THIS – Question of Smoke

movies are so weird people hang out like twice and theyre all like “im in love with you” calm down maybe

I implore y’all, please, please remember that writers are human. Especially fic writers, who do this for free, who have no positive response to their writing other than your feedback. As fun as it is to entertain the idea that writers write solely, nobly for themselves, there is no writer publishing their fic to the world who isn’t at least partially doing that to share it (and yes, also because they love what they’re doing! It can be both!).

I have gotten an increasing number of honestly dehumanizing reviews of late, all from different people, many of them with named AO3 accounts. There are people out there who treat my comments box like a Goodreads review for a book they’re dissatisfied with, who think that they’re my professor and I’ve just submitted my final assignment of the semester, who pop in to complain midway through a fic and then, when I address their criticism in later chapters, never return.

And I’m fortunate to have a lot of wonderful, generous reviewers who gift me with amazing comments that more than balance out the nasty ones! But I think about all the writers who are just starting out, the ones who are getting two or three reviews per chapter, the ones whose only received comments are from the people who write feedback that they’d never dream of telling someone to their face.

There are writers who gladly accept criticism. There are writers who will take criticism and internalize it, for better or for worse. But there are many writers who are doing a fun thing because they’re just?? trying to have some fun?? and there’s no reason to leave them nasty criticism because you didn’t like their story. (There is a space, of course, to leave constructive criticism on something offensive or troubling, so long as you can find a way to be tactful and positive within that criticism. I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone react the way that a critic wants them to when the criticism comes with vitriol and disgust alone.)

A good rule of thumb is to assume that any writer who doesn’t actively solicit criticism isn’t asking for it. That’s going to their emails! They’re going to see ‘Guest left the following comment on Your Fic’ and be excited to see it! You are sending a message directly to someone like that!! A real human!!

Please, think about how constructive your criticism is before you post something. Last week, I literally got a review on a story that’s been finished for years that was listing off every single specific tiny complaint that they had with the story. Today, I got one on a finished fic that graded me. (I got a…..B+, thx ever so.) If you want to make a difference with an author? Focus on something that can be changed or improved. Talk at length about how much you loved the [one time they got that thing right, if you stretch a little]. React emotionally to stuff you want to critique but focus your unhappiness at the character, not the author. If you want to treat someone like a fictional machine producing stories for you, treat the characters like that. They’re actually fictional.

And for the rest of you– please do keep in mind that these people will continue to review, will continue to make writing your favorite stories a consistently unpleasant experience. Please remember that that new writer who you’re kinda into is getting a few reviews at best, and if a third or a half of them are negative, that’s enough to scare someone off from sharing their writing for years. Please try to balance out these negative reviews with positive ones of your own!! Please give writers something positive about their experience writing a fic! They’re putting themselves out there and you’re reaping the fruits of that– and giving back, no matter what excuse you have (literally no writer cares if you’re inarticulate or if you’re going to repeat what they wrote or what other people have said. many writers care if you don’t bother saying anything at all), is vital to your fave ship or story or writer continuing to gift you with more.

(And I reiterate, I’m so, so grateful for my wonderful reviewers! This is not a letter about me or soliciting more feedback for me, this is for the other writers and reviewers out there for whom this might resonate. tho also it’d be nice to be treated like a person as well, t b h.)

To all those who don’t think the rape joke was a problem, or rape jokes are a problem.

I get it, you’re a decent guy. I can even believe it. You’ve never raped anybody. You would NEVER rape anybody. You’re upset that all these feminists are trying to accuse you of doing something or connect you to doing something that, as far as you’re concerned, you’ve never done and would never condone.

And they’ve told you about triggers, and PTSD, and how one in six women is a survivor, and you get it. You do. But you can’t let every time someone gets all upset get in the way of you having a good time, right?

So fine. If all those arguments aren’t going anything for you, let me tell you this. And I tell you this because I genuinely believe you mean it when you say you don’t want to hurt anybody, and you don’t see the harm, and that it’s important to you to do your best to be a decent and good person. And I genuinely believe you when you say you would never associate with a rapist and you think rape really is a very bad thing.

Because this is why I refuse to take rape jokes sitting down-

6% of college age men, slightly over 1 in 20, will admit to raping someone in anonymous surveys, as long as the word “rape” isn’t used in the description of the act.

6% of Penny Arcade’s target demographic will admit to actually being rapists when asked.

A lot of people accuse feminists of thinking that all men are rapists. That’s not true. But do you know who think all men are rapists?

Rapists do.

They really do. In psychological study, the profiling, the studies, it comes out again and again.

Virtually all rapists genuinely believe that all men rape, and other men just keep it hushed up better. And more, these people who really are rapists are constantly reaffirmed in their belief about the rest of mankind being rapists like them by things like rape jokes, that dismiss and normalize the idea of rape.

If one in twenty guys is a real and true rapist, and you have any amount of social activity with other guys like yourself, really cool guy, then it is almost a statistical certainty that one time hanging out with friends and their friends, playing Halo with a bunch of guys online, in a WoW guild, or elsewhere, you were talking to a rapist. Not your fault. You can’t tell a rapist apart any better than anyone else can. It’s not like they announce themselves.

But, here’s the thing. It’s very likely that in some of these interactions with these guys, at some point or another someone told a rape joke. You, decent guy that you are, understood that they didn’t mean it, and it was just a joke. And so you laughed.

And, decent guy who would never condone rape, who would step in and stop rape if he saw it, who understands that rape is awful and wrong and bad, when you laughed?

That rapist who was in the group with you, that rapist thought that you were on his side. That rapist knew that you were a rapist like him. And he felt validated, and he felt he was among his comrades.

You. The rapist’s comrade.

And if that doesn’t make you feel sick to your stomach, if that doesn’t make you want to throw up, if that doesn’t disturb you or bother you or make you feel like maybe you should at least consider not participating in that kind of humor anymore…

Well, maybe you aren’t as opposed to rapists as you claim.

Time-Machine (via a comment at shakesville.com)