http://www.themudflats.net/2009/03/27/in-exposing-the-identity-of-mudflats-rep-mike-doogan-exposes-himself/In Exposing the Identity of Mudflats, Rep. Mike Doogan Exposes Himself.
Anonymity is an interesting thing. Anyone who has read my “About” page knows that Mudflats popped out of my head and on to my keyboard last May. I, like many of you, get frustrated with my government. There isn’t anyone who pays attention, on either side of the political spectrum, who doesn’t at some time feel like they need to get something off their chest.
***
The day that Sarah Palin got nominated to be John McCain’s Vice President, life changed. My sister called me at some pre-dawn hour and said, “Did you hear?” I, like many Alaskans, was completely stunned. Sarah Palin? Was I still dreaming? Really? I knew I had to take the day off. I made a pot of coffee, and thought to myself, that my 250 people might not be the only ones interested in this VP pick. Now, many people adored Sarah Palin, and maybe some of them had blogs too….I had never checked, but they must be out there somewhere. But I knew some things about her, and her policies and positions that others might not be able to find out so easily. I decided to write my opinion. So I wrote a post, “What Is McCain Thinking? One Alaskan’s Perspective.” And that’s exactly what the piece was - one Alaskans perspective. My perspective. Just in case anyone was interested.
It took me about 45 minutes to crank it out and click Publish. (Yes, I was still in my pajamas at the time) And it turned out that people were interested. Really interested. By the time I’d made myself a couple eggs and toast, and sat back down there were more than 7,000 hits. By the end of the day there were 64,000. The total readership of that post ended up being almost 270,000 with more than 1300 comments. To say I was shocked is putting it mildly. I began to get emails and comments asking me when I was going to post again, asking questions about Palin, and saying that this was the only “real” information they were getting.
***
But here’s where it gets interesting. After the initial opinion piece in Mudflats, I started hearing from fellow bloggers that Mike Doogan was trying to figure out who I was. It seemed strange to me, because really, all I’d done was take his own words and actions and comment on them. Anyone was perfectly free to disagree, or comment on the piece. “He’s rabid,” one blogger told me. Wow. Rabid? I guess I struck a nerve. Over the past few months, I’ve had other messages through the grapevine that he was trying to figure out who I am.
I have to confess, that while I understand the curiosity factor, the fact that an elected representative was this preoccupied with the identity of an anonymous blogger had me puzzled. He wrote a piece for the Alaska Dispatch talking about “accountability”. The thought was that if I was anonymous, I was not accountable. In what way, I wondered. I’m not a journalist. I’m just, as we established before, me. This is my opinion. If he were around, we could ask the “anonymous blogger” of his day, Benjamin Franklin what he thought about this. Using the “screen name” Mrs. Silence Dogood, Franklin was able to put out thoughts and ideas that were weighted on their own merits, not attached to a particular person. Sometimes it’s easier, if you don’t want to think, to attack the person, rather than the idea. I think Franklin would heartily approve of anonymous bloggers.
So, it seemed odd to me that Mr. Doogan was seemingly more focused on the messenger, than on defending his position, or even better, apologizing to people whom he had insulted. I didn’t think much more about it until yesterday, when I got this email:
From: “doogans@gci.net” <doogans@gci.net>
To: akmuckraker@yahoo.com
Sent: Thursday, March 26, 2009 2:55:14 PM
Subject: your identity
Jeanne:
I am reliably told that you are the anonymous blogger who writes Mudflats. I am planning to reveal this in the enews I send to my constituents tomorrow, and am writing to let you know this and offer the opportunity to comment.
Mike Doogan
I was a bit surprised to see my real name, as you can imagine. But after the initial surprise wore off, it really hit me. This is an elected State Representative, of my own political party, who has decided that it’s not OK for me to control the information about my identity; that it’s not OK to express my opinion on my own blog without shouting from the rooftops who I am.
If I were to appear, as many of you have, at a political rally and I were to hold up a sign that expressed my opinion, I don’t have to sign my name on the bottom. And if someone wants to come online and read my diary, they are free to do so. And if they want to disagree, that’s OK too.
It said in my “About” page that I choose to remain anonymous. I didn’t tell anyone why. I might be a state employee. I might not want my children to get grief at school. I might be fleeing from an ex-partner who was abusive and would rather he not know where I am. My family might not want to talk to me anymore. I might alienate my best friend. Maybe I don’t feel like having a brick thrown through my window. My spouse might work for the Palin administration. Maybe I’d just rather people not know where I live or where I work. Or none of those things may be true. None of my readers, nor Mike Doogan had any idea what my personal circumstances might be. But that didn’t seem to matter.
What appears to matter to Rep. Doogan is that either 1) he feels that if he “outs” me, he’ll change what I have to say, or keep me from saying anything. 2) he gets to play mystery detective (like in his books) and believes people will think he’s really cool for figuring it out, or 3) he feels like getting revenge. He knows I want to remain anonymous, so he’s going to take it away. In any of those three scenarios, he didn’t think it was important to get the bigger picture.
***
It turns out, that Rep. Doogan did make good on his threat to expose me in his legislative newsletter. It actually suprised me, because I thought that maybe he realized that blowing up a progressive political blogger wouldn’t earn him many brownie points with other Democrats. But nevertheless, here you go.
Anonymous Blogger Anonymous No More
The identity of the person who writes the liberal Democratic Mudflats blog has been secret since the blog began, protected by the Anchorage Daily News, among others. My own theory about the public process is you can say what you want, as long as you are willing to stand behind it using your real name. So I was interested to learn that the woman who writes the blog is Anchorage resident Jeanne _____.*
Best wishes,
Apparently for Rep. Doogan, the rules of the game are whatever his “theory of public process” say they should be. How does everyone feel about that? And as a former journalist, why is Rep. Doogan criticizing the Anchorage Daily News for protecting my identity?
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