Friday, March 11, 2016

One Weird Trick for Making a Writer's Group Hate You

Last month on writers.net there was some person who joined and was really frustrated that the site revised its policies so you have to make 5 posts before you can post links and samples.  A lot of new people who join the site use those posts to respond to old threads.  Sometimes they pick a thread that's months or even several years old, at which point I usually make fun of them.

This prick decided that instead of even pretending to give a fuck about the group, he'd just post one thread after another whining about not being able to post his link yet.  And that he could only post 1000 words.

So basically this guy's agenda was to join the site, post a lengthy sample, get his critiques, and split.  If you really want to turn off established members like me, go ahead and act like that.  Throw your little tantrum about how you should be allowed to spam the group right away.

But I think you'll get a much better reception if you actually pretend to give a fuck about the group.  I like it when people seem to want to be there for the long haul, because usually all people are interested in is getting critiques and then moving on, probably to another group.  Because honestly it's just selfish to demand people give you critiques while you do nothing for anyone else.  That is sadly our me-first culture these days.  But you probably know that old saying that you catch more bees with honey than vinegar or whatever it is.  If you pretend like you might care about more than yourself, people might treat you better.

Then again if you're only planning to stay a couple of days, why not be a huge, whiny bitch about it?

2 comments:

Cindy said...

People like that usually get ignored or booted out pretty fast.

stephen Hayes said...

I've belonged to a few writing groups and the best ones include people who are willing to be generous with their comments and critiques, in exchange for receiving them.

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