A phlog entry on phlogging.

What is phlogging?  For the most part it's talking to a tree, or cat, or a
pet rock.  It's putting your thoughts together, typing them out, casting them
out into the universe, and never knowing if anyone picked up on any of it.

Imagine you're posting something on your favorite social media platform but
this platform removed any "likes", comments, or any other indication that 
anyone read your post.  There's no replies, no back and forth, and certainly
no dopamine hit when you get "engagement".  But also there's no dreaded 
anxiety of barratement because you posted like a fool (like probably 
mis-spelling barratement).

It sort of "feels" like I'm talking to someone but very much in the way Tom
Hank's character in Cast Away (Chuck) is talking to Wilson (the ball with a
face drawn on it).  

So, it sort of sounds like phlogging might be insane.  Or maybe an indication
that the phlogger is insane, or at least heading in that direction.  But, 
much like Wilson, maybe it's just a coping mechanism to hang on to sanity in
an insane situation.  In this case the insane situation is the very frabic of
society.  A collection of individuals that grow more distant from one another
the more their interaction is limited to happening through electronic systems
that are centrally controlled by sociopaths.

I don't know if me writing these things is healthy or unhealthy.  I don't know
if it serves a purpose or not.  I don't know if it would have been better if
I had posted them in the bulletin board section of this BBS instead of typing
it into the user files area and publishing it via the gopher server.  At least
in the BB section there is the option of conversation.

But maybe I don't want conversation.  Maybe I just want to express what I'm 
thinking and feeling without concern for whether anyone else cares, agrees, or
has anything to say about it.

I could implement a feature to allow gopher visitors to "like" or comment but
as much as I might like the technical challenge of implementing that I really
don't think it would be wise.  The point is to not care how anything I say is
received or even if it is received.  The point is to not rely on social 
acceptance from others but to be my own self whether anyone else gets it or
cares.  

I think this is also the reason I like reading other people's phlogs.  I'd like
to know what other people are thinking behind their mask, behind the construct
they project to others socially.  Phlogging feels more real, more genuine.  
But also quite lonely.  
.