One thing I like about blogs – about all of Media 2.0 in fact – is that it opens the doors to creative people doing their things and the audience directly supporting them. Whether you’re Ani diFranco or Michael Totten, it’s now possible to lead a middle-class (or better!) life by directly engaging your fans.
And for those folks living closer to the edge, to just live by directly engaging your fans.
Gary Farber of Amygdala is holding a pledge week while he waits to hear about his disability claim. You can make a big difference in his holiday season by making sure there is food in the larder.
Click here to help out; I just did and the $25 bucks I was going to spend on lunch tomorrow just became a yogurt and a banana. I’m better off spiritually and physically.
Thanks, Marc. There are a reasonable number of old posts I made here when I was actively posting that people can check out, if they’re interested, as well, with a simple click, although I tend to the theory that Google’s claim that there are “10,800” such posts may be a tad off.
Wow!
Here comes the cruelty from a guy w/o a blog.
I’m over 65!
I have COPD!
I have rheumatoid arthritis in my shoulder.
I have arthritis in both my hands.
The cartiledge in both my knees is disintergrating.
I’m a, so far, prostate cancer survivor.
I’ve only missed one day of work as an Indian Casi-o,(blacklist problem) card dealer in over four years. (How’s that for a job? I once made hi-six figures as an independant M&A guy)
Make about $50k a year plus benefits.
Have no time nor money to have a blog, let alone a bleg!
Wait, that’s a self respect thingy.
Words fail me. You make $50K plus benefits? LUX-ury. (insert Monty Python “Four Yorkshiremen” sketch here).
My suggestion: make more friends. Hint: what you just did probably doesn’t do that, very much.
So let me get this right, Mike. You’re too proud to beg, but not too proud to make a lot of noise about how you’re better than a beggar?
Riiiiiight.
Everybody!
You’re all so freakin’ RIGHT!
I’m not asking anybody to do anything for me!
If Mr. Farber needs food for Xmas he’s better off going to work as a Wal-Mart greeter than somebody who stays on-line, costs $$$’s, and whines about the delays in his taxpayer supported “disabilty” payments.
Screw you all! 2/3’s of my income is from tips from people I wouldn’t piss on if they were on fire. As demeaning as that is, it’s not publicly blegging.
Self rightous bunch of assholes who have no idea what self repsect means or costs!
OK, I guess you’ve made your point. I currently make less than a -quarter- third of what you do, with no benefits, and no prospect of any — and it never occurred to me to do what you’re doing {in this thread}.
I’m too proud to take charity but I’m also too proud to be an a**hole about it where others are concerned. And I will probably regret telling the world that. But polemicism has its price.
Obviously, you’re not me.
You might even be right. Merry Christmas.
Edited to correct calculation and remove an ambiguity.
Bummer Mike,
If only you had a talent for writing (which, as much as I often disagree with him, Gary certainly does).
Nice shout out for him AL.
Mike, you obviously save your piss for better uses.
Actually, as much of a liberal I am, Mike does have a point.
This comment is going to be a bit more about me, than about Gary, however (see, there’s the liberal).
Gary clearly is a really bright guy, and a good writer. In terms of the political blogosphere, his voice is worthy, and worthy of being supported, financially. (Certainly as much as, say, dweebs like “Kit Seelye”:http://ezraklein.typepad.com/blog/2007/12/why-oh-why-cant.html.
However, given his obvious intelligence – why can’t he find decent work, do articles for smallish magazines, etc?
The answer, of course, is that his various infirmities, both psychic and physical, prevent his obvious intelligence from being _reliably productive_.
For myself, yet, I look at his intelligence and writerly skills, and I think – jeez, why can’t he get it together? And then for thinking that, I feel guilty, and look at how he’s suffering, and put myself in his shoes. Then I feel pissed at feeling guilty, and think, “it’s not my problem!”. Which makes me feel guilty again.
But it is what it is, in the end. Gary does “produce”, as unreliably as he does, in comments, and in his own blog. And the voice and insight he produces with, is valuable, and why A.L., and others, recommend contributing. And, I don’t want to make him feel “worse”.
but, I notice my own “frozenness” around this type of indigence, or indigence in general. Whether it’s someone on the street, or a much higher class of giving asked, via Gary.
Probably, I’m just a selfish a@@hole, despite my liberal tendencies. If that is the collective judgment, I’ll accept it – certainly there is a percentage of truth to that.
But for myself, I’d like to find a “place of peace” in my, for giving, where I don’t feel taken advantage of by someone who “should” or “could” help themselves out, on the one hand, and I don’t feel like a piece of s**t on the other hand, for holding on tight to my wallet.
At any rate, more than I’ve ever shared, personally, here. But I’ve had this come up in relations to Gary previously, been drawn to contribute, then been frozen by “why doesn’t…”, then felt like a selfish prick, then…
Probably shouldn’t be putting this up on a blog. Oh well, what the hell.
Sigh.
hypo – I’m glad you did.
It’s a complicated thing. I’ve been lucky most of my life to be (relatively) well-off, and when I was in grad school, I made it a point to give a few bucks a week away as a kind of ‘tax’.
Later, when I learned more about homelessness, I realized that was a bad thing to do.
But the impulse is still there, and somehow I’m less than comfortable doing it be remote control – giving to charities. We’re nowhere near rich – retirement? what retirement? – but we’re far better off than most people, and I’ve worked hard to make sure my kids appreciate that.
And part of the way you appreciate it is to be generous. I think it’s important to be generous, and giving away my lunch money seems like a good thing to do.
If Gary was a close friend, I might have a talk with him along the lines you set out above. It’s not wrong to help someone get unstuck.
And I think it’s very much not wrong to be generous to those who are.
A.L.