Some Thoughts About Criticism (Patreon)

So lately there have been some conversations over on the Discord about the kind of criticisms that people get when they put their creative work out into the world. Anyone who has ever put themselves out there has faced it. You either figure out a way to deal with it or you get out of the public eye business.

I think I went through all the same stages that everyone does. First you're kind of shocked to be getting any feedback at all - that someone, somewhere, actually cares enough about what you're doing to express an opinion. Then you take the criticism more to heart than you should, because often it's a mixed bag of compliment and critique (a little sugar with your salt), and you start to change what you're doing in an attempt to make your "public" happier.

And before long, you get the full throated attacks.

I think I reached that stage in Fallout 4 modding fandom when I released Immersive VATS for New Vegas about ten years ago. By this point I'd done a few other mods, gotten some decent feedback, it was a fun little hobby that provided a much needed distraction in some tough emotional times. I didn't think Immersive VATS would garner much attention, because none of my stuff really did: I was strictly a niche interest and I was happy that way.

It was the only mod I've ever done that was straight up called a troll mod. I got scathing messages over it. The closest it got to positive feedback was the dreaded, "Sounds like an interesting idea but I'm not going to use it, good luck with it."  

Yeah, I really love that one.

I seriously considered taking it down, forgetting that I ever wrote it. Because obviously if so many people hated it, I'd misread the audience seriously - maybe I shouldn't even be doing this, if I got it this wrong this badly.

But I kept it online. And I'm glad I did, because looking back at that experience now, it taught me an important lesson about criticism, and especially about the kind of criticism you're likely to encounter on the Internet from anonymous critics. And it's a lesson that I think you should consider when you find yourself up against your own barrage of attacks over something you made.

I've been on the receiving end of online criticism many times since that early episode. It happens almost every day now. And I've noticed patterns. 

For one thing, very little of it is in any way intended to solicit a response. Most critics aren't peers, they don't want a conversation: they want to be heard and to be the last word. They'll save their criticisms for their own preferred fishbowls, throwing out their barbs in contexts that they think will preserve their image of outrage and shield themselves from criticism. They don't actually want to make anything better.

More than that, I've noticed that the ones who get personal with their criticisms - who just really go all out - are never actually being honest about their beefs. They don't attack you for the thing you did, but for all the things you're not doing, and in particular how you're interfering with some ideology that they're invested in.

That's what happened with Immersive VATS. The mod itself was fine - and, in actual fact, had enough interest and players to justify my doing a Fallout 4 port. I just never heard from them.

The people who attacked it did so, not because it didn't work, but because they interpreted the idea itself as an attack on this sacred cow called VATS. The criticisms I got basically boiled down to, "If this becomes popular, then maybe Bethesda will take VATS out of future games, and so this must be stopped as aggressively as possible." There was an ideological fault line that I didn't know was there, until I tripped over it. It really had nothing to do with me.

A lot has been said elsewhere about political agendas and online criticism, but I'm not typically on the receiving end of that kind of thing, so I'm not going to comment on that. But what I do see a lot of is fandom ideology.

This happens when someone gets heavily invested in a particular thing and takes the leap from enthusiastic fan to ardent advocate. For them, now suddenly anything that stands in the way of the ultimate victory of their preferred mode of creative consumption is a foreign object that their immune system must destroy. They don't really care that you don't really care; what matters to them is that they are able to see themselves as ideological warriors for this noble cause.

And seriously. Fandom ideology is truly the lamest form of ideology.

For one thing, it never comes from people who actually create their own stuff, but rather from people who want to score points for having opinions. The people who are actually busy making the things don't care about the fandom border wars, mostly because they see the situation for what it is and have better things to do.

But more than that, so much of the ideological outrage is just dishonest. Because once it reaches an ideological level, the issue isn't what you're doing, how you're doing it, why you're doing it, or whether you're going to keep on doing it. 

Rather, the issue is that you're not subscribing to their ideology. And if there's one thing that can be said about ideologies, it is that they abide no competition - the power of an ideology is in its perceived hegemony, its ability to be mistaken for the inevitable hand of fate itself. Simply existing outside of that ideological zone is enough for one to be branded an enemy.

So if you want to react to those critics, your options are either to surrender to their ideology - basically, to shut up and go away - or to keep doing what you're doing and remain an independent voice. 

You're never going to make them happy, and that's the choice they're giving you: stop or go. Speak or be silenced.

Criticism is part of this process. Don't fear it: you're going to get attacked, it's going to occasionally ruin your day, so just expect it. Learn to shrug and keep rolling. 

If you are making things and putting them out into the world - no matter what they are - you have already achieved more than many of your "critics" ever will. Celebrate that and keep doing it.

But also study the criticism you receive and learn to read the agendas, the ideologies, the fault lines. See it for what it is, for where it actually comes from. When you don't take them to heart, those kind of "critiques" can tell you a lot about where particular fandoms intersect and how you can better navigate them. That knowledge is useful.

Just whatever you do, don't take any of it at face value. They weren't being honest about it in the first place. It doesn't deserve that much credit, and it certainly doesn't deserve the power to stop you. Don't give it that.