Why I Don't Allow Comments

I suppose the answer to this is simple. To quote myself from a while ago, "I don't want spam or to have to hear people's dumb opinions." Personally, I think that's fair enough. Lately I've been reading statements from various individuals to the effect that they think people who have comments disabled on YouTube, for instance, have "something to hide." Yeah, I do have something to hide: your stupid opinions. I don't mean "you" personally, dear reader, because in all likelihood some of you are sufficiently sensible to not be the kind of person I'm avoiding. Rather, I mean "you" as in the angry or prejudiced or generally insecure person who likes to comment on, for example, YouTube videos.

I would love to make some hyperbolic comment like "Web 2.0 has failed," but that might be taking things too far. Nonetheless, as much as I argue in favour of discourse, that does not mean that I am obliged to offer a platform for people's stupid opinions. There are, of course, those who have sensible and constructive remarks to make. That's entirely fine. But if you want to say anything on a topic, you can discuss it on a forum or on social media, or start your own blog. Even the most feeble producers of "content" such as myself have no duty to provide that space.

I think that it's patently obvious that in innumerable cases, internet comments serve no useful purpose. I don't mean critical or discursive responses, but those which are based on mindless hostility, discrimination, generalisations and the whole host of "contributions" such as they are which, in their unironic expressions of fear manifesting as prejudice and hatred, speak volumes about the individual making the comment rather than the content under critique. I myself used to occasionally make jibes or arch remarks here and there, but now I don't. Why? Because it serves no purposes beyond justifying your own feeble compensations for inadequacy.

This is why YouTube and article comments are a waste of time, why in its current state things like 'Yahoo Answers' are a waste of time and why basically anything which allows individuals to give immediate responses is a waste of time. They allow no consideration. If they were forced to join a forum or write a blog to respond, it would pare things down a great deal because that would be too much effort. Some people blame this state of affairs on trolls and anonymity, but I believe the real reason is that there are quite simply genuinely many deeply angry individuals out there who cannot abide criticism or differences of opinion. These people have no voice in reality, because you would never meet them in real life. Why ought they to have a voice online?

My most consistent source of views is my rather exploitatively-titled article "Sherlock is Overrated" which I to an extent composed because I felt like there was a demand. I offer this kind of criticism, however, as a form of solidarity, I suppose, with other people out there who may be bewildered at how popular some of our current cultural juggernauts are. I feel that this is rather a different form of discourse to the spewing of mindless bile and hate, particularly of a sexist or racist kind. Those kinds of people, I would like to think, are not a majority - I certainly do not know any personally - but I think that nonetheless they ought not to be given a voice. I like to believe in a "live and let live" policy when it comes to differences of opinion: I can't stop people liking New Who or what have you. The exception, however, is when the people with the "difference of opinion" do not themselves have a "live and let live" policy: people who feel they must yell down the opposition as loudly as they can, who must have the last word, who honestly cannot see the world as anything other than dichotomies, biases and extremes. Why ought such people be given an inch? Some might argue they ought to be given just enough rope, as it were, but honestly I don't see the point. I believe that the propensity for comments on the internet to be abused in many cases drastically outweighs the advantages to having them.

I have never believed that the many should be punished for the crimes of the few. Nonetheless, things like limiting internet comments are not a form of punishment. As I've said, there are other platforms: take the discussion to a forum or your own blog. The danger with comment systems is the creation of echo chambers where people with these absolutist beliefs can endlessly reinforce their own opinions and confirmation biases by shouting down opponents: they in fact limit discourse rather than increasing it. This is healthy neither for individuals nor for society.

It is, perhaps, the doom of humanity that the poor examples of a few will spoil the experience of the many. We are a species of many moods, which some fail to control. Perhaps Western society in the late twentieth and early twenty-first century is such an unprecedented time of relative peace for its specific inhabitants that certain individuals are incapable of otherwise dealing with a previously less inhibited human propensity for violence and destruction. I believe we are still at war, primarily, with ourselves: some, however, have made greater peace than others. Might we hope for such a strain to die out? It seems unlikely. Perhaps it can be remedied by education: a more viable solution, albeit I daresay one with its own limitations. Enough of us, I'm sure, are capable of wielding self restraint. Those who have the patience and self-awareness to do so have the opportunity to respond in a sensible fashion. This is why I believe, for the time being, that denying a voice to hateful elements is at least a potential stop-gap. Those who have mastered themselves will find a way to contribute if they wish. Those that have not will, I suspect, in many (albeit of course not all) cases be too overwhelmed to seek alternatives, and so drown in their own silence.

"Don't Like, Don't Watch"

The single most useless and ineffectual response to criticism is "If you don't like it, don't watch it." I have a good reason for thinking that this is both useless and ineffectual. Let's render the sentence down into its psychological components, replacing the specific "watch" with the more general "consume." Why does the person saying this want the critic to not consume it? We must first of all dismiss the notion that this is out of altruism: "I'm telling you this for your emotional wellbeing!" Nonsense. Moving on. The person who utters this phrase has a motivation, a self-interest, in the critic not watching. Why? If the critic does not consume the media, they have no legitimate grounds on which to criticise it. You cannot justifiably criticise something you haven't seen. My article doing just this was intended to draw attention to this notion. The most I can do is offer remarks on why the concept does not appeal to me, why I've never started. I couldn't talk to a big fan of, say, the "Game of Thrones" TV show and tell them that it was rubbish. I haven't seen it, so I can't say that it's rubbish. I might give them a medal for how astoundingly original their taste in television is, but I could hardly criticise them for it. People who say "Don't like, don't watch" don't want something they watch, and presumably something they like, to be criticised.

Why not? I've been in conversations with people who say that Tolkien, who any regular reader might have gathered is my favourite author, was a bad poet, that he described the setting too much, that he "couldn't write." Over the years instead of throwing up mental earthworks and hunkering down I've taken on board a lot of these remarks, and it's improved the way I read the works because I can see why people have issues with Tolkien, even if they don't bother me personally. It expands one's understanding. I would never say to one of these people "Well you shouldn't have read the book in the first place." Why? Well firstly it would be an incredibly stupid thing to say because it's impossible to form an opinion of something without consuming it. We can extrapolate this, however, to serial fiction. Why do I watch these shows that I criticise on this blog? I watch them because I want them to be good. I want to enjoy myself. Sometimes I do, to a certain extent, as can be observed in most of my reviews. I'm generally willing to offer at least a few positives. If I don't watch it, how can I know either way? What if I miss something I enjoy? Maybe it's just a kind of Stockholm Syndrome where I'll watch anything with a particular name slapped on it. Even if that's the case, however, the criticism fulfils a purpose: expanding the sum of consideration on a work. Even if it's only seen by someone and it helps them understand the other side of the argument, or it helps them consider their own creative activities, or even if it gives comfort to someone who feels like bewildered with an opinion that differs to the norm, it has achieved something.

"Don't like don't watch" achieves nothing. People who say "don't like don't watch" just want to feel comforted. Allow me to explain this. As I've established, people who say "don't like don't watch" don't want something they like, a piece of media, to be criticised. For some reason it matters. Why? In enjoying this thing, they have identified with it, and in identifying with it they have over-identified with it. Therefore if someone criticises what they like, it seems like a personal attack. It feels like the critic is criticising them, not the work. Sometimes, of course, critics do level personal attacks at the people who like something. I myself have aimed a few low blows at fans of one thing or another, which of course is beastly behaviour not in the purview of professional criticism. Opinions Can Be Wrong is not a professional criticism blog, however, so there you go. It doesn't matter, however, because "don't like don't watch" isn't a response to personal attacks. It's a response to criticisms which turns them into personal attacks. It's in the same school as "make your own then." "Don't like don't watch" at a fundamental level just means "I am insecure."

I think any reasonable person would agree that one person's insecurity is no reason to shut down criticism, nor that it is the responsibility of people who consume media to protect the self-esteem of its fans by not criticising it. As a response, therefore, it serves no purpose beyond revealing that the person who said it lacks the psychological and emotional fortitude to handle criticism of things they enjoy and is not sufficiently mature to have a functional identity independent of media. Insecurity manifests as fatuousness, which is to say contentment in one's own stupidity in full knowledge of that stupidity. It's a passive-aggressive behaviour which tries to deny the power of consumers and reflects a willing enslavement to faceless corporate entities. I'll get to that at some point. This is, of course, a trauma which has been manufactured by the modern age where the increasing quality of life, as unlikely as it might seem that it is increasing, gives people more and more leisure time and more and more kinds of media. As such Western culture has become incredibly dependent on entertainment, but that dependence is not purely a commercial one. Entertainment has infected the Western identity, producing people who are simultaneously entertained and taken complete advantage of by the media they consume, because entertainment is responsible for both the fragility of the modern Westerner's identity and the very wobbly crutches which hold it up.

We live in a culture where self esteem is hard to come by. The media constantly assaults us with people who are living more exciting and more luxurious lives than that of the average citizen: celebrities, businesspeople, even politicians. Consumers feel as if they have not achieved anything - even if they have - and so they retreat to safe havens: hobbies and interests. The situation is compounded by their factor of monetary investment. But when hobbies and interests are all you've got, what are you going to do when the critics come knocking? No, criticism is not infallible, and yes criticism itself ought to be criticised. What serves no purpose beyond embedding people's neuroses, however, is trying to shut down criticism. Find strength in your own achievements rather than perceiving yourself as weak in comparison to others. "Don't like don't watch" is a useless phrase. People ought to take criticism of the things they like on board and consider them. Sometimes it can be annoying, but the point is to overcome that frustration and master self-control, not to be a creature of impulse who lashes out at the first sign of danger. Besides, the businesses who produce most hobbies and interests, be they shows or films, books or games or whatever, are generally listening to the money, not the critics, so it's not like a few people criticising will mean your toys are taken away. Criticise people, criticise things, criticise criticism, but don't stop criticism because criticism is healthy and necessary. What people should stop doing, however, is over-identifying with what they consume, and start having a little self-respect.