Everyone needs to be able to give valid critique every now and then, lest we end up with a friend embarrassed before the nation when Simon Cowell pronounces her tone deaf and fat (then despite listing "female" on her entry form, he continues to inform the world that our friend is most certainly a "dude"). Terribly devastating, as you can imagine. And all because you never learned how to tell your friend that she really wasn't a great singer.
But contrary to popular belief, critique doesn't equal criticism. Plus it's not as simple as "calling a spade a black icon that looks sorta like an upside down heart skewered on a stick. It's takes some skill and practice. Like anything you have to practice, it's best to start with the basics.
To get us started in the proper vein, I thought I would include a short rant about how ludicrously inept most people seem to be at offering proper critique. In true blogpost, bullet-rant form, here are my five things a critique isn't and should never been confused with:
- A tweet is not a critique.
- "I liked it," is not a critique.
- Spell check is not a critique (nor is grammar check).
- Critique is not an opportunity to mock someone's ineptitude, or to stroke your own ego. If you need to blather on to feel smart, write a book rather than critiquing one. (Or start a stupid blog for goodness sake).
For those of you critiquing my blog post, you'll notice I said, "five things a critique isn't." Well Mr. and Mrs. Smarty Pants. The fifth one is for you to post in the comments.
Part One: Compliment Someone, Stupid.
Learning the skill of critique in our po-mo (post modern) world is handier than a grave digger learning how to sharpen a shovel. Bitching and moaning has become a competitive sport and a matter of pride. Without spending more than a few seconds considering this statement, it's the only thing that unites every generation from youngest to oldest.
But sadly, most people think genuine critique is as simple as farting his or her gut's first-churnings onto paper or into the digital aethers. Not so. Today we will deal with the first rule of courteous critique: Compliment someone, stupid!
Match your slash and burn with at least an equal amount of praise.
This might sound one of two ways to you. If you're a big teddy bear, this might sound obvious or even insufficient. To that I say, most of society's woes are you're fault, Mr. and Mrs. Never Spank!
This is critique we're talking about after all. And when compliments get more than a few deep, they start to fester. How are naughty writers ever going to learn the difference between active and passive verbs if we as a community don't take responsibility for each other. "You dangle another participle Mr., and I'll spangle your hide!"
But, if you are more like me (a pedantic jerk), then matching compliment per complaint might sound like both an empty exercise and impossible task. To that I say, get over yourself and learn a new skill. You might even find you like it, you gnarled old pontificator! (I mean, what a wonderful sweater you're wearing.)
Lastly, when applying the compliment per complaint technique in your critique, always remember to prime with compliment and finish with complaint. Compliments cover over all sorts of rough spots, moldy stains and greasy surfaces. When a writer is appropriately rubbed down with compliments, you'll discover that your complaints tend to stick and have a much longer lasting effect.
Part Two: Get in Their Head Before Their Jock
We all know truffles are just bottom-dwelling, fungus balls leaching off the decay of other plants, and that it takes a pig to sniff them out. Yet most of us will jump at the chance to eat the truffles for dinner and then turn on the pig for breakfast the next morning.
So it shouldn't surprise us that as critics we always want to add salt to the gravy before we've tasted it to find out it's caramel sauce. (Am I inside your head yet?) On that note, it's time for our second rule of giving courteous critique: Get into a writer's head before you get into their jock.
For those of you who never played high school sports in the 80's or 90's, "getting into someone's jock" isn't as provocative as it sounds.
It simply means staying in their face and playing tight defense--moving with their every movement as if you were sharing the same jock strap (one of the more delightful images I remember from my adolescent year of athletics).
When applied to critique, this jock-strap-buddy concept means that the critiquer should make sufficient effort to match the mind and intent of the writer before attempting to ride them into the front row of the bleachers and convince the referee it was charging.
If a writer is attempting satire or allegory this could be important for you to grasp before tearing them a new one for their unrealistic representation of the social behaviors of barnyard animals. Nothing is less helpful than gathering critique from someone who clearly doesn't understand what you as a writer were trying to do.
If things are simply too blurry for you as a critiquer to be confident about what the writer's intentions are, then start there and simply ask for clarification.
The second take home here is to challenge yourself to help the writer improve their writing, not adapt to yours. It's fine to share jocks with a fellow bard, but only if your tough defense is all about helping them improve their own style of offense. You aren't allowed to cry foul every time they shake rather than bake (or versa vice).
Part Three: Haterade is for Sipping
Get on the love train folks, because it's time for rule three of giving courteous critique: Haterade is for Sipping.
There, I said it. Now don't get me wrong. Haterade is a powerful elixir, and has its place and purpose around the sphere of artistic endeavor. Where would we be if Milli Vanilli hadn't received the heavy dousing of haterade they so rightly deserved? Or if reality T.V. hadn't gotten booed from the primetime stage... (oh, crap).
Anywho, haterade is fine and dandy, sour candy. As long as its consumers understand the difference between a snifter and a cooler jug (a snifter is a snooty glass, narrower at the top, used for brandy) (thus the difference is that one of them is refined and small while the other is big and clunky and used at foozball gatherings) (okay. Good to go?).
Just like a seventy-year-old, overweight football coach with heart issues standing on the victorious sidelines in freezing weather moments before the end of football contest, an artist (or creator of any sort) can be quite negatively impacted by a cooler-jug-full of haterade all at once.
Not only could he or she die, but even if said artist only suffers hypothermia for several hours, your lambasting will only be remembered as the blathering of a petty individual who needed more love from his or her mother. Thus, legitimate criticism will be dismissed along with the torrent of overdone, gagamagging verbal flatulence.
So if you fancy yourself as a sophistimacated critic of the arts and you wish to be taken seriously while sitting around the table of artistic endeavor (I know it was a sphere earlier. Well now its a spherical table. Get over it.) then try drinking from a glass rather than a trough.
- Make it a rule to never use exclamation marks in your critique! If you find something like this!!!! in anything you've written delete it and start over.
- Don't write a critique the same way you try to win arguments with your spouse. (ie. "Why do you always do this?") bellyaching via superlatives makes you sound whiny and pathetic.
- give specific examples or numbers to back up claims. Something like "The author must have used the phrase 'dirty Mexican' every third sentence," when in fact the author didn't use it at all, can make you seem crazy.
- Along those same lines, react emotionally, but then critique rationally.
- Finally, always remember rule number one: Compliment them, stupid!
If you can follow these guidlines, then you will be well on your way to drinking haterade responsibly. And that, folks, is enough to preserve the community of artistic endeavorers sitting around the spherical table of artistic endeavor well into the future so that our children will benefit from the same long-endeavoring arts that we do.
Part Four: Jackasses Will Always be With Us
For the fourth and final installment of The Green Porch's Guide to Courteous Critique, I'm expressing my confusion. Is it fashionable to hate apples because they don't taste like oranges? So why do people think it's legitimate to read pulp fiction and then hate on it because it isn't teen romance?
And has anyone noticed hate-nastics often include all the same buzz phrases? Are these auditions for The Next American Jerk-A? Look, I get it. It's easier to sound smart when criticizing something than when praising it. Every monkey loves his banana. But to describe it as thick-skinned, moldy and lacking pungency makes me sound like one cool gorilla.
That's why part four of the guide is about ignoring the inevitably erroneous critiques when we get them. Ignore them, they won't go away.
What was it Jesus said about the poor? That they will always be with us. This wasn't intended to let us of the hook when it comes to caring for them, but it was meant to help us prioritize. If Jesus were writing this post he would tell everyone that jackasses will always be with us.
That doesn't mean we shouldn't do anything about de-jackassing them, but that we should de-prioritize them.
If someone offering critique has failed to follow steps one, two and three of this guide, then they are either a struggling jackass or a hopeless one. Either way, their comments will be tainted by their own mental and emotional instabilities. While there might be useful information, it will undoubtedly be sleazed over.
So as an artist, do yourself a favor, and just ignore it. Find the same critique in more lucid and helpful manner elsewhere. Yes, I'm telling you to throw the baby out with the bathwater. 'Cause this baby ain't right. Jerks will always be with us. You better learn to ignore them now.
RedneckGranola (aka David Mark Brown) writes Reeferpunk (a Weird-West Diesel-Punk mash-up) novels and short stories under the clear skies of Montana. His first two novels Fistful of Reefer and The Austin Job are available from www.Amazon.com now! You can read more about Reeferpunk here: www.reeferpunk.com and more about the man, the myth and the legend here: www.thegreenporch.com 
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