An Explanation

With the exception of responding to comments on instagram yesterday, I have remained silent. However, I wanted to take a few minutes and address openly what happened yesterday.
I signed on yesterday morning to find a ton of blogs I followed were hosting a giveaway. I looked at it briefly and then proceeded to make a comment on my instagram feed about my feelings towards the giveaway. At the time, I did not know that the giveaway was created by a specific blogger. While I thought the concept of the giveaway was creative and much better than a $20 gift card, I saw that some smaller bloggers MAY interpret some of the prizes in a way that was not the intention. I personally have offered video consultations or other services for a small fee on my own blog, so I had no problem with that. I am not a hypocrite, so saying that giving away such services as a prize would be wrong of me. The problem that I had was that some of the prizes stated "unlimited email responses" to the winner.
As a "bigger" blogger, I did not want anyone getting the impression that they were not free to email me whenever. Although sometimes it may take me a day or two to respond, I always reply to emails. Bloggers have talked to me before, saying they were so scared to email me, because they thought I wouldn't have time for them or that they have been ignored by other big bloggers in the past. This saddens me, as we are all just equals, all writing about and sharing things we are passionate about. I placed the hashtag #bloggersarenotcelebrities on my instagram, not implying that anyone involved in the giveaway thought they were a celebrity, but just stating that we should be able to take the time to respond to any reader who comments.
I believe the hashtag caused a lot of the issues with my post. For that I am sorry. It was not my intention to make any of those girls feel that I was being rude to them or that I was trying to imply they thought they were better than anyone else. I merely added the hastag lightheartedly, joking that even bigger bloggers are just regular ole' people.
The other fault I realized quite early on yesterday, was that the giveaway was created by one blogger in particular. I know that I have created ideas in the past that I thought were awesome, only to have someone else discourage me or tear me down. The instant I realized that this giveaway was not a collaboration, but rather a blogger's idea, I emailed that blogger personally. I explained to her everything I am writing here and told her that I was so sorry if she took my comment as being directed at her. I let her know that I thought the giveaway in and of itself was really creative, I was just trying to bring attention to how it MAY come off to some people. We emailed back and forth 4 times, all very respectfully. She explained that some of the bloggers who offered "email" as the prize were not comfortable doing phone calls or video chats. I can respect that. She admitted that her wording may have been poor regarding the "email" part of it and thanked me for coming to her directly to apologize and work it out. We ended the conversation and said we would both just move forward.
This is something that no one else in blogland witnessed, and that was ok with me. I didn't go to her to talk to her and apologize to put a bandaid on the issue and hope for no drama. I went to apologize because I could see how she would have thought my comment was tearing down her idea and how her feelings could have been hurt. In reality, I made a comment about my viewpoint on prizes that were being offered in a "group giveaway". At the time I made the post, I was only speaking my opinion on something that I didn't agree with and that I wanted to clarify with my readers or other bloggers. I am not sorry for that. Blogging gives all of us the platform to have an opinion. We all write posts every day with differing viewpoints and that is all my post was meant to be. I realize that my added hashtag, which was not intended to be taken seriously as me calling anyone a celebrity, made my post come off as offensive, catty or rude to the bloggers involved in the giveaway, and I apologize for that.
I went back and re-read all of my comments on the post. I was never attacking, I never called anyone any names and I never belittled anyone who felt the need to leave a comment. I respected all the commenters, because just like me, they have a right to express an opinion. I knew when I posted it that by putting my opinion out there, I would get negative feedback - not everyone agrees with everyone else...but what occurred for the rest of the day yesterday and throughout today really disappointed me. There are plenty of times I have not agreed with something someone has said, but I just speak my opinion respectfully and move on. That is not really what happened in this situation. A lot of hurtful and rude things were thrown around and said, and I just didn't understand why bloggers had to get so ugly.
So I wrote this just to explain what happened, to offer my apologies for anything that was misinterpreted, but also to say that everyone has their own viewpoint and thoughts on things and if they want to express them, that is their right. And as long as they aren't making fun of anyone, calling people names or being disrespectful, there is no reason for people to act so ugly.


Check out one of the sweetest ladies I know, Mallory: