Perpetuating Stereotypes

Everyone blogs for different reasons, but like anything else there are certain stereotypes that exist. While they most certainly don’t hold true for everyone, there’s a reason the stereotype developed—because it’s true in one way or another.

So without further ado, I present my list of stereotypical bloggers.

Mommy Bloggers

Forget Bigfoot. The most elusive creature on the planet is a mommy blogger who never mentions wine—needing wine, drinking wine, cooking with wine so they can drink and eat the wine, etc.

They’ll tell you they’re doing all this drinking in sweatpants and dirty shirts because they haven’t had time to shower in three days. However, they have the time to take a picture of their dirty house/adorable children that make them lose their mind, blog about not having time to shower and then promote their daily blog post—which is usually some sort of infographic— on Twitter/Facebook 212 times a day.

They also run in a pack mentality, so beware. Do not incite the Mommy Blogger or say anything as I just did above. They will attack. Then drink wine.

The Apologetic Blogger

About 75 percent of this blogger’s posts involve him or her apologizing for not posting more often. At one point this blogger probably posted more frequently before life suddenly got in the way and blogging fell by the wayside.

Note: While readers might have been concerned, the world went on without your posts. No apologies for living your life.

Food Bloggers

Posts from these culinary paparazzi will start out with something like, “THIS just happened” or “Look what I made you!” followed by a picture of something they didn’t eat because it took them 57 tries to perfect the shot before plastering text of the recipe name over the image so people can “pin” it.

You might go there for a recipe, but you will end up with a 500-word backstory about the creation of the “best thing EVER” and 12 pictures of the dish in various stages of spilling before getting to the ingredients and reader comments about how they’re “drooling” and/or “licking the screen” and “trying to stab the picture with a fork.”

The Expert

This self-proclaimed guru will tell you how to succeed at blogging and social media despite any credible research, credentials or data to support their theories other than spending 10 hours a day online. They often sound like a used car salesman with SEO keywords and links back to other “expert” social media bloggers.

Don’t forget to tweet, Facebook and share all their posts.

Fiction Bloggers

A visit to this blog cannot be random/infrequent and still make sense, as they most often post pieces of whatever fiction they’re working on at the time. It’s like opening up a book to a random chapter and expecting things to make sense.

Thoughtful and endlessly tortured, these bloggers are always writing the Next Great American Novel and searching for “concrit,” or constructive criticism. They join various writing groups of people who are also writing the Next Great American Novel and together in gangs they will often solicit your vote for whatever contest they’re entering to help them become the author of the Next Great American Novel.  

Health and Fitness Bloggers

Even though health and fitness are the focus of the blog, it often seems like a cult. They have their own language that includes things like “WOD” (Workout of the Day) and “WIAW” (What I Ate Wednesday) and seem to sustain their energy for hours of strenuous exercise through protein pancakes, odd Greek yogurt concoctions (sent to them by sponsors) and “healthy” versions of things that in no way resemble the “thing.”

Note: You did not make “healthy” chicken nuggets out of rice. You made rice in the shape of a nugget.

They’re called “motivational” in the comments and prove it by posting endless inspirational posters and self-portraits and ending every conversation with a hashtag #fitfanatic #paleoprincess

Humor Bloggers

Easily distracted by shiny things, these neurotic bloggers excel in shorter formats like Twitter and Facebook where one-liners are easier to form than whole blog posts. However, they still blog to a) make people laugh and b) mask their disappointment and insecurity over never getting “discovered” or picked to co-write an episode of “30 Rock” with Tina Fey.

They’re frustrated, but they laugh to keep from crying. And a lot of them were probably dropped on their head as a kid. There can be no other good explanation. 

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*Now remember that there are dozens of funny, rational moms who blog and talented food bloggers, for example. We’re generalizing here, people.

Except with the humor bloggers.

That part is mostly all true.

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