the moment i started actually writing fics, i stopped worrying about my own “pet peeves”

ive recently seen an uptick in social media posts that encourage people to share what they dont like seeing in fics, and i cant help but wonder if some of these people have at least tried to write fics for themselves.

please dont get me twisted, it is ABSOLUTELY valid to have preferences and to dislike anything, that is well within your right. but it genuinely makes me sad when there’s some form of discourse over a rather silly pet peeve (non grammatical, subjective), and i see authors replying saying that they will no longer write in that way. i had my own share of pet peeves wheni was exclusively a reader, but now it just seems trivial to mention any of them/use extremely negative language talking about it. just seeing the amount of effort that goes into writing a single chapter, i cant find it in myself to bash on elements of a persons writing when i dont know where they are in their journey as a creative. like i saw somebody go on a very heated rant about how they hate when the main character has a pet??? its just a very particular hill to die on.

im all for concrit, but i feel like we lose the constructive part of that as soon as we use words such as “hate” or talk about these works as if theyre a stain on this site. ig i just feel for the newer writers that are still figuring themselves out and are just writing to have fun. there are people behind these stories, at the end of the day. maybe im just being soft.