The Top 5 Commenters You Meet On Every Blog Post

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Being a blogger has its ups and downs. We don’t know whether or not to write about a certain post. Then we decide to write about it but… do we publish it? We finally get the courage to publish it and we hand ourselves over as prey to our audience. We love our audience because they tell us how we perform at our job/hobby. We meet interesting characters through the comment section and learn what we do well and what we could do better. Unfortunately, we hear more about what we did “horribly” and wonder why we write at all. But we need to learn how to handle these cases because comments, like your post, are just an opinion. Here are the five top commenters you’ll run into.

1. The Offended

This is the bane of every bloggers existence. Although we learn to accept the fact that not everyone is going to agree with what we write, the Offended still gets on our nerves. The great thing is that you can always tell whether or not this commenter understood what you wrote. From their comment you can tell that they 1) didn’t read the post in it’s entirety, 2) drew meaning from where there was none implied, and/or 3) just want to start a debate.The trademark of the Offended is usually two or more swear words, often including “f*ck,” and “sh*t,” and often in the same sentence… more than twice. It doesn’t matter if you write as transparently as possible, they will find some reason to feel attacked by your post and that the blogger’s perspective doesn’t represent anyone at all. They don’t understand that not everyone shares their opinion, so it confuses and angers them that someone would have the gall to write about it and have it published.

2. The Defendant

This is your best friend (and in some cases this is literal). They read the entire blog and understand what you were conveying and it didn’t matter whether or not they agreed with you; their sole purpose is to set the Offended straight. The Defendant is just as feisty as the Offended, as is most apparent in their language, which also contains expletives. The Defendant is like a ray of sunshine. Even if it’s just one Defendant, we the bloggers know that we got the point across.

3. The Peacemaker

This commenter may or may not have an opinion about your blog post. They began to comment on the blog but became sidetracked by the ongoing battle in the comments section. Peacemakers also like to scroll to the bottom of the page just to see how they can be of assistance to the blogger and to two unwitting Offended commenters and Defendants. Common terms used by the Peacemaker is “This is ridiculous;” “I agree (with both sides);” “While this is true, that is also true;” etc. If the website you posted on allows commenters to have nicknames, they will choose to remain anonymous and names themselves “Peacemaker,” “CalmDown,” or “RodneyKing.”

4. The Troll

Their comments don’t contribute anything to anyone expect for superstitious readers and bored teenagers. Their comments are the well-hated “Repost this comment in 30 seconds or die.” No one likes them.

5. The Blogger

Sometimes we feel the need to set the record straight. By reading the comments we can see where the commenters misinterpreted our post, and yes, that is our sometimes fault. We don’t always give enough information, but to be clear, we shouldn’t have to. We don’t write to make friends; we write because we have an opinion we knew most people would appreciate. But at the same time, reading the misconstrued thoughts of commenters gets on our nerves, so we too enlist in the comment battle and see what it is we can say to appease the masses. These attempts are both helpful and futile. They’re helpful in that they help most commenters understand where you are coming from and this sometimes puts them to rest. It’s futile, however, in that our comment will get lost somewhere in the middle of oncoming comments from readers who either didn’t think to see if the Blogger commented beforehand or just didn’t care what the Blogger had to say.

Our job/hobby is unforgiving, but we do it anyway because we know that other people feel the same way we do. We want and need our voices to be heard and blogging is the one of the best ways to get that across. If we focused all our creative energy on what people think of our writing, we would be prisoners of our own doing. Don’t be afraid of what they say; instead let it fuel yourpassion. Someone will always listen.