Alright, Look, People...

Yes, I'm back. I've returned from the edge of the dark depths of space, Tumblr has kindly—temporarily—returned my soul so that I can check back up on my watchers and Inbox and every other website that I reside on. And because of some extremely important school projects and a series of some fairly terrible headaches, I have been doing nothing more than reading things on Fanfiction: trying to come up with some sort of inspiration and muster up a little bit of motivation to get back into my lovely life as an author.

Lemme tell you a story of a recent experience on Fanfiction that has motivated me to write out this journal today...

Just as I always have before reading a new story or a story by an author that I've never read from before, I checked the reviews to see what other people's opinions of it were and to see if it was worth my time.  And as I was reading through the reviews (there were only 17 so it didn't take long to get through the vast majority of "oh how cute" or "I love this please continue! "), I stumbled upon a review that very much reminded me of the infamous Critics United.  

Do you remember them? Anyone that follows my twin () should remember her awful experience with them and how they were the sole reason for her deleting everything she had on FF.net and her transferring a majority of the things she wrote over here and AO3.

Yes, those people.  And the review had the exact same word ("con-crit") that all of them use as if it were an actual word. And the reviewer honestly thought he or she was giving a decent critique.  But he or she wasn't.

No, far from it, in fact.

What he or she was doing,though; was tearing down everything the author had worked so hard on and had practically said, "No, shut up, you have no idea what you're doing; this is terrible. Don't write this crap!"

Okay, look. That's not how a critique goes.

What bothered me the most, though—because I had a Flamers United member PM me for days on this topic despite me not replying to a word she said—was the fact that the critic (if I can even call him or her that) focused the majority of his or her review on the author's style. "No, that goes against grammar rules. No, you can't do that! No, no, no, no, no! Stop. You can't—You can't do that!"

Yes.  It's a rule in the grammar book.  But this is not some huge essay that will fail a person if he or she chooses to ignore a couple of rules in the grammar handbook.  Nobody is so very perfect that he or she is going to follow every single rule that has been pounded into their brains since grade school! It's the author's style. It's not a big deal, okay?

And, no; the argument that, "Well, huge publishers are going to reject the crap you call art because you didn't follow one grammar rule," will not work because, trust me when I tell you this, there are plenty of authors out there that pay no mind those.  Because it's his or her style!

And, anyway, who said anything about huge publishing companies besides you critics? This is a website for amateur authors and fans to write out their own stories for fun.  It's a place to improve, yes, but that, by no means, to call someone a terrible author because he or she has a style that isn't yours and, therefore, is different from you. And ultimately not you?  

That's good! That means you are unique.  That means the author is unique. That's a step away from cliché. Fantastic.  That is exactly what the world needs. Less over-used redundancy and more stand-out-ish originality.

But it just got better.

See, the reviewer, thinking he or she was being the best critic ever; decided, 'Hey, let's be totally biased and include lots of opinions in this because I want this done my way, and I'm not going to take it any other way.' So as the critique continued, I began to notice that he or she was adding phases like, "Well, I think..." and, "In my opinion..." and, "I believe..."

Do you know how much that weakens an argument? Because it's biased it sounds like a comment and not a suggestion.  Take all of those phrases out, and the argument sounds pretty decent.  If, you know, you can get passed how forceful the reviewer is saying, "You suck; stop writing; you're terrible."

Did you know that there is actually a polite way to suggest a way to improve in writing? Amazing, right?

I know.

Completely blown away.

Instead of, I don't know, saying harsh things like, "This sucks, so you should be thankful enough that I stooped down so low as to review you and tell you this sucks and give my godforsaken-honest-to-Satan opinion on this story, and tell you that this sucks," It's just as easy to say, "Hey, you've got a pretty good start, but can I give you some suggestions to help you improve and help you along?" And maybe even suggest (politely) that they could request a beta to help them (if you feel like it's absolutely necessary).

There is absolutely no need for this awful hatred towards other people when reviewing.  

The whole point of a review is for an author to get a sense of accomplishment from the readers that appreciate the story and the author's hard work, and for the author to receive tips on improvement from those who are willing to help out in those categories!

Nowhere in there did the words discouraging, bullying, flaming, ever come up, now did they?

So, why is it, that the more I look, the more of this I see?  And it's definitely not solely fanfiction.  FF.net is just the main place that I've been lurking lately!  I see it on Tumblr, I see it here, I see it on Fanfiction, I see it on FictioPress, I see it on Facebook, I see it on Instagram, I see it on Twitter, everywhere.

It, honestly, makes me sick. Seeing all of these people that think they are so much holier, that they are so much better, that they are so much mightier that they feel the need to stoop down low as to say, "You suck as an individual, die," it absolutely makes me sick to my stomach to see these people.

I don't get frustrated easily...

No, let me rephrase that.

I get frustrated easily.  I don't get pissed easily.

But when I see something that someone has worked so hard on to create, being torn down by one person after another that are heartless enough to think that they're better than the other person because they're saying things that make an author or an artist or even just any general person feel awful about themselves—because I know what that feels like, and I know what it feels like to hate everything that I've worked hard on because someone said, "Ya know, you should really stop because you really aren't good, no matter how much you think you are"—

—It pisses me off beyond the use of proper speech.

I'm so sick of seeing, hearing, reading from people that feel the need to step all over others just to feel great about themselves.  I have to deal with it in all of my classes. I have to deal with it with my friends.  I have to deal with it on the internet.  And I'm done.

I'm so done dealing with all of this nonsense that has swept over.

And, you know, if you're one of those people that can read comment from some high-and-mighty and laugh at how immature they're acting like I can now; Awesome. Good to see that there are people out there that are confident enough in themselves to pay no mind to those awful people.

But for those of you out there that are looking for arguments, looking for someone to put down because, "Hey, that sounds like a fun goal of the day!" Let me tell you something.

You aren't cute.  You aren't cute, and you definitely aren't as helpful as you think you are.  I know, "I'm just trying to better the world."

No... You really aren't.  You're just adding gasoline to a fire and making the tension between those you put down and those who put them down, even worse. It's immature.  It's stupid.  It's out-of-line.

And I'm done.

~Melody Syper Carston