First, I’d like to thank all of those who participated in my
very unscientific poll. As one commenter pointed out this particular poll was
heavily subject to error for a number of reasons. One of them being the following.
As this blog is somewhat
controversial, there are people who would like nothing better than to shut it
down… and will stop at nothing to do so. Those people are not beyond cheating
and undermining the results. So even though they might be Jewish they could
have voted as a gentile and purposely rated this blog very low (D or F). Just about
as soon as the poll went up, I very quickly received one D and one F in the
gentile poll, I suspect that these were planted there by cheaters… but I have no
way of knowing that for certain.
It is however gratifying that all other rating were either A
or B (7 As and 1 B). Even if I allow for the fact that all 10 respondents were
honest, that still gives me an 80% favorable rating. Which seems to corroborate
the very gracious gentile lady whose e-mail (excerpted in the previous post) was along
those lines. Although not scientific, I have a sense that this is the way most
gentiles see this blog in positive ways. Does that mean I fulfill my mandate as
a Jew to be a light unto the nations? I don’t know. But I hope it is at least a
slight indication that I do.
The same can be said about Jewish voters. The vast majority
of respondents (84%) gave this blog a very favorable rating of A (53%) or B(31)
An earlier poll I had along these lines had a greater number
of respondents. I’m not sure why. I have more readers now than I did then. I
typically get over 1000 unique hits (over 3500 hits) daily. Many of those do not
read my blog daily. So that it is possible that my readership base numbers well
into the thousands. I am very humbled by that. But gratified just the same.
The only thing I was a bit disappointed in here is that
there were so few comments explanations of why people voted as they did and
where they were coming from.
Other than that the primary purpose of this poll was to see
what gentiles think of this blog. And to try and get a sense of the percentage
that read it. 10 gentiles versus the 70 Jews makes the percentage of gentile
readers much higher than I imagined… about 14%. I still believe that is high
and does not reflect the real numbers. Of the thousands of readers I have that
only about 80 responded and the fact that cheating on this poll was so easy,
makes me discount that 14% percentage.
But I do think it shows that there are
more than a few readers here that are not Jewish which means we have an
obligation to never do anything to misrepresent ourselves… that as an Am
HaNivchar – God’s Chosen people that we
make sure that our message to not veer
from our obligation to present the beauty of the Torah to all.
