“Did you see the new law being considered by Congress?” asked the blogger. “It’s outrageous! I’m going to post something on my blog about it.”

“Good,” said the blogger’s wife. “Because I’m sure the columns this morning by Paul Krugman, Peggy Noonan, Glenn Greenwald, George Will, Emily Bazelon and the Daily Kos didn’t bring it to enough people’s attention.”

“Are you being sarcastic?”

“Moi? Now what exactly are you adding to the discussion besides poor spelling and bad grammar?”

“Four-letter words,” declared the blogger. “Gotta let the reader know I’m outraged!”

“OK, dear, you have fun. I’ll be at the office.”

(Later, in the evening.)

“Well,” said the blogger, “my blog post really started a dialogue.”

“Dialogue?” said the blogger’s wife. “It just looks like a bunch of people yelling and calling each other names. And who started a capital letters convention?”

“It was a genuine discussion on the issue, dear. Look at the second comment, by Confrontational Contrarian, the one that starts, ‘You’re wrong, and here are the reasons why …’”

“I like your response, ‘You make some valid points, Confrontational Contrarian, but here are my counter-arguments…’”

“I don’t remember writing that.”

“You didn’t. Your actual response was, ‘Bite me, fucktard.’”

“Yeah, but did you see what he called me?”

“He responded to your name-calling by calling you a name. I’m shocked, shocked.”

“Well, I might be changing people’s minds.”

“I’m sure you changed LibertyDefender’s mind when you told him the only difference between him and Hitler was that Hitler didn’t diddle little boys.”

“OK, that may not have been my finest moment. But I’m increasing awareness of the issue. I’m rallying the troops.”

“What troops? According to the blog stat, your post has had 52 page views. This morning at work, I was in an elevator with more people than that.”

“I’m speaking truth to power.”

“Which power is that? The government officials who will never read your blog? Or the unemployed slackers who read it in their mothers’ basements?”

“It was important that I express myself, even if nothing gets changed.”

“Usually when a man masturbates, he looks at nude pictures.”

“What?”

“Did you work on your graduate thesis today, dear?”

“Uh, no, I didn’t have time.”

“Because you’d rather spend the day arguing with an Internet troll who calls himself HolocaustDenier4Ever.”

“Dumb bastard needs to be shown the error of his ways.”

“Yes, I’m sure he’s open to logic and reason.”

“Don’t worry, dear, my thesis isn’t due for a few more weeks. I’ll concentrate on it tomorrow.”

“What was the subject of your thesis again?”

“Its title is ‘Confounding Contradiction: How the Internet’s Increased Avenues of Expression Are Making It Harder to Have a Coherent Conversation.’”

“Mmm-hmm.”

“I see the obvious irony there, but, um … er … I was doing hands-on research. Yeah, I was doing research.”

“Great. Now, Mr. Researcher, could you shut down the laptop for a while and throw out the garbage?”

“You didn’t say the magic word.”

“OK. Could you throw out the garbage, fucktard?”