Two-in-one

[homais]

I didn't mean to spend a shade over a month with no updates. So much for being good about updating over break - blame my comprehensive exams, which were every bit as stressful and unpleasant as I thought they would be. Well, I'm back now anyway. I hope the internets didn't break while I was gone.

One more piece of meta-LJ from me for the next

Comments

[marrog]

Well, not in the sense that it makes up a majority of LJ, just that there were a lot of 'em about by comparison to the normal make-up of society. Places like LJ, or certainly like LJ once was back when everyone of a certain set of cultural types had one, are where you can always find enough of a certain combination of people to form a community with an individual identity that's much more specific than anything you'd find in the real world.

[bdouville]

Perhaps you have been reading my mind (or picking up on the vibes floating through the internet tubes), because I was just talking about this with latestarter, who recently posted a "meta-LJ" entry as well. In fact, in my comments, I mentioned you. You can read his post here, along with my responses. (You might want to friend latestarter, he's an interesting guy.) blindapprentice has an interesting response as well. (And ditto with blindapprentice.)

What I find interesting is that so many people (myself included) talk about LJ as a past-tense phenomenon. Or more precisely, we talk about the halcyon days of the queer-nerdy-Jewish axis (which included many non-Jews and a handful of heterosexuals) as though it's a past tense phenomenon. To use the analogy I employed in response to latestarter, it's like a once-popular pub which has been deserted because the former patrons either (a) flocked to the disco down the street, or (b) stopped drinking

[tko_ak]

LJ is certainly past its prime - dying, if you will - but it is responsible for a lot of friendships. I think since friends' lists have a tendency to be incestuous, all you have to do is make one or two friends for things to take off and you to have a crop of very similar friends.

[spiffieus]

I totally get what you mean.

I'd highly suggest organizing an event geared towards queer-nerdy-Jews (Borges book group? hosting a game set in ancient Jerusalem?), and then publicizing its existence (ideally, you'd publicize it where your target audience is, but if there's no space like that already, you'd publicize it where the any-people are).
Then, queer people and nerds and Jews and QNJ's can come to it.

An Event is great because everyone can wrap their heads around it, get excited about it, and pass the word along.

You might also check at big Reform and Reconstructionist synagogues. They're a pretty good bet for progressive Jewish nerds who are looking for a community. (It's a little rare to see twenty-somethings there, but sometimes they have events specifically for twenty-somethings, and that helps.)

[homais]

You live! I'm so happy to hear from you, even e-wise.

At this point, the queer-nerdy thing is more important than the Jewish part, though there's a much longer and more complicated version of this, that I'd love to tell you in person sometime.

Hint hint.