The end is near for Akram’s Razor

Well, folks, I’ve never really had the time to blog in the first place and I  happen to be a slow writer who tends to savagely rip up, spit upon, and then rewrite his output over and over like some unholy cross between Sisyphus and Penelope. Which means that I often find blogging aesthetically frustrating, as I hate leaving a post in an unpolished a state but rarely have time to revise it adequately. That problem is exponentially worsened by my fondness for complex and/or sensitive topics that require all sorts of contextualization and good old fashioned CYA.

I’ve also come to the conclusion that blogging, at least in my case, is a bit like owning a condominium: Just as a condo brings with it the disadvantages of both an apartment and a house, so does blogging have the weaknesses of both ephemeral means of communication (like conversations or email) and permanent traditional publications. Unless you are a talented writer who consistently nails things on one "take" (or just have the time to fiddle constantly endlessly), it’s an exercise in frustration for somebody who cares passionately about the written word. At least that’s my experience. (I have no doubt it’s different for many other bloggers, though, and more power to them.)

The other unfortunate side to this endeavor is that blogs tend to suffer from the stylistic shortcomings of email while–like traditional publications–representing you, for better or for worse, for all eternity. I’m totally comfortable with the substance of my posts–most of which have been variations on the theme that Muslim problems are no inexplicable than other communities’ problems if you bother to consider them in their proper context–but whenever I look back at past posts I squirm at how hastily some were thrown together.

As the regular occurrence of typos and sentence fragments–the telltale sign of multiple last-minute revisions–in my blogs show, I’ve generally treated this as a medium for relaxed conversation with kindred spirits as opposed to in-depth analyses or polished essays that are intended for general consumption.

Finally, I find blogging inherently geared towards contemporary events and politics. These are topics that are important to me, but I need to be focusing my attention elsewhere, and on topics that are if anything far more difficult to discuss casually. Blogging just pulls me back into pundit mode, which is something I can’t afford to be doing these days.

So I’m planning on shutting down Akram’s Razor soon. 

At first, I considered taking a page from wise Faraz at SeekersDigest and limiting myself to linking to articles, but I’m not very good at keeping my peace on things I care about, so I think I need to go cold turkey, at least for the time being. I do so to some extent with a heavy heart–as I’ve enjoyed and benefited greatly from the many exchanges I’ve had with fellow bloggers over the last 2 years–but also eager to escape this distracting and ego-feeding taskmaster. 

Perhaps Akram’s Razor will return like Gandalf the White, rejuvenated and ready to give Sauron and his neocon minions hell, or perhaps I’ll try to channel my energy into proper published articles for a change (another danger of blogging–if you’re not careful you can cannibalize your other writings in your rush to get something out the door for your readers). That remains to be seen.

So I’m going to be zapping away much of the site, but I’ll probably transfer its  "greatest hits" to some free website (I currently pay a monthly fee for TypePad).  So if anyone has suggestions on what if any posts should be preserved for posterity (and future foes), please let me know.

In the meantime, I will probably post some of the many drafts that got started but weren’t completed for whatever reason. Then it’s curtains.