Each week, when I tell my mom I'm on a writing deadline so she'll leave me alone, she wants to know what I'm writing about. "Is it another fluff piece?" She asks, and I always cringe when I have to answer.

It's not her fault, she's never overtly mean about it, but there's a part of me that hates that word -- fluff. So demeaning. I feel like a dog-show groomer maximizing the poofiness of my Pomeranian just so that it gets the judge's attention. My work is something to be admired and given a trophy for its appeal, nothing more; it really doesn't do anything to benefit society as a whole. It just is a pretty show of my abilities.

There's a Pomeranian for reference. You guys like puppies, right? Good, because I'm supposed to be concerned about the number of clicks this piece gets.

Anyway, what my mother means by "fluff piece" is something similar to that cute little dog: more self-reflective, less research-based works that come from personal experience. My pieces about autism, sexuality, and mental health are in this category. They don't really fall under the umbrella of journalism, as they're not really news, and they don't call anybody out. These "fluff pieces" are opposed to my real fact-based journalism, where I pull out receipts on so-and-so's misdeeds, or urge readers to act when net neutrality is in jeopardy.

So which kind of piece, then, is really more valuable? Are these self-reflective pieces really a waste of my time to be writing -- or yours to be reading?

The answer to that final question is not quite. While it's important to remember that this is entirely my opinion, I believe the real enemy to professional writers, journalists, and content creators is just what I showed you above: dog pictures.

Not dog pictures specifically, of course, but click-bait and truly brainless content. Those articles that encourage a crap-ton of people to click on them and mindlessly scroll through "30 Cute Puppy Pics To Brighten Your Day!" and then leave without their days really being brightened for any lasting length of time.

Speaking from personal experience, when I'm in the throngs of a depression / self-hatred spiral or have just had a really rotten day, puppy pictures aren't going to fix the problem. They just help me avoid it, put it off to deal with later -- I'll just remember it all at around midnight and ugly-cry my heart out then.

But advertisers are happy with click-bait types of work because, apparently, viewers see their ads more often. Thus advertisers pay corporate, and then corporate is happy, and we keep this giant, money-making cycle running without so much as our conscious thought.

Creators are happy making this kind of content, too; when your brain is fried from the school week and you can't even remember what two plus two is, who doesn't want to spend hours looking at puppy pictures instead of investigating the corruption of society or talking about their inner demons? We want to ignore everything and melt into a puppy-picture-produced haze.

I'm as guilty of this avoidance as anyone else, don't get me wrong. The state of the world and the human psyche terrifies me; it's why I never visit the home pages of news sites: I get anxiety attacks.

But that's exactly why I write these so-called "fluff pieces" in addition to my research-based ones: because yeah, the world may be in a terrible place right now and we need to be aware, but when that hits us we also need to directly attend to the receive from it. Puppy pictures can't do that, but talking about human experiences can. "Fluff pieces" about learning to accept one's autism diagnosis, about validating one's sexuality, about remaining true to what you were made to do in college, those are the ones that can heal a reader, that can save lives, soothe wounds. Hard news, for all its informative value, can't do that, but it remains crucial to the modern human experience. Puppy picture compilations don't even fit into the equation.

As writers, content creators -- heck, even social media users -- we have a huge power in our hands to distribute any type of work we so choose. We need to use it to benefit society, not to help click-bait keep some corporate machine running.