I have always wondered about the role the blogs and free/unrestricted writing forums like www.poemhunter.com play in our modern lives and society . I exist on both these worlds i.e of e-blogger and the poemhunter and have been keenly following the writings posted on them and I have always reflected on their role in our modern lives .
Lets look beyond their obvious role as a source if exchange of ideas and information at very little financial cost. One of their roles which I have experienced is when I gain some confidence out of them , like recently a 24 year old lady called Diana from Romania commented nice things on one of my romantic poems . Earlier a guy called Lawrence Pertillar from Connecticut ( USA) had contacted me after he liked my poems . Before that a 40 year old lady from India who writes under the pseudonym of "Tranquil Ocean" also appreciated my works . It really makes me feel happy at times that may be I am not that useless and less abled as the rest of the world makes me feel by repeatedly pointing out my flaws almost on a daily basis.
Atleast some lady in Romania feels that I have a unique and beautiful style of writing poetry! I could atleast convey my ideas of love and romance to someone in Romania because of such facilities on the net. I could light a smile some thousand miles away.
I regularly read some of the poems posted at poemhunter and recently I read a few bizarre ones that made me sit up and take notice . One girl ( I cant remember her nationality , but she was not an Indian ) had posted a poem there which had nothing but the sentence "I hate you" written about a hundred times !!!
Recently there was a great piece of writing put up on one of my friend's blog pbhas.blogspot.com .
She is Nivedita and also happens to be my college-mate and an immensely talented and gifted lady. I should also perhaps dare to say elegant . ( I hope she doesn't read this blog. She might just murder me). But the great writing was followed by a sequence of irrelevant comments ( currently 37) and it ended up in personal attacks . Ultimately it was a complete public fiasco. I should also accept my responsibility in partly fuelling the chain of comments by writing slightly provocative stuff .
But the common link that threads together the "I hate you" poem at the poemhunter and this fiasco at the Nivedita's blog is that these unrestricted writing forums have become a venting point of this world where people find decent ways of letting out their pent up anger and frustrations. This world is today , no doubt a pressure cooker waiting to blast apart . These blogs and forums like poemhunter are doing a great service to mankind by providing nice outlets for these frustrations that let out in any other form might have caused damage to life and property .
I dread to imagine if the subtle fights that ensued in Nivedita's blog would have happened face to face! Face to face fights badly hurts relations and often embitters relations beyond repair . Its best that such things get vented out through writing poetry or blogs etc .
I fancy that the society is not far from a golden day when the husband and his wife sort out mutual understanding problems by writing poetry on such forums or by writing blogs to vent out anger.
Beyond doubts that would be a far better world to live in.
