#i critique because i care

[anneapocalypse]

So, just curious how many writers and creators will have to be forcibly outed by relentless harassment before we acknowledge that "This queer characters was written by a cishet person and that's why they're bad" is not good criticism.

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

MDZS x Brazil (1985)

(Yes. Real movie dialogue)

[starrysharks]

evilution

[autisticrosewilson]

Um if you write Jason having to get drugs for Catherine I want you dead btw. Not only does it tell me you assume the average drug dealer would give the hard shit to a very small child and then not supervise them at all (classist stereotype that all drug dealers are inherently evil + lazy writing with no grasp on reality) and you genuinely think that Catherine was CONSTANTLY high, as if that's even possible without overdosing far sooner than she did. That's without even getting into the bad mom Catherine propaganda.

[thelilylav]

I’ve gotta admit as much as I know Darabella is a flawed ship (and some of the ppl who are anti for it have legit criticisms I love y’all for pointing it out cause it frustrates the hell out of me too trust) they’ll always just kind of be it for me.

Because as much as it was an “I can fix him” trope, as much as Rosabella could be selfish and Daring’s flaws got cranked up to 1000, she was also the first person to look at him after his destiny, the thing he dedicated his life to, failed, when people were questioning him as a prince and putting pressure on his and Apple’s relationship and tell him that, like, maybe it would be alright? Maybe this wasn’t his destiny, and maybe that was okay.

And the part that really gets me? She’s the first person after this happens to tell him that it doesn’t matter what’s on the outside, which as much as you can like other Daring ships or him whatever he desperately needed to hear. Not even cause he was selfish, that’s not what I’m saying, but bc he placed his whole identity on this image that people concocted for him based on him appearing the perfect prince. He was handsome, he was talented, and he was handsome! So who cares about him as a person?

Idk man. You spend four seasons (I watch the specials on Netflix so that’s why four idk if it’s three to some ppl or whatever tho) watching him be praised for his looks, watching girls fawn over him, and of course he enjoys it so nobody really questions how much he enjoys it. And then you get this girl, this girl who owes him nothing, this girl who (contrary to popular belief apparently) has a life of her own and people she cares about outside of him, and she’s nice to him. And she’s the first person after everything happens to just be nice to him, for the sake of being nice. Something about that will always hit different for me

[shorthaltsjester]

i contain multitudes and can say that i am a little :( about vex and percy being teammates with benefits because i think there’s something particularly heartbreaking about the dynamic that was neither of them ever said a thing even though they both were aware of it and it took losing percy for vex to finally admit it and Even Then, she couldn’t say it to percy’s face when they got him back, percy was the one who had to make the first move (that they were both alive for at least) and he was only able to do that because he’d heard her confession, because he never would’ve thought otherwise. to be clear, i also very much enjoy the story being told, i think i just wish they’d maybe committed more significantly to This Is A Campaign-Inspired Story Rather Than A Retelling sooner in the show so that maybe there would be a bit more grounding or set-up for the storylines the narrative is focusing on (and i understand why they wouldn’t), because i think they’re doing very well with percy’s arc for example, because they started with focusing on his and keeping his beats mostly the same and that seems to be much the same case as some of his second wave of meaty character stuff has arrived. but with vex they’ve aimed for the same character beats but it doesn’t always feel as earned or really feel like much character at all; i think saundor particularly was a bit of an :/, since in the campaign it was really a catalyst for vex interrogating her role in the party and her morality and something she struggled to get over and that haunted her far beyond the walls of that tree, but in the show it hasn’t really had a clear impact on vex beyond the scope of the episode itself — syldor certainly has, but the challenge that saundor presented didn’t really have much weight beyond its moment. and obviously a large part of that’s also probably just, 7 protagonists and wanting to expand the perspectives to antagonists and give more room for side characters is a lot of things to cover. and, i say with love, perhaps a bit too ambitious for a 12 episode per season, ~22 minute runtime show if they want their characters to have the kind of depth that really makes campaign 1 shine the way it does.

[wilsonsmcgillsweatshirt]

Okay I've been meaning to respond to a post but Tumblr won't let me reblog it for whatever reason, but I feel like my response has enough context on its own that I can make it it's own post.

So this is in response to multiple posts I've seen people make about Wilson telling House that he wishes he had been an asshole like him, House responds that he would still have cancer, and Wilson says, "Yeah but at least I'd feel like I deserved it!"

There are so many people saying that Wilson had absolutely no reason for saying that, that they can't understand why he would say it, that it didn't need to be in there, and how dare he say that to House after House helped him so much after his cancer diagnosis.

There was a reason behind it, just because it's not a happy reason, doesn't mean it's not an understandable one. I think the way Wilson sees it at first is that House has spent his entire life pushing people away and hurting them so that he doesn't get hurt in return. House has abused and ruined every relationship he's had. House constantly hurts people, and yet, he gets to live. Wilson, on the other hand, has practically dedicated his life to helping and taking care of others. He's maintained this nice guy mask his entire life, and yet Wilson, who has lived what others would call a good life, who has been what others would consider a good man, is the one that gets cancer and is going to die.

Wilson feels like he wasted his life being a "good man" instead of just doing and saying whatever the fuck he wanted like House. Wilson is jealous of House. Wilson is laying there on the couch in insufferable pain with death looming over him, and here's Gregory House, asshole extraordinaire, who's alive and well (as well as he usually is). That has to really fucking hurt.

This idea that "omg how could Wilson do that?? He said that for no reason!!" Is just not true. Wilson said it because he's was in excruciating pain and terrified and just found out he was going to die in a couple of months. Wilson was scared, and he was lashing out, which is a very human reaction. House does it all the time, Wilson is not special in the way he reacts to pain. The entire series is full of House berating people and hurting them and saying awful things, and pushing them away. He does that to Wilson multiple times. And Wilson forgave him every single time. And so when Wilson is in pain and lashing out, House knows not to take his personally, and that's why he basically immediately forgave him.

House and Wilson know each other well enough that they can see behind the harsh words, and understand each others intent. Ideally, Wilson would not have said that, and he should have apologized, but that was not a crazy horrific reaction. It's true, House has done a lot for Wilson during their relationship, especially after his cancer diagnosis, but Wilson has also sacrificed for House. After the infarction, House lashed out and pushed away and abused everybody until they all cracked under it and left. Everybody except Wilson. Wilson put up with the constant humiliation, degradation, pain, and abuse from House.

Wilson put House before everything in his life, including his marriage. Later, Wilson refuses to vote to get rid of House, and therefore loses his spot on the board, and the job that he loved and put so much of his life into. All to protect House. Wilson lies multiple times to the police to protect House, risking his freedom if they found out. Wilson and House constantly sacrifice for each other, it's just what they do. Neither one of them is "better" or "worse", they just are.

If they switched roles, and House was the one with cancer, House would definitely lash out as Wilson, no doubt about it. And Wilson would forgive him. Wilson has such a realistic reaction. It doesn't matter how many times you see people diagnosed with cancer and think that it's not personal, that cancer doesn't have an agenda, nothing can prepare you for when it happens to you or somebody you love, and a lot of the time, it feels incredibly personal.

How we react to dying and sickness is not always rational, and anger is a stage of grief. This is Wilson trying to grapple with his death, and that doesn't always look pretty. Sure, it was a fucked up thing to say and House didn't deserve it, but Wilson wasn't just insulting him for the fun of it. He had a very realistic, understandable reason behind it.

Not going to lie, I see people all the time talking about this scene in particular, with such a surface level approach to it. They act mad or confused, and talk about how they have no idea how someone could possibly hurt their favourite characters. So yeah, Wilson saying it was a shitty thing to do, but there is no way it was the worst thing anybody said, and he had very obvious, complex reasons for it.

I honestly love this scene, and I think it gives so much insight into Wilson's character. Wilson finally lashes out and exposes his grief in such a raw, mean way is lowkey a pivotal moment for him because he's finally letting himself be the "bad guy." And yeah, they weren't forced to put this in the show. It's literally fiction. They don't have to put anything in. But it fits so well. So yeah, just because he has complex reasoning for why he said what he said, that doesn't mean the reasoning doesn't exist.

[greenerteacups]

Hello GT, I absolutely love Lionheart!

I published my first fic and have been dealing with some criticism; it’s not anythjng super hateful, but it’s not anything meant to make me improve either. I’ve been feeling sort of down because of it. My question is: have you ever dealt with hate or criticism before? What is your attitude towards it?

I find your work and answers on here super insightful and inspiring! I hope you have a nice day ❤️

Fuck em. Like, seriously, just fuck em. There's a time and place for writers to take critique and be strict with themselves; it's necessary for any artist to grow. That place is with a chosen group of creatives whose work you admire and whose judgment you trust. A rando on the Internet, while they may in fact be the next Marcel Proust, probably isn't. And I was raised to believe that while it's appropriate and kind to pay compliments to strangers when they're performing — just as you'd smile at a busker on the sidewalk, and or compliment a chalk artist — it's not appropriate to criticize them when what they do isn't to your tastes. They're providing you with their art for free. No one forced you to read it; no one forced you to listen. If you don't like it, it costs $0 to shut the fuck up.

Also — that thing I said about artists taking critique? That assumes that you're doing this out of a desire to improve your writing, which, while noble, is not actually a thing you need to do if you're a hobby writer. I like trying to improve; it makes me feel good. But at the end of the day, I do this for fun. I do this because in my real job, I am ruthless and self-critical and try really fucking hard to do well, and you need parts of your life that Aren't Like that. You need parts of your life where you're not worrying about whether you're Doing It Right. And living without that anxiety of critique is, paradoxically, the only way you'll find the artistic courage to take risks and develop new skills. Everyone is a little bit rough around the edges to begin with. (Not saying you're a beginner — you merely said "publish," and I certainly wrote a lot of things before I started publishing! But every artist is always trying to develop new skills and techniques; in the grand scope of things, we're all beginners.) Giving someone blunt critique when they're in the beginning phases of their journey as an artist is about as helpful as screaming at your six-year-old kid because he can't swim the butterfly.

And the thing is, these people will bluster and say "well, I'm just being honest, I'm just trying to be helpful," but like: mmmmmmno, you're not! You're not. And it's disingenuous to say so. Because if you were actually trying to be helpful, you would introduce yourself, offer your skills as an editor/beta reader, and start building the relationship of trust that grounds any meaningful co-creative partnership. People do not just accept random critique that comes flying at them from the blue nowhere. And issuing it in that form is the best way to make them hostile, defensive, and unreceptive to it. Delivering harsh feedback without a context of care and support is almost sure to fail as a method of actually changing behavior, and either (1) you know that, and are doing it anyway — presumably because you want people to know how Terribly Clever and Better At Writing you are, or (2) you sincerely have never thought about the effect that context and word choice have on how other people receive your meaning.

Which tells me you are the last fucking person on the planet I want writing advice from.

[lucydacusgirl]

I think at this point if you still can’t cope with Sally Rooney not using speech marks you should probably just not read her stuff. And like that’s fine. You don’t have to read Sally Rooney if you don’t like the way she writes. It’s okay. Quite a few authors actually don’t use speech marks but if you don’t like it you can just read books by authors who do. And also you can critique any author on anything you like but I feel like it’s an established part of Sally Rooney’s style that she doesn’t use speech marks and you making an instagram reel saying ‘why can’t she just use speech marks’ isn’t going to change that fact. And again she’s not unique in that stylistic choice. Maybe we can say some new things about Sally Rooney.

[rxttenfish]

honestly im calling it now. the silt verses is one of those rare perfect pieces of art for me. absolutely flawless. perfectly fitting end to the story. excellent.

[epickiya722]

"The finale is bad."

Damn, we didn't even get it officially released out yet.

[clotpolesonly]

another incorrect reason to hate the TW movie: Malia and Parrish's "age gap". y'all, they are both grown-ass adults, she is fucking 30 YEARS OLD by this point. he is not "taking advantage" of her because he is 37, they are both adults and long-time friends who are engaging in a consensual relationship. criticize them for being a bland and poorly formulated subplot if you want (i certainly do), but don't infantilize Malia and invent a power imbalance where there isn't one.

(also a 7 year age gap is an intensely hypocritical thing for Sterek shippers to condemn. just saying.)

[britneyshakespeare]

Had the extremely upsetting experience of a mutual of like 6 years going off on me for occasionally making posts about supporting Harris because apparently that makes me a g n cide denier who refuses to learn and grow, with all of my views just being assumed not even from what I've told them I believe or what I've posted before, but just because I DON'T post particularly the kind of things they THINK I should be. When I pointed out how much they were just completely assuming about stuff I'd never talked to them about, I was told it doesn't matter what I do in real life or "care" about if I simply disagree with their conclusion and vote for her anyway. Like they were absolutely not sorry for the level of maliciousness they not just assumed of my character, but for some reason thought appropriate to bring directly to me before unfollowing me. No apology whatsoever for how discomforting or upsetting that might be and certainly no acknowledgment that I could disagree with them and still be a good person. I just got another even longer rant about how they fundamentally can't fuck with me because of this one thing, no matter WHAT else I do in my real life (which I pointed out that they do not know), and how I'm directly supporting fascism.

Like seriously what is it about Tumblr that makes people think they know someone based off of occasional posts? There were just such DEEP assumptions they were making of me and going off of very little or absolutely nothing. Around the time I first became mutuals with that person I used to express my personality and beliefs and talk about what was going on in my life a lot more openly, but I've significantly scaled back on doing that in many ways for many reasons. One of my major ones is privacy and the way I've had strangers outside my followers and following circles just find random things I say and dogpile me for it. I was fundamentally changed after some T Fs did that to me like 3 years ago. I also just didn't have many conversations w that person anymore (I message people in general on here like 10x less than I did circa 2018-2019, which I'm somewhat sorry about!). My point is to say I think this person felt comfortable assuming that they knew me, especially who I am in 2024 at the age of 25, much better than they actually did.

One of the specific things they accused me of was being afraid of learning and growing (because I don't perform social media activism on here like they think I should). Like AFRAID to take criticism. When again I've never received criticism from them or had to respond to any criticism on here before as pertaining to my views on... well, absolutely any of the issues they accused me of not caring about. They essentially treated it as if the only thing in the world I cared about was the US election and characterized me as the most out-of-touch liberal they could possibly imagine, because I'm not "pushing" Kamala Harris to be better (Oh?? Should I do that on here?? Does she read my blog??).

And most hypocritically what they said was that I only *sometimes* *vaguely* post pro-Harris things (I often post like 5 or fewer things in a day though?). But here's the kicker. "Because I know I'll get shit for it. And rightfully so."

Really????? Not a single person, anon or not, in my messages or in a tagged post or anything, has ever given me shit before for saying who I'm voting for. I'm actually NOT afraid of "getting shit" for that opinion, I just don't start fights with people who are anti-voting. And why should I??? I genuinely don't believe in trying to change the minds of strangers on the internet about that sort of thing. I'm just not confrontational about it; that is so not the same thing as being "afraid of getting shit." I'm not posting ENOUGH about my support for Harris, therefore I'm afraid. But therefore they can also make all these assumptions about me being their strawman for an ignorant Harris supporter.

I'm afraid of getting shit but I still post anyway? But if I weren't afraid of getting shit I'd be posting a lot more?? This is ALL based on their assumptions of what my blog *should* look like, based on what I really and truly believe. My level of posting every now and then is an accurate gauge of my feelings on complex, sensitive, global issues. Because I'm voting for the Democratic presidential candidate and I'm ok sharing pretty much just that little glimpse of myself.

I really don't think that person knows just how inappropriate and insulting that is to just say all of that to me. Like they really know what's going on in my head. Their first message began and ended with like "I'm sorry I love you I just can't take it anymore" but they clearly weren't sorry enough to try and be more respectful to me, and they didn't love me enough not to default to extremely ungenerous assumptions and attacking me based off of those instead of any actual words I've said that they take issue with.

Online radicalization is real and it's not necessarily bad because your political views can start to fall well out of the contemporary Overton window. The way you find it appropriate to treat people whose views, however common, seem to fundamentally misalign with yours... that does matter. You can't just assume the worst of everyone and then act on that in how you approach them as individuals. And then be shocked that you don't stay friends with them. You can't be confrontational with someone about an issue you've never had an honest conversation about, and then expect them to take your bad faith in them as reasonable well-meaning criticism.

I'm afraid of criticism??? I'm afraid of criticism. No I'm not. This person and I have never had an issue before where they criticized me and I got harshly defensive. It was ALL projection. The entire tone of their messages was as if all their anti-voting posts recently were somehow in communication with the occasional go-vote-for-Harris posts that I make. That's not a conversation. I don't post for your satisfaction. I don't post in "response" to my mutuals I disagree with. I just post what's on my mind, sometimes, about some things. I really again can't stress enough how baffled I am by this

[hellaversity]

"We need more complex and flawed main characters!"

You guys couldn't even handle Blitzø Buckzo.

[kyouka-supremacy]

Well.

[rutadales]

people who participate in hate-fandoms need to get an actual hobby I'm so serious 😭 not to be a hater but for the love of God log off. genuinely humiliating to be spending that much time caring about something that makes you so miserable that is ultimately so meaningless