The Shmohawk dropped a comment into the “Good Political Blogging Thread” that has more than enough meat for a thread of its own. Here are his thoughts.

A lot of people who work in journalism crap all over blogs — and bloggers — as disruptive, their sites full of deliberate disinformation, hyperbole and invective instead of reasoned, rational discussion. They question the claims by some bloggers (and quite a few academics too) that they are part of a new and misunderstood aspect of public discourse, something they call “citizen” or “public” journalism.

These critics, mostly but not all in the traditional media, point to the lack of credibility of many bloggers, their lack of journalism training or adherence to basic principles of journalism, their snatch-and-grab of snippets from traditional media sites (aka real journalism) to offset their lack of original content, and their deliberate skewing of the information they present to push a particular agenda. I’ve heard it compared to a back alley full of cats in heat with a lot of hissing, spitting and loud noise but little else.

There’s more than a bit of hypocrisy in there. The MSM, some would say, is guilty of a lot of the same criticism. How much original reporting does any media outlet in any medium really do? Or do they snatch-and-grab a lot of pre-packaged PR fluff, wire service copy, and unattributed gossip (either political or entertainment) to fill its pages? Anyone who slams the Toronto Star or the National Post might understand.

Look at the number of MSM outlets that have setup personal and corporate blogs to tap into this wish by ordinary folks to have a say in whatever issue (even if they have nothing new or interesting to add). In some cases, such as the Globe and Mail’s comments sections after stories, some people have told me there’s little difference between the reader’s comments there and what they read (and are disgusted by) on a lot of private blogs. So even newspapers have trolls.

But few newspapers, the printed versions at least, have descended into platforms openly advocating racism, bigotry, misogyny, intolerance and other social evils in the name of generating readership or revenues. I wrote “few newspapers” — not all newspapers. I think — I hope — this is the big difference between so-called journalism and blogging.

I believe that the big difference, and disagree if you like, is that one is a social institution built over centuries in the hope that the exchange of rational, reasoned ideas in a public forum is good for political development. The other is not.

Not every letter to the editor should be published for all kinds of reasons, not least because the letter writer may be a paranoid idiot whose letter doesn’t make sense. There aren’t any rules or gatekeepers for bloggers - except for the bloggers themselves.

Some bloggers for instance, staunch defenders of their right to say even the most offensive crap anywhere they want without restriction, refuse to allow anyone else to comment on their own private sites. Others provide open platforms and try to engage readers and hopefully as many participants as possible with good writing and challenging ideas, with peer pressure as perhaps the only moderating factor. When applied to blogging, it’s the old adage that even pigs don’t shit where they eat.

So what makes a good political blog? I think that when the medium achieves some maturity it will be because those who present good ideas, expressed well, with civility and a measure of respect for the views of others, outshine and outdraw the crap that others profess as their right. It ain’t a right - it’s a privilege. I am not required, don’t need or want to read you if I find you don’t engage me or respect me.