Why read and comment on things you don’t like?

[Abdelkaoolomocro]

imagine I just don’t like pizza. Really don’t like it. And I go to a pizza restaurant and leave a comment saying it is a bad restaurant as I don’t like pizza. Why go and eat there?

Same happened with my story. The tags are clear, you know what you are going to read. Why read it and tell me you hate reading about the things you knew were going to be there?

It is an anonymous comment, so well, never mind. But I do wonder, why does someone do that? Any ideas?

I don’t like heavy metal. Not going to a concert but I do appreciate that someone might like it and leave them to enjoy it.

Love,

Abdel

 

[IsabellaEmily]

I don't understand what compels someone to do that either.

I think your pizza analogy is spot on. If you love pizza you can easily offer a critique about how to make one you're not enjoying better. But if you hate it pizza, you should understand that even if it's a great pizza you're still not going to like it, and that isn't necessarily the fault of the restaurant or the person in the kitchen.

 

[Abdelkaoolomocro]

Thank you! I really don’t get it.

 

[easyoff]

imagine I just don’t like pizza. Really don’t like it. And I go to a pizza restaurant and leave a comment saying it is a bad restaurant as I don’t like pizza. Why go and eat there?

Same happened with my story. The tags are clear, you know what you are going to read. Why read it and tell me you hate reading about the things you knew were going to be there?

It is an anonymous comment, so well, never mind. But I do wonder, why does someone do that? Any ideas?

I don’t like heavy metal. Not going to a concert but I do appreciate that someone might like it and leave them to enjoy it.

Love,

Abdel

Because they are living a miserable life and want everyone else to be as miserable as they are.

 

[Abdelkaoolomocro]

Because they are living a miserable life and want everyone else to be as miserable as they are.

That sounds a little sad. Maybe that’s why they post anonymous.

 

[OffNSFW]

imagine I just don’t like pizza.

You lost me here.

Seriously, though, social media (which every comments section is) invites a perfect storm of a lot of our worst tendencies. Speaking our mind, even when it isn't called for. Treating the human being on the other end of the interaction as part of the entertainment. Forgetting that there's a human being on the other end altogether. Demanding things that no story can give us, like returning to our youth or ensuring that our partners will never leave.

 

[OverconfidentSarcasm]

It is an anonymous comment, so well, never mind. But I do wonder, why does someone do that? Any ideas?

Because it works.

There's a reason why KFC stopped selling nuggets. Because people wanted chicken but didn't like that particular kind of chicken, so they gave it bad reviews nobody asked for and KFC stopped selling them. Simple as that.

Seriously, I'm sorry if this sounds harsh, but you kinda just have to live with the fact that, if you post something on the internet, people will tell you when they don't like the flavor of what you created. The only defense is to turn comments off.

And just to be thorough: Tags don't help. Lit screwed that up when they allowed authors to write whatever they like. I rarely look at tags anymore because half the stories don't even have them, while the other half has inaccurate tags.

 

[scixxxfi]

I ask myself the same thing. It's certainly not in my nature to leave a nasty comment or review bomb something just because it's not my cup of tea. But lots of readers do. It's just the way it seems to be.

I also relate it to the category. LW is ultra critical and outspoken, but I actually enjoy the rapid fire comments, even when they're critical. It's just how that board is. Sci Fi is a lot friendlier and less critical, and it shows in the higher average scores.

I still can't figure out the illustrated board. I've seen some really nice work get beat up, and other work that's not very impressive (not being rude) voted surprisingly high. That board has massive volume, which makes it even more mysterious.

By the time we figure it out, something will change, haha.

 

[THBGato]

What gets me is when there's a really long story (say 30,000 words). It's clearly long. It runs to 9 or 10 pages, and has the word count at the start.

Yet somebody has bothered to write a comment saying "too long". I've seen that a few times. Like, why bother getting to the end at all if you thought it was too long?

 

[Abdelkaoolomocro]

You lost me here.

Seriously, though, social media (which every comments section is) invites a perfect storm of a lot of our worst tendencies. Speaking our mind, even when it isn't called for. Treating the human being on the other end of the interaction as part of the entertainment. Forgetting that there's a human being on the other end altogether. Demanding things that no story can give us, like returning to our youth or ensuring that our partners will never leave.

I do like pizza!

 

[Abdelkaoolomocro]

Because it works.

There's a reason why KFC stopped selling nuggets. Because people wanted chicken but didn't like that particular kind of chicken, so they gave it bad reviews nobody asked for and KFC stopped selling them. Simple as that.

Seriously, I'm sorry if this sounds harsh, but you kinda just have to live with the fact that, if you post something on the internet, people will tell you when they don't like the flavor of what you created. The only defense is to turn comments off.

And just to be thorough: Tags don't help. Lit screwed that up when they allowed authors to write whatever they like. I rarely look at tags anymore because half the stories don't even have them, while the other half has inaccurate tags.

You’re right. But being negative does nothing for someone. Like those people protesting against god knows what because they feel different.

 

[Abdelkaoolomocro]

I ask myself the same thing. It's certainly not in my nature to leave a nasty comment or review bomb something just because it's not my cup of tea. But lots of readers do. It's just the way it seems to be.

I also relate it to the category. LW is ultra critical and outspoken, but I actually enjoy the rapid fire comments, even when they're critical. It's just how that board is. Sci Fi is a lot friendlier and less critical, and it shows in the higher average scores.

I still can't figure out the illustrated board. I've seen some really nice work get beat up, and other work that's not very impressive (not being rude) voted surprisingly high. That board has massive volume, which makes it even more mysterious.

By the time we figure it out, something will change, haha.

I don’t know sci-fi,is it worth checking?

 

[Abdelkaoolomocro]

What gets me is when there's a really long story (say 30,000 words). It's clearly long. It runs to 9 or 10 pages, and has the word count at the start.

Yet somebody has bothered to write a comment saying "too long". I've seen that a few times. Like, why bother getting to the end at all if you thought it was too long?

That is actually so funny, when you say it like that. For sale blue shirt. Then a comment saying it’s blue. It cracks me up. Too long!

 

[scixxxfi]

I don’t know sci-fi,is it worth checking?

Very fun board. Not as high traffic as the big boards (LW and taboo), but lots of cool stories in there. Since it's fantasy you can pretty much cook up whatever bonkers fever dream you want, so long as it's well written and appealing.

 

[karina_jayde]

What gets me is when there's a really long story (say 30,000 words). It's clearly long. It runs to 9 or 10 pages, and has the word count at the start.

Yet somebody has bothered to write a comment saying "too long". I've seen that a few times. Like, why bother getting to the end at all if you thought it was too long?

I think that can still be a valid critique, even though I think the commenter should be a bit more precise in their feedback.

Stories can definitely be too long for what they are and can wear out their welcome. Stories can be repetitive, overwrought, or tread too much water between the important stuff. Something that was 30K words could have perhaps been more effective trimmed down to 25K or even 20K.

A lot of works (including some of my own) could definitely be improved by trimming some of the fat.

 

[Stimtheone]

I can say there are two reasons for this. Going back to that analogy.

Perhaps there are some people who dislike pizza so much, whichever kind it is, no matter how harmless it is to society and if it was made with less pain on people than whatever they like... there exist people who simply want there to be no pizza because they feel like the protagonist of the universe and obviously, the world should not have things they dislike in it, even if far more enjoy it. They are these people who expect everything to be for them and if it's not for them it should not exist, people unable to consider that maybe other people enjoy pizza and the planet does not have to ask this one random 44-year old woman from Detroit if they are allowed to have pizza. While many of us can agree that there are some foods that should not exist, despite some people enjoying them, these are not motivated by such common sense and neither should you care about their opinion.

And then there are those for which it's not even about the pizza, even if they dislike it, maybe they don't dislike it either and this was never about reviewing something they don't like. Some people just go out there in the world and spread pain simply because that makes them feel better, that fills up the void of their lives that they can't employ in constructive purposes, they don't care if you make pizza, sushi or burgers... they want you to feel bad either so they feel better from some perceived control in their life or because they feel like they're winning if someone else is losing. There exist in the world people that deserve no pizza and whom will pass through it by worsening everyone's experience in whichever way they can get away with until one day they will be gone and that will be the first pleasant thing about them.

 

[VerbalAbuse]

You're too thin skinned.

I may go to a restaurant or a hotel/lodge. I discover it's not what was advertised. The meat was chewy. The table cloth was dirty. The room was moldy and noisy. The staff was miserable. I leave a bad review -- so that others know.

What is the point of reviewing and commenting, if all the reviews and comments are positive?

If I want to go to a restaurant or a hotel/lodge, first thing I do I check out the reviews -- and look for the negative ones, because they're the only useful ones.

 

[JuanSeiszFitzHall]

I won't try to work this into the pizza analogy, because I'll try to keep this short. Lately I've wondered if some people who post these comments, or seek out stories with certain themes so as to downvote them, might see themselves as culture warriors. They take the side of strictly defined two-person hetero marriage with no external hanky-panky (especially by women). The actual content of a story doesn't matter to them, and they might even worry that reading it might corrupt them. While most of the ire might be directed to adultery stories in Loving Wives, Literotica as a whole might be the target. How dare people enjoy sex?

 

[VerbalAbuse]

This actually really makes sense to me. Let's all stop saying anything negative. Only positive opinions should ever be expressed.
We should consider people, their feelings, their beliefs, their religion, their political views, their government. We should see that we offend none of those.
Every place should be a safe place.
Freedom of expression? Yes! As long as the expression is supportive and caring.
How dare people criticize stuff!? Or not be wholly enthusiastic?

 

[SueDNimm]

imagine I just don’t like pizza. Really don’t like it. And I go to a pizza restaurant and leave a comment saying it is a bad restaurant as I don’t like pizza. Why go and eat there?

Same happened with my story. The tags are clear, you know what you are going to read. Why read it and tell me you hate reading about the things you knew were going to be there?

It is an anonymous comment, so well, never mind. But I do wonder, why does someone do that? Any ideas?

I don’t like heavy metal. Not going to a concert but I do appreciate that someone might like it and leave them to enjoy it.

Love,

Abdel

It's a rare comment or feedback indeed that isn't useful to me. Even someone saying that your chosen genre isn't their thing can be useful. Think of it as an opportunity to consider what led them to click on your story and read it. Could your title mislead someone? What about the little description blurb? Tagging a story can help communicate useful things to prospective readers and inform their decision to click. Might it be useful to give a bit of a heads-up to your readers about what they're about to read at the start of the story itself?

Even if you've done everything you can to communicate this to readers, you may well get some readers who give your story a shot anyway. Even this can be useful as an indicator that your title/description/opening introduction interested someone who isn't usually interested in your story.

The most useful and valuable feedback I get is usually negative. It's often uncomfortable to read, but it does so much to help me get perspective and figure out what works and what doesn't.

 

[joy_of_cooking]

The culture warrior thing makes sense to me.

There's an AH regular who has said that she feels morally obliged to speak up whenever people discuss rape fantasies. I suspect we all have topics like that which we cannot stand to allow pass without comment. Underage beastiality scat/vore snuff or whatever. The rest of us just have the privilege of not being constantly confronted by those topics.

 

[Sammael Bard]

imagine I just don’t like pizza. Really don’t like it. And I go to a pizza restaurant and leave a comment saying it is a bad restaurant as I don’t like pizza. Why go and eat there?

Internet karens are an expert on everything. If they could, they'd be speaking to the manager about how they didn't like the smut despite being warned that the smut would be nasty and beyond redemption.

Their catharsis lies in your comment section, and one bombing your story because Yelp doesn't work here.

 

[AchtungNight]

Personally I think life is too short to put up with people who shame sex fantasies and a healthy sharing of them. As long as everything’s consensual, legal, and enjoyable, it’s no big deal. Then again, I also am not into those who would profit from putting others down in any way and backing their actions by insisting others should adhere to their beliefs. My own thing, in other words. I’m not as extreme as the people with whom I don’t get along, though, and willing to reconcile and move on. Therein lies the difference.

 

[Britva415]

The tags are clear, you know what you are going to read

A reader has to go out of their way to see the tags before reading the story. For months I didn't even know it was possible to do it.

 

[Britva415]

This is why I put the tags in a line at the beginning of the story