About Orators, Bloggers and Prostitutes..

There are two kinds of orators: the prostitutes and the wives. No don’t get me wrong, I am not the typical pervert, its just that its the only way to categorize them. Having a 2 year master’s degree which taught me to give fancy names to everything that walks or stays still under the sun, I have an exaggerated appreciation for simplicity. So we will stick by the simple categorization. And note that I have been debating since I was 7 years old, and have participated in nearly every notable state and national level debate there is, so you’ll have to give it to me, I have seen every type of orator. And they are all either the prostitutes or the wives.

The logic is simple. There are the prostitutes… the speakers who perform for the masses, who address the complete audience, irrespective of whether you are the judge of the debate, or just a passer by who stopped by to listen... Personally I have always admired these orators more than the wives. Wives are the ones who address only a selected part of an audience. It could be the panel of 3 judges in a crowd of a 100, or their girlfriend sitting in the last row, or their professors/boss.. anything. Mind you, the wives are also pretty successful orators, I have seen quite a few of them win some of the biggest competitions. But as I said… personally I would go for the prostitutes. They are the guys who don’t care a damn about winning. They get a kick out of speaking to the masses… and that’s all that matters. They don’t care if you agree with them or not, they don’t care if you believe them or not, if they get through to you, if they can reach out to you, if they can make you think and ponder on what they just said, they are happy. That’s victory for them. The worlds greatest orators have historically been politicians.. John F Kennedy, Abraham Lincon, Julius Caesar, Mark Antony.. and in that profession you cannot afford to be a wife.. you have to speak to the masses.
And though you must have guessed it by now, as an orator, I am a prostitute, and I don’t know if the last line would have been more difficult to say if I had been a girl.

But its actually the writers I want to talk about. It’s just that I cannot help but draw a comparison to the orators. Both use the most powerful tool there ever was: words. Both have a huge impact on an audience. Both have been known to change the history of the world. Also I identify myself more as an orator than a writer and hence feel more strongly about them.
But there is a distinctive difference in the prostitute-wife philosophy when applied to writers. And that is my point of contention. Whereas every orator worth his salt wants to be a prostitute, most respected writers fall into a third category altogether – virgins – those who write only for the sake of penning their thoughts and not for pleasing any specific audience. I don’t know if there are wives as well, I guess there are.. people who write to please their editors, their friends, family and specific audiences. And then of course, there are the prostitutes… who I don’t have a personal fascination for. Some of the latter category can bend down to such extents to please their audience and increase their viewership that I sometimes believe that the government should impose a license to write, and such writers should have their licenses revoked. The art of writing is as much an art as painting and singing and should command as much respect. It is not to be auctioned off for the sake of popularity. If you have been gifted with the art, please do not berate it by writing for the sake of being popular..
Just as all thoughts and blog entries are inspired by a certain incident, so is this.

This post is inspired by a blogger/writer/author with excellent skills in penmanship, for whom I have a lot of respect. The person in question has slowly shifted from to the category of writers I am not so fond of, and now tries to write on topics which he knows will draw audiences. This includes some scandalous topics and some insinuating topics. And there are some advertising gimmicks involved, like scrapping everyone about each new blog entry, sending mass mailers to people and posting in communities asking people to read the blog entry. I am not judging, but isn’t the definition of a blog supposed to be a tool of self expression, and not a tool of self propagation.
Interestingly, the bloggers whose blogs I follow are people who write on topics that they feel about. Of course, every person is influenced by the opinions of the people who read their blog. And every person tries making their blog more interesting. And I guess that’s all right.. till they do not join the P category.

I was having this interesting conversation with my best friend... about blogs and bloggers. I was expressing my opinion that most bloggers start blogging with the intent of expressing themselves. But it is impossible to avoid being influenced by the opinions of the readership, especially when you have a sizable audience. Some of the blogs I read about, admire and follow have also gone through the changes. And if you have followed it from the beginning you can see the difference. However the changes are on most occasions welcome and I feel there is nothing wrong with them, as long as the person remains genuine. As long as the person still pens his thoughts. As long as the person writes what he/she feels and not what he/she is expected to feel.

As for this blog, maybe it will have its changes. Maybe it will not have any readership at all and I will be able to stick to my guns and write boring philosophies. But its better to blog stupid stuff than not blog at all. As I wrote in my first post below “A not-so-wise lady once said very wisely "There's only two types of people in the world.. The ones that entertain and the ones that observe" Well as I also have always been the put-on-a-show kinda guy, I guess I will want to be in the first category... and blog...”