My blog has always been about my interests, most people’s blogs are this way and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. It seems that to have a “normal” blog nowadays is a bit of faux pas and we should all be churning out marketable content, otherwise our blogs just aren’t worthy of reading.
Says who?
Seriously, I cannot understand why bloggers have to be snubbed or ridiculed just because they talk about their personal stories. Talking about my personal stories is the main reason I got into blogging around ten years ago. I follow blogs whose content feels relatable to me, or who have something interesting to say on a personal level, not just because they are writing about the latest trends.
I have just gone through the top 100 trends on Google trends and I kid you not, I sat and yawned most of the way through it. There are plenty of football (soccer) teams cropping up on there, I have a healthy interest in that sport, but not enough to dedicate blog posts to it. There were a couple of political topics and one about Facebook publishing, but the rest were just celebrity based.
FML, I can think of nothing worse than having to follow so-called celebrities just to find some content for my blog. I have had it said that my blog is boring, not really arsed about the opinions of that person because they were hardly trailblazing their way to the dizzy heights of uber-blogger. The thing is, I don’t blog to gain awards, or make money, or even appear trendy; I blog because it is a release for me, it is a way of sharing things with people who have an interest in my life – I am talking friends and family here, not fans. I am aware my content is not to everyone’s taste and there will be days where my blog gets no views. I actually never check that, mainly because I forget.
Lately, I have been sharing music, mostly because I am going through something huge and it keeps my mind busy. On a personal level, I am doing the best that I can to keep my shit together; the sharing of music is a release for me and a way at keeping my hand in from a blogging point of view. It means I have to show up and think about something other than this huge thing that is threatening my piece of mind.
But curiosity got the better of me and whilst I had some quiet time earlier, I checked out Google trends. It is disheartening to see that blogging has been reduced to worshipping at the altar of celebrity. You know, many people do not religiously follow the latest celeb news, many like me don’t actually care. I am assuming the content on Google trends changes regularly and I am going to keep an eye on it, just to satisfy my now piqued curiosity.
Being so obsessed by celebs makes me feel twelve again. I can’t help but feel that by promoting so-called celebrities to such a prominent place in our society we have forgotten how to have conversations about things that really matter. It is a sad fact that someone famous being pregnant is a more talked about topic than poverty, world peace, ending suffering for animals, domestic abuse, child abuse, women’s health issues, men’s health issues and many, many more topics that affect us all globally.
I can’t help but feel that a lot of problems could be solved if we, as a society, ditched our obsession with celebville and concentrated more on the problems in our lives, both locally and in the wider community. It is a sad fact that so many people would rather use celebville as a form of escapism – and whilst I can understand why people do this, I don’t understand how people can become so obsessed by such trivia to the exclusion of everything else.
Trends I would love to see are trends that address real issues such as poverty, stopping the abuse of humans and animals, and many other topics that are worthy. Bloggers, users on twitter and Facebook, or any other social media platform, should not feel that they are Boring Betty’s just because they don’t talk about celebs and other such trivia – because let’s face it, that is all it is. We should never feel like we have to share content just because it is trending and those “gurus” who have declared themselves experts in how to be liked need to quit with their smug attitude over their popularity and start giving a shit about real concerns, not just what is happening in la-la land.
Life Through My Lens. 