This is Excellent!

Yeah, Gianna is a talented writer who is fortunate in presenting from a different perspective to most other bloggers.

Unfortunately though, she has a nasty habit of airing her dirty washing in public. Whether it be belittling her mother, sneering at her sisters or disparaging her child’s father, all of whom come from a position of genuine care and concern, she doesn’t miss.

For one so talented with words, she can sure use them to machine-gun those who love her and Harley. Unnecessary and depressing.

You, on the other hand adrian, are clearly a role model of sensitive, non-judgemental civility, who would never ever think about passing a bad one-sided patronising word about anyone at all in the ‘sphere … errr …

I didn’t even know she’d quit…

Folks, don’t get me wrong I’m generally a fan of Gianna’s writing and yes, her lot is not easy. Indeed, I’ve congratulated her from time to time in personal emails.

But CS, you fail to distinguish between bagging family members and bagging others on the ‘sphere. There is a world of difference and you’re a dope for not recognising it.

When Gianna posts verbatim conversations with her family, designed to belittle them, well that’s really rough and must be very distressing for the wounded parties. Would you do the same to your mother or sisters ? Of course not.

Sure Mark, ‘laudable honesty’ is one thing. Denigration and humiliation of a loving family is quite another. Simply put, no class.

thanks a lot, Mark. most kind.

but far out, adrian. i really feel i need to defend myself on this charge. haven’t you ever heard of ‘poking gentle fun’, which has always been how i’ve looked at posts about members of my family? i thought they were generally pretty affectionate actually. i have the best family in the world, and it concerns me that you think i deliberately belittle them. my personal posts are only ever motivated by honesty.
i’ll have to send my sister around here to give her opinion, since she’s a big fan of my blog. she frequently comments at my site, including on posts where i’ve mentioned her, and always in the positive. i doubt there’s any “wounded party” or “distress” there, or that she feels belittled” or “sneered at”. but let’s ask her, shall we?
as far as any hostile motive is concerned, there was only ever one angry post about the baby’s father which i regretted and withdrew. since then–nada. sure i have discussed a couple of issues, but i haven’t sought to portray him in a negative light, i’ve hardly even mentioned him directly. for the record, harley’s father is a very decent human being, and we’ve resolved most of our personal differences over time.
as for posts about my dad, admittedly they’ve sometimes been slightly disgruntled, but i’ve only ever been honest. and i reckon i’ve often erred on the side of rose-tinting my relationship with him.
adrian, you don’t know what my family is like in real life. we are incredibly tough with each other. we call spades spades. so my family isn’t likely to take offence at anything i’ve written. besides, as mentioned recently, my father has his own blog which in my opinion was far more negative about me than anything i’d ever written about him.
so adrian, could you please tell me exactly which exactly which verbatims have been ‘designed to belittle’?
geez, what a motivation to impute. makes me wonder why you still read my blog, when i’m clearly such a nasty little girl.

Gianna, I considered your post, Riding In Cars with Boys, belittling of your mother. To publish on the Internet a verbatim conversation, in order to justify an position you took, leaving your Mum looking pretty stupid was I thought pathetic. I really felt for her, and wondered if she had right of reply. Or even if you notified her of your posting a personal conversation in a such a negative context.

But hey, call me overly-sensitive. That you and your sister both insist I’ve totally misread your other personal references to family, then I must accept that. I also must accept the assertation your family is amused at how they’re portrayed on the Web.

So my apologies for the misinterpretations. Let’s call it a difference in personal styles. Equally I trust you’ll understand why I’ve rarely visited since the aforementioned post. All the best to you and your blogging.

thank you, Miss B.

i went away after bashing out my earlier comment and thought, now why did that criticism sting so much? was there a kernel of truth in it after all? was i protesting too much? so i just want to say one last thing on this subject, and then i promise i’ll shut up about it:-

it is true that we are all sometimes guilty, in the retelling of a personal story, of trying to present ourselves in the most favourable light, often by making the other person’s argument appear unreasonable or ridiculous. but adrian–to jump from accusing me of ridiculing a particular belief of my mother’s (granted) to ridiculing an entire person is unfair.

further, as you note, those posts are verbatim (or as close to it as imperfect memory permits). therefore it’s really always open to the reader to place their own interpretation on what is said. and indeed, on that particular post, one commenter did leave a remark that they’d just heard my mother say “i love you” 17 times on that post. which felt like a lovely, and humbling, way of looking at it (thanks, Weezil).

Gianna’s posted a number of times on the ethical dilemmas that occur from time to time when ‘real’ life becomes entangled in the ‘written’ life – it’s obviously something she’s given a great deal of thought to. There’s a tension that all writers who are dealing with matters outside the abstract & empirical have to acknowledge – that imagined characters are frequently not entirely imaginary; and that reconstructed ‘real’ characters can ever be rendered entirely objectively.

Anyway, Gianna, I’ve always really enjoyed your affectionate posts on your family – apart from the mild feeling of envy they induce…:)