thefourthvine | [Rant] In Defense of Bad Writing

Crossposts: http://thefourthvine.livejournal.com/175329.html

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[rant]

[Rant] In Defense of Bad Writing

A long time ago, I had a lot to say in rants about how people were DOING IT WRONG and should NOT WRITE THIS WAY but rather THIS OTHER WAY. (And, if I'm gonna be honest, those rants are all still there, just waiting for me to type them. Let me tell you about the Should You Use the Pluperfect? flowchart I made the other day. Or not, because honestly, TFV, nobody wants to hear that.) I was all, "People! Write better!"

Sorry, past me -- you were wrong. What I should have been saying was, "People! Write more! (Even if it's really bad!)"

Because, yes, I still think the word sensitized needs to be left to lie fallow for a decade. Where it can maybe cavort with its friend, lave. I still sometimes want to ban thesauruses. I still feel like maybe those weeping cocks should see a doctor, or perhaps a therapist.

But these days, I also think we're lucky to have those stories. I probably won't be reading them, but I'm happy they exist, for three reasons.

Writing is good. People are writing! For fun! Good news! Seriously, if I had spent more time writing down the hideously painful Mary Sue fan fiction I dreamed up when I was a wee teen, I might have spent less time on, you know, drugs and sucking the cocks of random strangers without protection. I'm always happy to see someone making better choices than I made.

Maybe you're now saying, "Okay, fine, but do they have to post those Mary Sue stories where I can see them?" If so, you're being a dick. Cut it out. The Archive of Our Own is not the Archive of Just What You Want to Read. It's the Archive of Fanworks. Is it a fanwork? Then it belongs there! And if you're incapable of scrolling past something, it's not that the Mary Sue writers are in the wrong place, it's that you are. (Also, I'm sorry, but I don't know where would be the right place for you. Everywhere is going to have stuff you don't like, because tastes are individual and all that. Maybe the internet just isn't for you.)

Crap is important. Sturgeon's law is right, but it misses the point. Ninety percent of everything has to be shit. That's how you get the 10% that's good.

Your favorite writers, fan fiction, published fiction, published fan fiction, whatever -- they didn't start out writing that way. There was a time when they wrote unspeakably awful crap. Writing unspeakably awful crap is how you learn to write only moderately awful crap, and then eventually maybe decent stuff, and then, if you're lucky, actually good things. There are not two classes of people, those who are good writers and those who are bad writers, so that all you have to do to have only great stuff is scare away all the bad writers. There are people who used to write bad stuff, and there are people who are currently writing bad stuff, and there's a lot of crossover between the two. Some of the second category will one day be the first category. (Also, tomorrow some of the first category will move back to the second. No one hits it out of ballpark every time.) If you want to read new good stuff tomorrow, encourage the people writing bad stuff today. (And also maybe help them get betas. Betas are great.)

And, no, those people don't have to hide their work away until it gets better. They can share it with anyone who wants to read it. If they want to post it, they should. Wanting to is reason enough. (Although if you want another reason -- posting is how community happens. Which is how things like betas happen. People who share their work get better faster.)

Crap is a sign of life. New bad stories are a sign that this genre -- fan fiction, the genre I adore the most - is alive and well. Bad stories mean new people are trying to write in it, and people are trying to do new things with it, and maybe new people are joining the audience, too. When only the best and most popular are writing in a genre, it's on its deathbed. (See: Westerns and Louis L'Amour.) I want this genre to be here forever, because I want to read it forever. So I'm happy that teenagers are posting Mary Sue stories to the Archive of Our Own.

Does that mean you have to be happy? Nope. I can't make you do anything. (I can think you're wrong, but hey, being wrong on the internet is a time-honored tradition among our people.) But when you start making fun of a writer and bullying her in the comments of her story, simply because she's writing something you think is bad and embarrassing, well, that's when I say: shut the fuck up or get the fuck out. Because she's not a problem. She's just doing what we're all doing -- having fun, playing with words, throwing something out there on the internet to see if other people like it.

But you. You're trying to stop someone from having fun. You're trying to shame people into not writing anymore. And that, folks -- that is the definition of shitty behavior. (Mary Sue fantasies, on the other hand, are just the definition of human behavior.) It's bad for people, it's bad for the future, and it's bad for the genre. So you're a problem.

Please go away, problems, and let all of us write out our ids out in peace.

(And, yes, this was triggered by one specific story and some of the responses it's getting on the AO3. But it applies to all of them, all the fan fiction we don't like out there. Okay, I'm done.)

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I <3 you.

I <3 you right back.

Yes. All of this. Thank you.

Thank you. <3<3<3

So much WORD.

Thank you!

And the thing about all of this is just how damn much it stings even years later.

Once upon a time under another user name several of the things I'd been a major longterm beta for (that were unashamedly Id tastic) kept ending up being "sporked." Nothing makes you feel better than something you'd spent a lot of time on and were slightly embarrassed to be doing (because it was hard to put my likes so blatantly out there) being taken apart piece by piece so everyone could enjoy making fun of you.

It took me about six years for me to even comment to anyone in fandom again and I entirely sat out the heyday of a couple of fandoms I really loved (SV, SGA) because I was so scared.

...and of course, my chapter word counts are still too low to do fandom right. *wry smile*

Shit. I'm sorry that happened to you, and so glad you came back, even if you'll never recapture that first fine careless rapture. Hi! I'm happy you're here!

(And, seriously, fuck doing fandom right for other people. Do fandom however it's right for you. This is not showjumping, here.)

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majoline - 2013-11-13 04:12 (UTC) - Expand

Well said. Thank you.

<3<3<3!

Let me tell you about the Should You Use the Pluperfect? flowchart I made the other day. Or not, because honestly, TFV, nobody wants to hear that.)

I actually would. My grammar knowledge is sketchy and mostly through reading-osmosis, but I'm curious about flowcharts.

I still feel like maybe those weeping cocks should see a doctor, or perhaps a therapist.

*snickers*

There was a time when they wrote unspeakably awful crap. Writing unspeakably awful crap is how you learn to write only moderately awful crap, and then eventually maybe decent stuff, and then, if you're lucky, actually good things.

Yes, that, exactly. Writing not-so-great stuff is a learning curve to writing better stuff. And just because you've gone through the learning curve 5 or 10 years ago doesn't mean you shouldn't have some patience for the young writers of today going through that same curve. (I mean, you don't have to read it, but you don't have to discourage it either.)

You're trying to shame people into not writing anymore.

Oh, I don't like that. I mean, fandom is a place where shame shouldn't be an issue. It's a community with support (and, yes, socially enforced standards of expected behaviour through shunning -- but not shaming and insulting people. That's just rude.).

I mean, fandom is a place where shame shouldn't be an issue

A nice theory, but as a now-adult who was literally shamed and silenced out of writing anything for fandom for, oh, eight years because she had the temerity to give a (unattached) canon male character a love interest who was able to make her way home without drowning BECAUSE OMG MARY SUE HOW DARE YOU, YOU SILLY SHALLOW LITTLE GIRL HAHAHAHA LET'S PUT HER ON A SPORKING COMM!, not actually born out by reality in any way shape or form.

(I didn't stop writing, I just went and wrote original stuff. Eventually the Sue-sporkers/shamers started sporking original fiction that dared to have female characters who could get home without drowning and I eventually decided I didn't give a shit, but.)

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out_there - 2013-11-13 06:09 (UTC) - Expand

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goodbyebird - 2013-11-21 20:57 (UTC) - Expand

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thefourthvine - 2013-11-13 04:08 (UTC) - Expand

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out_there - 2013-11-13 05:58 (UTC) - Expand

Thank you for reminding me of this.

When you said this though: fan fiction, the genre I adore the most You blew my MIND. Because you know? Me too. I think I've secretly been adoring fan fiction the most, of all genres, for quite a while now, only I never realized it. And it feels good to come out about it, if even to myself. Fan fiction is awesome, and so is everyone who writes it.

This post also reminds me of the Ira Glass quote about practice. (Probably you've already seen it, but):

“Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, I wish someone told me. All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase, they quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know its normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will finish one story. It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions. And I took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone I’ve ever met. It’s gonna take awhile. It’s normal to take awhile. You’ve just gotta fight your way through.”
― Ira Glass

That's such a wonderful quote.

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laisserais - 2013-11-13 04:38 (UTC) - Expand

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thefourthvine - 2013-11-14 02:40 (UTC) - Expand

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mekare - 2013-11-14 20:42 (UTC) - Expand

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laisserais - 2013-11-15 20:42 (UTC) - Expand

You are SO SO right. No one should EVER be bullied out of posting fic. NEVER, NEVER, NEVER. Post everything! \o/ And then post more!

Bullying sucks. And you'd think in fandom we'd understand that better than most, but there are always bullies. Fortunately, here there are also people to tell those bullies to fuck off.

Well-said!

Thank you!

YES THIS YES. You! I like you! *hearts*

I like you, too! (I even love you for the whole rabbit hole obsession you started with Bird and Johnson.) <3<3<3

<3<3<3<3x10000!

<3<3<3 back at you!

Thank you for writing this! What is taking place on AO3 reminds me of how LJ got to be a few years ago. We've got to remember that everyone starts somewhere. This girl really has guts to continue over there.

Ugh, did LJ really get like this? I hadn't known.

<3!

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amalthia - 2013-11-14 06:01 (UTC) - Expand

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thefourthvine - 2013-11-14 22:26 (UTC) - Expand

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amalthia - 2013-11-16 03:22 (UTC) - Expand

Thank you so much for writing and posting this.

Thank YOU. <3!

Just--thanks. I spent a long time away from fandom and writing in general because shit in meatspace got incredibly real for a few years. I'm back to doing the beta reader thing and slowly dipping my toes into writing, but I know the work I'm producing is not great. And that's fine, because, hey. I have seriously atrophied writing muscles. It's comforting to know that awesome writers are supportive of crap.

Crap is a sign of life. New mantra, right there.

It is literally true: if you're making shit, you're alive. And it is also figuratively true.

And I'm sorry shit got real for you for a while there; I'm glad you're back. Hi, you!

I'm really glad you posted this. I don't know why, but it just struck me SO HARD and I spent the last while commenting to the author and just, god, treating her like a human being who has aspirations and creativity and the desire to share that. She's only a sophomore in high school, ffs. I have a KID who's older than that, and the thought of her having to get hit in the face with the hostility and contempt that my fellow hockey RPF fans spewed directly to this writer makes me nauseated. I'm a reasonably well-known writer in this fandom, for one pairing at least, and every time I post I have to talk myself through the panic of knowing that I'm going to get ripped apart on the anon meme. At least I can choose not to go there, unlike this writer. Seriously, fandom, take a look at yourself and be ashamed of what you've become.

(thank you, TFV. You're widely read and respected in fandom and I hope a few people will pause and think about their sense of entitlement and the way that so quickly translates into aggressive ill-will).

I'm glad you talked to her; we were all that sophomore in high school at some point, and she doesn't deserve the shit that's getting thrown at her.

(And I wish, but there's zero chance anyone who would do that would stop and think based on anything I could say. But I still think it's worthwhile to say something. Posts like this are mostly directed at the people on the sidelines; the people involved already know what they think. So maybe I changed a few undecideds? Who knows, but maybe.)

Word.

<3!

YES THIS

HI YOU! HI!

I love this! Cheers you on. *\o/*

Thank you! <3

Yay!

(I wrote a So You Want To Write A Self-Insert, Then thing a few years back: http://azurelunatic.dreamwidth.org/5703114.html -- a *lot* of it was influenced by having innocently handed over a rough draft to my English teacher. Hoo boy. I'm still not entirely over that.)

Oh, interesting post! I like it a lot, although sadly I think people are likely to find it when they've already learned much of what it says.

And I conclude that your English teacher was harsh? If so, what a jerk. (Or, I guess, nice person making a major mistake.) You teach high school or middle school English, you're gonna have a class full of novice writers making novice mistakes, and wouldn't you rather have an enthusiastic novice than a reluctant one?

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azurelunatic - 2013-11-14 09:37 (UTC) - Expand

If I hadn't written a metric fuckton of crap, including the most painfully obvious Mary Sue stories that the world has ever seen (I don't hate them, but my early OCs were obvious authorial self-inserts and I'm a little embarrassed), I would never have learned to write fiction. BECAUSE IT'S ALL CRAP WHEN YOU START. And then you learn. And nothing's perfect anyway.

Perfection isn't happening, yup. One of the great things about writing against a deadline is learning to say, "It isn't perfect, but it's good enough." I appreciate all my deadline work for teaching me that. (Sort of.)

And, yeah, you always start off writing crap. My poor wife has read basically everything I've ever written, all the half-finished and barely-started stories, all the way back to the unspeakable crap I wrote as a teen. I'm glad she has a kind memory, basically.

Like, no one gives four year olds crap for having bad handwriting. We KNOW it's a hard skill, we KNOW they're just learning, and we're really proud that they can make a recognizable B even if it is backwards and wonky. But ten years later we expect them to be great at writing a story right out of the gate.

Thank you for posting this!

<3<3<3!

Well and truly said!

Thank you!

Linked here via

metanews. Thank you for posting it. Word to all of it.

And add me to the list of people who would love to see the Should You Use the Pluperfect? flowchart.

I just lost several minutes staring at your ridiculously cute icon.

And, yeah, pluperfect flowchart is coming, although maybe not until after I write my Yuletide story. THINGS TO DO. EVERYWHERE.

Brava.

This sort of bullying and shaming has been prevalent in fandom the whole time I've been around, and while I continue to support the idea of reviews and sensible, non-abusive criticism--public mockery is not it. Does not help. Merely shames the perpetrator, rather than the subject.

Edited 2013-11-14 03:21 (UTC)

Ugh. Yeah, I wish it were new, but it isn't. It happens a lot -- there were several commenters on this post that had something like this happen to them. I just have no idea WHY it keeps on happening.

The Archive of Our Own is not the Archive of Just What You Want to Read. It's the Archive of Fanworks. Is it a fanwork? Then it belongs there! And if you're incapable of scrolling past something, it's not that the Mary Sue writers are in the wrong place, it's that you are.

I want to put that on the Archive's front page, and then I want to put it in one of those blue notice banners right above the comment boxes, too. Possibly with some sparkling gifs and in a really, really big font.

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