To blog or not to blog?

I had a thought this morning, when I realised some of my innermost thoughts are floating in cyberspace, and it made me think twice about blogging: what on earth am I blogging for? I know what my friends and family would think if I even started discussing blogs, or debating things that people write in them. Already, someone dear to me advised me not to read such stuff. I mean look at the word blog. It sounds like dog! And what is the point really? Shouldn't I be out there in the real world, mixing with real people, rather than tap my cute little fingers on a heartless keyboard? Isn't an hour spent cruising the blogworld better spent cruising the real world?

I know what is good and bad for me, even though I may not always practise the right choices in real life. I am now trying to make a choice of whether I should pull out of this blogworld or stay put. On the one hand, I know there is something wrong about it if it's so taboo to my friends - we love debating but I'll sound like a moron if I "cite one of my sources" as being a dude in the blogscene! On the other hand, there is obviously something, a "control" factor, in writing whatever you want for complete strangers to read; and sometimes comments can be fulfilling because they show that some anonymous soul out there shares what you're thinking.

Not only does blogging improve my english and grammer (:P) but I find I'm also using dictionary.com much more, which can only be a good thing. But hey, the only words I can immediately recall learning are: "shard"; "salacious" and "polyamorous"! And would I dare use these in my daily vocabulary in my social group? I don't think so. In fact, perhaps it would have been better if I hadn't known the last two words existed at all. Then, I think...isn't there a lot on the blogworld I should really not have known?

Knowledge is power, they say. Does being exposed to the blogworld really enrich my life? Or should I exercise my brain in more useful ways, like read up on macroeconomics and biochemistry? The Internet has made information so easily available, that it is hard to differentiate between the definitely not shit, the not-so-shit, and the definite shit. Most bloggers would argue there is real value to blogging. Some of the more "serious" bloggers such as samuraisam and secretdubai write about stuff that make you "think" - their blogs are also of "use", in that they have influenced those they directly/indirectly want to influence. But then again, don't other bloggers make one "think" too, even if they don't appear as wanting to change the world? And what makes them appear less "serious" than others? I suppose it's just the language used, and consistency in theme. So it seems both serious and unserious blogs have equal significance.

Where is this whole argument leading to? And where do I stand now? Well, I know one thing all anonymous bloggers share is our "underground voice". All of us want to say something and most don't want to say it out loud, because of society, and what everyone supposedly "thinks" we shouldn't say. This is a paradox because if we think things "underground", aren't we thinking them in reality? Well, I am going to continue blogging: after all, what's the harm in thinking out loud?