#I have enough bullshit to deal with IRL guys don't need it online too

[voxofthevoid]

Fandom Etiquette 101: Don’t Be a Dick in the Comment Box

Actually, just don’t be a dick, period, but if you must, then don’t do it in the comment box.

I wouldn’t say I have a thick skin. Things don’t roll off me. I get hurt, I get irritated, and I get incandescently angry.

Thing is, I also have a certain amount of faith in my skills—writing skills, in this case—that has been cultivated by roughly a decade of practice and the experience that comes along with it. I am also not under the impression that my work lacks flaws. Some of these flaws are born of inattention because I write for fun in my free time—time that’s growing more and more sparse as school turned to college turned to grad school turned to a full-time job. Plus, I’ve long since accepted that artistic growth is a never-ending process.

So even if I don’t have a thick skin, if someone shits on my work, I won’t stop writing or doubt myself. I’ll just get royally pissed at the little shit who has the audacity to come into my goddamned yard and tell me how to mow my goddamned lawn.

A lot of writers react the way I do. Others don’t. Be it because they’re newer, more nervous, rejection sensitive, or just have different personalities, the fact remains that a lot of writers will be disheartened, devastated, and/or discouraged by negative feedback. There’s nothing wrong with that.

No writer should have to deal with people being assholes about something they created out of love and shared for free so others sharing that love can partake. Fanfic is free in terms of money, but a ton of emotion and labor goes into it. My work involves staring at MS Word for a minimum of eight hours a day to poke at and pick apart language; it’s not easy to do it for a couple more hours to write and polish that writing. Now, that’s my choice, and one I make because I damn well want to, but the point is that it’s a great deal of effort.

A large part of what makes it worth it is the fandom. Yes, I write for myself, because there are stories in me that want out, and no, I won’t let others dictate  what I write or the way I write it. But reader engagement is a gift—a treasured one. The interactions, the conversations, the sense of a larger community—all of that means a lot to me. I think most, though likely not all, fic writers will agree on that. For me, every Ao3 email heralding a comment brings with it a thrilling jolt of pleasure.

But the sweetness of that jolt turns sour very fast if the comment in question contains negativity. And I do mean contain. A comment doesn’t have to be wholly hateful or dismissive to ruin a writer’s day. Criticism sandwich is all well and good to those who’ve asked for constructive criticism, but to those that haven’t, that sandwich will just taste like shit, regardless of how delicious the padding. Tumblr has many long, in-depth discussion posts about unsolicited concrit, so I won’t rehash everything here. Suffice to say that not all writers are using fanfic as practice for “real” writing, nor do all of us aim to actively improve. And the ones who do want constructive criticism often have trusted betas or writing groups for that purpose. Unsolicited criticism dropped into the comment section of a published work isn’t as constructive as the commenter fancies it to be.

And then there are those comments that don’t bother with the sandwich method or any niceties. I’ve seen plenty of these in both my works and those of others, and they range from comically insulting to polite but infuriating. Honestly, I find the former to be easier to handle—if someone’s being an asshole in my inbox, it’s simple enough to tell them to fuck off. The nicely phrased ones are trickier, for obvious reasons. But fact is, if someone has read thousands of words and can only leave a comment pointing out some drawback— for instance, a typo, some factual inaccuracy, OOCness, or even continuity errors—then the problem lies with the reader, not the writer. But the writer, who’s often the one more emotionally attached to and invested in their craft, is the one who bears the brunt of the damage.

They shouldn’t have to. We shouldn’t have to.

So, to reiterate, don’t be a dick in the comment box. If you have nothing nice to say, hush and click that pretty red X. If the writer hasn’t asked for concrit, don’t give it. If you liked the story but have the burning urge to tell the writer everything they got wrong, take a good look in the mirror and ask yourself some hard questions.