I used to be a snotty little bastard.*

A song would come on the radio and I’d immediately identify everything wrong with it: “The mix is terrible.” “The bass sounds like my nephew farting.” “The compression feels like a baby drill sergeant is having karaoke night in my left ear.” “Really? Another song about making it rain up in da club?” “This is retarded.”

Then it was on to the artist: “Nippleback really need to stop making music.” “Remember when Katy Perry was good? Neither do I. She needs to stop making music forever.” 

It always ends with some variation of, “[so and so] needs to stop making music.” This is what a critic does, because the critic is a coward.

The critic is a coward because he does not create. He does not participate. In the arena of creative sport, he is a bystander: feckless and incapable or too afraid to enter the playing field himself. The critic is a coward. He is the impotent bastard child of self-doubt and arrogance, frustrated by his own failings and driven mad with envy by the unworthy success of another. I am the critic. We need less of me.

Tumblr is full of critics. Well, critics and curators. Curators are people who compile a buncha shit they didn’t create and put it together as if the compilation itself was a creation. Curators love to quote famous people. Curators reblog pictures of Karl Lagerfeld and Tyler the Creator and Ninja Turtle Noses as discoveries that represent their true selves. Collecting items for show-and-tell is not creation, it is curation. If not for HTML, curators would be pasting magazine cutouts on poster board to hang on bedroom walls - desiring piggish squeals and seal claps for their exquisite taste and classiness. High brows and raised pinkies to white poster board and paste. We need less of these.

What we lack are creators; Pros unfazed by critics and oblivious to reblogs and Like buttons and retweets. Creators with integrity and work ethic and talent. People who create because they have to; not for youtube views or passive income, but just because. People who find an empty space and fill it: something out of nothing. Writers who pen originals and musicians who do the same. Artists unafraid to share because their inner critic is stronger than the ones outside. These are the brave ones. Because when the dust settles, the creator leaves behind something of substance. The critic’s opinions die with him.

Creation is forever. I wrote it. I sang it. I drew it. Nothing can ever change that, and no goliath of snarky criticism can ever wipe it off the face of forever. It won’t always be great, but at the very least, it’s original. 

I guess what I’m trying to say is: create something. Be brave. Have no fear of judgment, because once you’ve created it, you’ve won. You’ve conquered the fear your critics could not. The fear will always be there, but the creators fight with courage, daily.  So, write your stories, sing your songs, snap your pictures. Be You. If they hate it, challenge them. Challenge them to participate and watch them wither like daisies.

Be You, and don’t let the critical misanthropes like me keep you down.    

*By “used to” I mean “am” and by “little” I mean “fat.”