Meta: Thinking About Concrit

[alixtii]

Annoyingly Obligatory Disclaimer: These opinions posted in my personal journal are, not surprisingly, my personal opinions. Now I happen to think that my personal opinions are right--I don't think all opinions are of equal worth, and unsurprisingly I privilege my own--and in some cases even normative. This does not mean that I think everyone who disagrees with me is an idiot or a moral monster, or that I don't recognize the logical possibility that I can be wrong.

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The Critical City on a Hill: Thoughts on Concrit and Its Role in the Fannish Community

People have been saying extremely interesting things about concrit, and have gotten me thinking about these things. In this post, peasant_ defines concrit as such:

Constructive Criticism, that is critical commentary on a fic that addresses both faults and successes in the story. By definition, to be constructive it must be carefully worded so as not to hurt the writer as an individual.

I agree with the definition, but more and more I think that the term is somewhat ill-chosen. "Constructive" criticism implies that it is going towards "building" something, usually the craft and skills of the author, and I mostly agree with karabair that constructive criticism isn't the best mechanism to help a mediocre author get better, and that there's probably no saving at all for a poor author (here and here). But I don't think that's what concrit is for, ultimately.

Of course, sure, I do want to become a better author (mainly so as to better serve the interests of my fannish community), but that's not why I desire concrit. I like concrit because it's more honest. If someone tells me that they think Kennedy was acting out of character in paragraph 7, then that means I can all the better trust them when they tell me that the fic is wonderful and they loved it. Otherwise, I'm left wondering if the fact that the feedbacker picked out a sentence from the penultimate paragraph means that she thought the rest of the fic was drek. Are they mentioning the thematic richness because the plot was horribly structured?

It's one of the paradoxes of human existence: we want positive feedback, we want to hear that we are the greatest writers who ever lived, but if that feedback does not contain content which is critical (in the negative sense) than that feedback is worthless, meaningless sycophancy. It should take its place next to the other paradoxes of our time, the Oedipus complex (we want to rejoin the mother but keep our separate identity) and the will-to-power (we want to have mastery over others, but if they don't have mastery over themselves our mastery is meaningless).

We all know how to give positive feedback: you find the nice things you can honestly say about the story, and you say them, and you shut up when you don't have anything nice to say at all. And sure, a sin of omission isn't nearly as bad as a sin of comission. And sure, only a jerk would knowingly hurt someone's feelings even in the name of honesty (unless they honestly think that hurt feelings now will be less than later, as with the person with spinach stuck in her teeth). But that doesn't change the fact that positively-only feedback fundamentally aims to decieve.

I have this vision of a fannish community where people have the necessary distance so that critical discussion of their stories and ideas is not felt as a personal attack against them, where ad hominem attacks never happen, and where people can engage passionately in debate and then perform the fannish equivalent of all going out to dinner afterwards on the fandom's expense account. In many if not most fandoms, I recognize this cannot be anything but a pipe dream. There are two many newbies, two many raw emotions, too many teenagers. But I don't think this is true across the board, I don't think this hurts its value as an ideal (we should work for the Kingdom), and I think LJ's ability to form like-minded communities can to a great degree mitigate this effect. My flist can, and to a great extent does, live out this vision.

It's not so much the "Cult of Higher Standards" that peasant_ talks about because I'm not so interested in having better writers in fandom. We (i.e. Buffy fandom) already have wisdomeagle, karabair, liz_marcs, nwhepcat, m_mcgregor, and so many others and I don't think I could stand to devote any more time to reading fanfic anyway. femslash_minis produces ficlets of incredible quality every two weeks. As long as they keep writing, I could(n't) really care less what happens to the bad writers in fandom. I'm interested in having a community of better readers. If concrit is ultimately constructive in any sense, it is that it strengthens this community.

In my experience, allowing both positive and negative criticism opens the range of what a critical responder can say, and thus what thoughts arrive on the critical scene. Allowing only positive feedback stifles expression. What can you say which is truly interesting, insightful, or thought-provoking about a story if you are restricted to only those comments which are unequivocatively positive?

And as a writer, I'm invested in the story and I want to know what people think about it. Not because I want to get better (although I do), karabair is right that my reaction to the majority of the negative feedback I receive will be to re-justify my decisions to myself and then ignore it. And that's perfectly okay. I value critical feedback because it shows that the reader cared about my story and wants to think about it. That they took out time to notice the elements they mentioned in concrit--theme, plot, character, whatever--and think about them in relation to a set of standards more complicated than "I liked this," regardless of whether they ultimately decide my use of these devices to be successful or not. As a writer, I approach this is the greatest compliment a reader can pay to me: thinking deeply and fully about my story.

Now, not all of us are prepared to provide detailed, thoughtful concrit; for one thing, it takes a lot of time and thought (which is why most people would only bother giving it to stories worth that much thought in the first place). Sometimes one doesn't know what to do but squee. There are plenty legitimate reasons not to give concrit--I'm not saying that you should be giving more concrit, whoever you are--but it saddens me that people who want to and would give it may find themselves silenced by the so-called "Cult of Nice" conventions. (As to whether the cult actually exists, I remain firmly agnostic.) I'm not saying that concrit is always better than squee (it isn't!), but the subject at hand is the value and worth of concrit apart from its ability to improve the writing skills of the author.

This is not to say I am unambiguous about concrit. One of the things I love about it is also one of the things I fear the most: the way it creates a dialogue between author and reader. In many ways, this is what I relish about concrit, a discussion about the dynamics of the text I created and thus love. However, despite the fact that the feedback is left in my personal journal, is addressed to me, and my heart really calls out for this sort of dialogue, the fact nonetheless remains that I am the person least qualified to take part in it. I'm too caught up in the process of production to be able to talk about the dynamics of the text as it stands. And so I find myself forced to remain silent in the face of negative criticism. Let's say a reader responds that she doesn't see the function of a certain scene. I know what I intended the scene to do, but not whether it succeeded, and thus I find myself either answering with a simple "Thank you for your honesty" when I could say so more, or by surrounding my comments by extensive intentional fallacy disclaimers. However, this is characteristic of all feedback on LJ, not just concrit; the format by its nature privileges the author. It's simply that insofar as concrit is more developed than squee, it provides a greater opportunity for a critical misstep. Also, I don't know any author who is afraid to take credit for the good elements of her or his text regardless of intent; warring interpretations form a much bigger problem if the criticism is negative.

Maybe it'd be better if we responded to other people's crit, agreeing and disagreeing with what they say, so that the author would become but one un-privileged voice among many but still able to take part in and enjoy these critical discussions, but we've seemed to have evolved the fannish convention on LJ that even though these conversations are public, feedback should still be a conversation solely between each individual feedbacker and the author. Disagreeing with someone else's feedback would be seen, I'm afraid, as one of the most heinous of personal attacks. I'm not sure why this should be so, but I do think that it is lamentable.

Comments

[likeadeuce.livejournal.com]

well, doesn't the fact that people get upset about (alleged) concrit, and that "concrit please" is common (and unobjectionable), while "no concrit" leads to mocking --

doesn't all of this suggest that "no concrit" is the default?

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

Well, I'm not sure that all those facts logically imply that "no concrit" is the default (I can construct an argument using the same data points that "concrit" as the default) but I agree that, as a purely empirical matter, the reigning convention (the so-called "Cult of Nice") in fandom is to not give concrit unless the reader explicitly asks for it. (And asks for it where? A large number of readers for a story will never read the poster's user info.)

peasant_ makes a case that concrit should be the default assumption in Buffy fandom to fuel the "Cult of Higher Standards," i.e. to help the mediocre writers to become better writers and to discourage poor writers from posting. I'm not sure I buy it, but it's persuasively argued. Your posts seem to argue for a "no concrit" default because concrit isn't a useful mechanism, and because fanfic works posted to LJ are published, both positions with which I agree.

I'm not actually arguing for either the opt-in or opt-out conventions, because my interest is more in theory and not policy. Both options come with their share of negatives, and I make no claim which side of negatives outweighs the other. However, I wanted to put forward my own feeling that concrit is for the writer but not to make her or him a better writer--if I were to write a movie I'd be more interested in reading the reviews by movie critics than my fan mail--because I thought it might be extra food for thought in the debate when weighing the positives and negatives of each option.

Not that we're actually debating about anything real, actually; as glossng pointed out, it's unlikely the fannish conventions will change no matter what meta writers say or do.

[likeadeuce.livejournal.com]

if I were to write a movie I'd be more interested in reading the reviews by movie critics than my fan mail

That strikes me as a false analogy. The movie critic is not directing comments at the artist directly; if Roger Ebert meets Ang Lee at a party, he may try to engage him in conversation about the artistic merits of one of his works, but he's not going to start listing off everything he didn't like about "Ride with the Devil." Or, if he does, it's going to be a short conversation.

There isn't a roll in the fanfic community that corresponds with that of a professional movie critic -- ie, looking at the new fic that comes out, listing what the reviewer liked and didn't like about each one. Now, if people are interested in a Cult of High Standards, that might be a way to go; set up a community with an editorial board and review significant fics that come out every month.

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

I don't think it's the analogy that's false so much as, well, as something else. Ebert and his ilk aren't writing for me, no, but if they were I don't think they could do better than keep writing the way they are. The conversation between Ebert and Ang Lee at the party is almost definitely going to be inane; if Ang Lee reads Ebert's review, on the other hand, he might learn something about his movie that he didn't know before. Because Ebert isn't being restrained by an imperative to say things that are nice (as he is at the party), there's a greater possibility that he'll say something truly insightful.

My point in this post was--or at least was supposed to be--that someone taking the part of someone like a professional movie critic can actually be of use to the author hirself, and thus such a balanced commentary would be appropriate in the author's journal.

Now, if people are interested in a Cult of High Standards, that might be a way to go; set up a community with an editorial board and review significant fics that come out every month.

As hermionesviolin points out below, that community is basically called club_joss. But my point was that type of discussion is one that a writer would want going on in his or her private journal (at least if that the writer were me).

[likeadeuce.livejournal.com]

I don't see any reason to assume that a genuine dialogue between a critic and a filmmaker would be inane. I've seen Ebert speak and he has told interesting stories about things he learned in conversations with filmmakers -- probably because he didn't just come on reciting his review but was actually interested in a give and take with the filmmaker. Your hypothetical, btw, assumes that the filmmaker only has things to learn from the reviewer, and not vice versa. If Ebert thought that was true, I doubt he'd be in the business.

club_joss from what I understand, is a discussion group; that's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about a review community that actually does the equivalent of, say, what the book review section of a major newspaper does -- decide which new work is worth commenting on and assigning reviewers to do it.

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

I still think that Ang Lee would be too caught up in his work to be able to discuss it with enough distance. That's not always true of course--I don't know anything about Ang Lee as a person--but Ebert is able to look at the dynamics of the movie as text, while I don't think Ang Lee could help but privilege his own intent; it's human nature. The main benefit that Ang Lee has over Robert Ebert is that Ang Lee thought about his own text longer and deeper than Ebert can afford to do, having to deal with a large variety of texts, and thus will naturally pick up on dynamics that Ebert will miss.

[likeadeuce.livejournal.com]

I'm sorry, are you saying an artist is not qualified to engage in a dialogue about his own work?

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

An artist is of course as qualified as anyone else to discuss a work and to say what s/he thinks it means, why s/he thinks it's good or bad, etc. It doesn't require a degree in theory to examine the dynamics of a text--which is good, as then I'd be out too. An artist might not be particularly good at dealing with texts critically--hir skill is in creating the texts--but there's no reason that she or he would be particuarly bad at it, as long as she could remember not to privilege hir own intent.

And as I said, the artist does have a special advantage over all other possible critics in that she or he has thought long and hard about the dynamics of her or his own text.

[likeadeuce.livejournal.com]

And as I said, the artist does have a special advantage over all other possible critics in that she or he has thought long and hard about the dynamics of her or his own text.

Well, we can agree on that.

I also think it's important to draw a distinction between theoretical/critical interpretation (in which, as you say, the artist may or may not be adept) and discussion of craft (in which the artist may certainly say something worthwhile).

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

I also think it's important to draw a distinction between theoretical/critical interpretation (in which, as you say, the artist may or may not be adept) and discussion of craft (in which the artist may certainly say something worthwhile).

Oh, I certainly agree that the writer has much to say regarding discussion of craft--she or he is the expert there, after all. I'm just not sure Roger Ebert--as opposed t, say, amateur movie makers--would care to learn how to make a movie.

[likeadeuce.livejournal.com]

Because "craft" has implications for the finished product. Craft and meaning aren't entirely divorced.

[likeadeuce.livejournal.com]

another comment on the movie critic analogy:

if a filmmaker is going to read reviews of his work, hoping to gain some new insight thereby, he's going to choose which reviewers to give credence to based for one thing on the content of the review itself, but also on a knowledge of the critic's overall aesthetic and to some extent. He's not going to give some random anonymous review the same attention without reference to context. So by that analogy, if someone I've never heard of before comes in and makes a negative comment on something I wrote, how do I know that they're a good critic?

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

First of all, I don't suggest purely negative feedback any more so than purely positive feedback--less so, as at least positive feedback is nice and makes the author feel good. But of course I'm going to privilege a thoughtful and balanced criticism from you more than from a random LJer who swung in via the su_herald. That just goes without saying. Although in both cases I'm going to be glad that my story encouraged people to think think critically, and that's going to be a bigger ego boost than pure praise could produce (unless it's particularly enthusiastic praise, like this).

[likeadeuce.livejournal.com]

So we basically agree there :).

Which goes back to my original point -- that I don't see much value in negative criticism dropped out of the blue, while a lot of the debate seems to assume that all concrit is equal. (I know you're not actually saying that; I'm just providing an extreme hypothetical).