What about those of us who take writing seriously and want readers to feel comfortable being honest in their responses? Why do we have to suffer from the culture you've created that serves only your needs? Part of being a writer is learning how to take concrit. If you don't care about becoming better, then why do you care about criticism? I miss the days when writers actually cared about the quality of their work.
You can:
- State in the author notes that you like and appreciate concrit and any other kind of comment from your readers.
- Write professionally, publish your novels and earn money from them. Those are the stories that deserve criticism, because people pay to read them and they are expected to be high quality and professional.
- Understand that most fanfic writers are not professionals; just random people like you and I who use their free time to put the stories in their minds into words that you can then read for free, and stop expecting fanfic to be of any particular level of quality to stop being disappointed when it doesn't reach your standards.
Fic is not like published books. Fic writers have other professions, other fields of expertise. Most importantly, not all of them want to become better at writing. Some do, but fanfiction is inherently not about that. It's about everyone being able to share their stories with the world in hopes someone else will enjoy them, or learn something from them, or feel emotions with them. Again: FOR FREE and AS A HOBBY. Fanfiction is about writing what you want, how you want, no matter who you are, where you're from, what your age is or whether you have enough skill, time or energy to even consider writing professionally. In fanfiction, all these things don't matter, because everyone is allowed to be creative and share their stories with the world! Fanfiction is tearing down the walls, saying 'fuck it' to the people who decide who gets to share their stories and who doesn't.
The reader of a published book has every right to comment on its quality because they paid for it, expecting to find something of professional quality in its pages. If you clicked on a fic, you did it knowing full well the writer could be literally anyone—of any age, of any background, of any skill level—who had an idea for a story and wanted to tell it. If you dislike the fic, you are allowed and expected to close the page and move on with your life at the amazing cost of 0€. And if you did like it, but are frustrated because you think it could be better, you can rant about it with your partners, friends, whoever. Privately. Because if the author posted it like that, unless stated otherwise, it's because they consider the story is finished and have posted it so people might enjoy it.
If you don't agree with this, say it in your author notes! You'll get the concrit you want, and we'll all be happy and comfortable with the way people interact with the content we've put out there.
And before you say it, yes, I have considered stating in my author notes that I don't take concrit. You know why I don't? Because I know fic writers who have done this and immediately received comments insulting them for "trying to police what I can and can't say". Like it's somehow incredibly hard and distressing for these readers to respect another person's very reasonable boundaries and keep the things they didn't like to themselves.
My post is about unsolicited constructive criticism. You need to understand that the one you personally get is always going to be solicited, but that's not everyone's case.
Lastly, I personally do care about the quality of my work. That is why I have alpha and beta readers: to become better on my own terms, with people who can assist me privately. And if you want to help other fic writers become better at writing, you can offer to do alpha and beta work for people who want it! You'll be able to correct other people's writing to your heart's desire and know that they will not only accept and appreciate your help, but also credit you for helping them tell the story they wanted to tell. But you need to understand not everyone wants to get better. Not everyone wants their stories to show a particular level of skill. Some people just want to tell the story as it comes to their minds and be done with it, and that's okay, because fanfic is free, fanfic is a hobby, and fanfic is about everyone being able to tell their own stories. Not just the few people deemed apt for the job by a capitalist, patriarchal, white supremacist society.
Tell me, if you found a DeviantArt account with fanarts that look clearly amateur, having no idea of the background or even the age of the artist, would you leave them a comment telling them everything they could change in the drawing to make it better? No. You'd close their page and keep scrolling. Well, fanfiction should not be different.
