Scribblings from the Mitchy Side

I think I made it clear in answer to another comment, I'm not talking about the sort of ranting that gets things off your chest and is between friends. People on your flist generally know when that happens and they will wander by with tea and sympathy or a kick up the arse as is needed. That's fine and dandy, that's one of the best things about LJ.

What I'm talking about is an endless, endless self-pitying "woe is me"-fest of an LJ that only accomplishes one of two things: everyone reading the LJ has this burning urge to defriend you or else it manipulates the more gullible into feeling sorry for you. I defriended at least one person this year who fell into the latter category when I realised that she'd been given in excess of $800 over the previous 18 months by various people (not me) to help her with her life crises and yet she was not one whit better off for it and was still whining about her life. She had genuine problems (assuming they were true and I was starting to doubt) but I could see no effort to really solve them. I decided to quit before she worked up to asking for more handouts.

Rant away in your LJ, I'm all for it. I do. That's what my post was, fer cryin' out loud :) But there's a line where ranting becomes self-pitying whinging and enough is enough.