The Blogger's Dilemma

I have been fortunate over the past four years: I have written what I wanted to write, my family have permitted me to write about them and encouraged me when I have faltered and my readers have contributed their own dazzling array of comments. I have made good friends and the correspondence has continued by email and on rare but precious occasions by actually meeting up.

I rarely get genuinely anonymous comments – they are mainly MrM trying to avoid responsibility for a lurid pun and these get deleted immediately.

I would like to put the following recent anonymous comments forward for your consideration:

"Yes your children are brighter than all of our dim wits. Obviously. Apparently destined for heights ours cannot even dream of. The shame of having ordinary children."

"Such boasting is upsetting to us and our children - have you thought of that? Why do we have to think it is ok to have inplied (sic) critisism at us but not for it to be returned? "

I would have hoped that it was obvious to anyone who has read this blog that every family, and ours is no exception, has ups and downs. I choose not to discuss difficult family issues in a public forum and I have made this clear on a number of occasions. As a result I still have permission from my family to write about them and I try hard not to push the boundaries of that permission.

My view is that anonymous comments like these – presumably by the same person – do not have a place on this blog. I assume that the anonymous writer feels they have the right to write whatever they want in this public space but it is my blog and I choose what gets published. If that person wishes to discuss the perceived inadequacies of their children they should do so on their own blog.

The saddest thing about these comments is that there is no such thing as an “ordinary child” –every single one of them has extraordinary gifts that make them special and it is the responsibility of the parent to help their child discover those gifts and celebrate them.