Am I A Masochist? (Writing Edition)
Do I want people to criticize my writing?
The Medium community is a supportive bunch. I don’t know that I have seen a single negative comment on a story.
Of course, 99.97% of the stories I read are tagged Humor. I’m sure there are plenty of keyboard-based knockdown drag-outs regarding “serious” stories, like whether you should trade in your 401k for three bitcoins and some magic beans.
But I have been posting for nearly two years — all my posts theoretically humorous — and nobody has criticized the quality of one yet. Which is weird because I criticize them all the time. And not just in that faux humble “I am definitely my own harshest critic — it’s quite possible I should have replaced that comma with a semicolon” way, but in the “boy, I really half-assed that one” and “what made me think that was funny?” and “I am embarrassed to the point of nausea that I thought Oscars for people named Oscar was a premise I could carry off” way. But nobody called me on it. Sometimes I think you people are too nice.
I suppose I take Views without corresponding Reads as some level of criticism, and Reads without Claps moreso, but I can rationalize this as “they were in a hurry” or “some people just don’t believe in clapping” or “they’re laughing too hard to type accurately, and they’ll leave a scintillating comment lauding my razor sharp wit once they have themselves under control, but if they don’t it’s because every time they come back they are overcome yet again with hysterics.”
Would the occasional “this sucks” hurt? Sure. But would it be the worst thing? Wouldn’t it make me think twice before publishing something that wasn’t my best?
I have been watching Inside Jokes on Amazon Prime Video (“Cheaper than Netflix — plus we can mail you socks!”), a six-part documentary about stand up comedians trying to get into the New Faces in Comedy event at Montreal’s Just for Laughs festival. These comics perform at small clubs (or cafes or retirement homes) in front of a hundred people (or twenty or three) and the audiences respond with laughs or silence or heckling. When it’s silence, I cringe. Jokes worked on for months fall flat, almost audibly hitting the floor like a wet towel. A wet, stinking-with-two-consecutive-weeks-of-use-after-summer-yard-work towel.
Heckling is better. At least there is a response. Someone to get defensive toward. It’s tough to fight dead silence. I respect the hell out of these guys for putting themselves through that. There is nothing fun about it, but they use it.
They learn. They tweak the joke or save it for the right audience or abandon it. And even when they do get laughs, just not as big as they’d hoped, they take that feedback and make good jokes great by playing around with inflection or word choice. They get better.
So would it help my writing to deal with the occasional “that sucks” or “I’ve heard this premise done a lot funnier by others” or “I’ve laughed harder while passing a kidney stone”? I don’t know. What I do know is my initial response to criticism is WHAT DO YOU KNOW?! YOU JUST DON’T GET ME! IT’S NOT MY FAULT YOU CAN’T COMPREHEND MY UNIQUE BRAND OF BRILLIANCE! before I eventually calm down and apologize to my mom.
So why would I want readers to attack me with an unending barrage of insults? That’s what Thanksgiving with the family is for. To be at all helpful, the criticism would have to be more detailed. More thoughtful. And frankly, who has time to insightfully critique other people’s writing? Not me. I have 400 bookmarked Medium stories I can’t find time to even read. I suppose I could pay an editor to look ov — hahahahahaha… pay! Could you imagine?
Let’s face it — if I start reading criticism the only writing I’ll do will be Redd’s-Apple-Ale-fueled diatribes responding to my critics. I should simply stick to occasionally submitting stories to exclusive publications and let “this is not for us” mean whatever I need it to mean.
In conclusion, I guess what I’m trying to say is thanks for not making me cry. As you were.