Friday, April 18, 2008

Too much information


This morning's New York Times carries a story on how some folks undergoing a divorce battle are blogging and YouTubing about the sins of their scorned mates, unleashing a caustic torrent of slime. One woman says she hasn't had sex for ages, yet her about-to-be-ex-spouse hoards Viagra and condoms.

What in hog hominy hell is going on in these people's heads?

Maybe it's just my advanced age showing, but I think they have no class, no class at all. It is one thing for immature adults to air their indiscretions on Facebook and even display videos of their sexual encounters on Xtube, but it is another to violate the privacy of other people. Maybe the lawyers can't do much -- it's a free-speech issue -- but for godsake, what about common decency as well as common sense?

We Americans have always had an unfortunate tendency to let personal things hang out that should be hidden, as Europeans will gently remind us. It has gotten worse as the Internet has helped foster a melding of indiscreet openness and political nastiness -- a combination that sooner or later is going to bite a lot of people in the posterior.

Even if their intentions are pure, many unsophisticated bloggers proudly -- and stupidly, in my view -- promenade online photographs of their families as well as detailed descriptions of their doings. This is dangerous in an age of identity theft and child snatching.

That is why you will not find anecdotes or photographs of my children and grandchildren on this blog, although once in awhile my Lady Friend will appear, and only with her permission.

Jeez.

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