The Second and Third Years

I began writing this blog in September 2018, though I have only written four blogposts since October 2019, when I wrote a blogpost looking back at my first year writing the blog. Over the past three plus years, this blog has served three purposes. Firstly as an intellectual outlet, to allow me to try and work out my understanding of some complicated political ideas. Secondly as an emotional outlet, to allow me to scream into the void in frustration at the barren political landscape of the past few years. Thirdly, to develop some of my skills around SEO and self-publicity. Fourthly and finally, to share some pieces of information that I know which aren’t commonly known.

The most consistently popular post that I’ve written on here is a summary of various statements that the billionaire Warren Buffett has made about class warfare. Buffett has said at various times that the American tax system is set up in a way that prioritises the self-interest of investors over workers, and has defined this as the rich waging class warfare against the poor. He has made at least four separate statements to this effect, but while one or more of these have been reported in various high profile outlets, I couldn’t find any article which compiled all four into a single location. I did this, and accompanied them with an infographic that seems to show up fairly high on most search engines. (Search ‘Warren Buffett class warfare’ in your search engine of choice). WordPress’ stats analysis tool shows me when a particular referrer or blogpost is popular, and the combination of the two in February 2021 indicates that a decent number of people were referred to the Buffett blogpost by a link on a reddit discussion about economic inequality.

Another of the most popular blogposts I’ve written is similar but a bit more niche, containing a quote from the biologist PZ Myers talking about Jordan Peterson. Like the Buffett piece, this seems to rank highly for searches involving both men’s names, and I’ve followed a link back to a message board where this infographic had been pasted. A compilation of quotes from Jair Bolsonaro bubbles up the charts occasionally. As with the Buffett compilation, these were quotes that had been written online in various places, but which I couldn’t find in a single place. So in that sense I think that this blog has been helpful in compiling information for people who want to educate themselves, and share that information with others.

But I’m realistic enough to know that any political impact I have through this blog will be minor at best. The belief that I hold deepest and most strongly is that transformative change has to come from beneath, from empowering, engaging and educating ordinary people. But that’s a long hard slog, and it’s easy to lose faith and lose focus on the big picture. This blog is my attempt to maintain my faith and focus.

Image in header via PX Here.com, photographer uncredited on their site.