grabbing whores.

I know of a few other organizations that make their money creating content. Namely, mainstream media."

Danielle Wiley of Edelman Digital wonders too when any business endeavors by women will stop being described in 'girly' ways since a man attending SXSW or E3 would not be described as doing something 'boyish.'  But then....that is because SXSW and E3 have become mainstream.    Technology, social media and web development,  is now considered business and mainstream...it is no longer the secret code of techies and internet support.   

It is like the San Diego Comic Con.  It used to be the realm of sweaty palmed mostly, male comic fans searching for elusive No. 1's and to meet the artists and writers.  Now it is a massive HOLLYWOOD event, where people of all stripes line up for HOURS to catch a glimpse of their favourite film celebrities.

Mom Bloggers appear to have replaced the comic nerds as things of mockery and confusion.

For what amazes me....what brings me back down from my lofty Page Rank Four status and 1600 Twitter followings is that in all my time parenting three kids, from doctors offices, clinics, drop-in playgroups, birthday parties, preschools, kindergartens and grade two school pickups, I have not met one other blogger.  

Not one.

Nor have I met another mother who tweets.  Or is on Facebook for that matter.

When I step away from the computer to interact with my neglected and unfed family (the irony is that as I was trying to type this my son was yammering about being hungry!),  I am suddenly alone.  My community is gone.   

When I mention blogging or (gasp) hand out a business card with my email on it to arrange a play date for the kids, I am met with expressions of confusion and bafflement.

I am alone in my nerdiness once again.  It is like my sci-fi, comic book reading youth. 

Every Star Trek or Star Wars fan now looks at us and says 'welcome to our world.'  The world of the marginalized, mocked and misunderstood.

We are big enough to attract media attention, but not enough on the radar to be acknowledged by our neighbours.

The fact that some mom bloggers make a living from their work muddies the waters even more.   The fact that marketers and corporations court some of us and 'give' us stuff causes even more confusion and resentment.

It is more than a hobby.   And for some...that makes us threatening.  

I have a feeling that it all boils down to the idea that is still out there, that once we become mothers, and gasp become STAY AT HOME mothers, that we suddenly lose all our brains and creativity.

Forgotten is that many women did and still do have careers beyond raising their children.  

Why does the media still try to 'put us in our place'?  Why are mothers not allowed a voice?  An opinion? Why is everything we say and do mocked and patronized?

Apart from the fact that main stream media is indeed threatened by the online world, blogs and citizen journalism - mom bloggers seem to raise the most ire...more so than any other subculture out there. 

We seem to be an easy target.   Anything we do away from raising our kids - according to the media - takes away from our abilities to raise our kids.  Hence the ongoing 'mommy wars' that still do the rounds.

I don't know if it will ever change.  The internet is fluid.  Things do change very quickly.  Trends and ideas take shape and come and go as quickly as the technology that we use to access it all does.  Mom blogging is just part of it.

A very large part of it.

So like my fellow comic con attendees, role playing dungeon keepers, starbase commanders, I will continue to attend tweet-ups and Word Press Camps, and blogging conferences and will continue to get strange looks from the parents of my kids friends.

----

Original Canada Moms Blog post.  Kerry can be found writing about  life and her kids at Crunchy Carpets. She also runs the  community site for women bloggers on the west coast,  Wet Coast Women.