Why I want to write 🔗
I’ve been going through some inner turmoil lately and need a new outlet to reflect. Among other more personal things, I work in the tech industry, and just can’t stand it. I like programming, I enjoy reasoning about technical things, but I just can’t find a company that has a culture I feel comfortable with. I’m afraid that the culture I’ve found so far is pervasive across the entire industry, and just about everything I’ve seen tells me that it is.
The culture of overwork. The culture of selfishness and self-aggrandizement in the name of self-advancement. The culture of tight deadlines for projects that will be thrown away as soon as they’re completed. The culture of happily building products that are causing the breakdown of society. The culture of the coasts. The culture that celebrates “tolerance”, “diversity”, and “inclusivity” (and don’t forget the insidious “equity”). The culture that will never include people like me. People who grew up in a small city and like the small city culture. People who not only aren’t hyper progressive, but are actually fairly conservative (and getting more so by the day…). People who value balancing hard work with a meaningful life, believe in freedom of thought and speech, who care about integrity, but are pushed to step over coworkers to do what’s best for themselves instead of the team, to suppress their own thoughts and blindly clap and cheer about the latest current thingTM, and to exploit their users.
Anyway, I’m rambling and already completely off topic. I’m sure I’ll brain dump more on tech culture at some point, but part of the purpose of Ramblings of a Halfling is to improve my writing and my focus. Really, the reason I want to write is because I think it can help me.
What I plan to write about 🔗
I have a lot of thoughts I’d like to explore through writing. I’m sure there will end up being a general theme or two I end up focusing on at some point, but mostly it’ll be whatever I feel like I need to put down in words at the time. There’s a lot that I feel strongly about, but more than likely what I end up writing about will be what’s bothering me the most at the time - things that are more anti-current-culture, things I’m not allowed to talk about with my peers at work.
Some general topics I feel like writing about are:
- Liberty and freedom
- Self-sufficiency
- Escaping, or at least learning how to better live in, a corrupt society
- Living intentionally (something I currently do a terrible job at)
- Religion
- Technology
- Passion projects
- Whatever else is on my mind
I’m sure I’ll end up writing plenty that I’ll look back on in the future and cringe at. Everything is a work in progress, and that includes my beliefs. I’d actually really like to have a comment section of some sort, but there’s no way I can be bothered to moderate it. I’m also quite interested in seeing view counts at some point, but I’m not going to install any tracking software on the site. If I keep up with writing, I’ll implement a simple pageview tracker myself at some point - maybe I could even do a writeup on its implementation.
Why I’m writing publicly 🔗
Honestly, I’m actually generally a very private person in real life, except for when it comes to close friends. I have no social media accounts beyond LinkedIn (which I only ever use when looking for a new job), and I really can’t stand the current culture of oversharing. However, I tend to get a sense of catharsis the rare times I find others that think and feel the same way I do, and hope that by sharing my thoughts I can help others realize they aren’t alone.
For now, I don’t plan to share any (or at least, much) personally identifiable information. I know I can’t hide who I am from a determined actor, especially from the state, but hopefully I can keep it private enough to start with. I’m considering signing my name to my work at some point, but I’ll make that decision down the line, when I see just how controversial I’m willing to be here. Honestly I’d really like to speak publicly and stand up for what I believe in, but for the time being I know that’s irresponsible. I plan on writing about why this attitude is detrimental to myself and others, but that’s hard advice to follow. It requires sacrifices that I’m not willing to make yet, even though I’m fairly certain I’d be better off following what I know to be right. Time will tell one way or the other.
In conclusion 🔗
I don’t really know what I’m doing, or if anyone will ever read any of this. I don’t know if I’ll ever share this with anyone, or sign my name to my writing. It’s more than likely that no one but me will ever read any of this. But that’s ok.
Hopefully I keep this up. Realistically, I probably won’t. Life is incredibly busy, and there’s so much that I want to do and strive for. I really should make the time to write, but I’m still not certain if sharing my thoughts so publicly is the right thing to do. Again, time will tell.