There are Strange People...

What the hell is that site coming to?

I haven't been there for...well, a long, long time, and haven't updated for even longer, and when I come back to browse around and see if my defective art is even worth the effort of updating, I notice something on the side of the screen in my review page:

"ABUSE" buttons.

What. The. FUCK. What is wrong with you people? "Abuse", are you kidding me? Jesus. I see the entire site has been pretty much consumed by emotionally volatile teeny-bopper girls, who all seem to have green eyes and long brown hair, and who put more effort into their bio page than their already shitty Young Adult vampire stories, and who all react to my attempts at constructive criticism as such; "omigod id like to see you write a story that has as many reviews as mine you asshole never talk to me again fucker im only 13/14/15/16/whatever leave me alone!!!!!!11!!!!!!!!!". 

Oh, but let's not forget the Poe-reading male quarter of fictionpress (a lonely group indeed, believe me), who either force themselves to write about crime, murder or historical events, or create poetry about girls who've dumped them (or guys). Their bios? All can pretty much be summed up AS: "I read poetry to look smart, but really I'm just a shithead who's brain is in his dick and who has NO TASTE whatsoever in music, as you can see by my extensive list of Linkin Park/Rammstein/Eminem songs that I like...". You know, if Fictionpress is going to add "ABUSE" buttons, I demand that they add a "Remove Account" button, so I can get the hell out of there before things get really bad. 

Seriously, though, there is nothing there that had attracted me to fictionpress in the first place; I'm brought back to that day, maybe...I don't know, a few years ago, when Fictionpress was a pretty fair place; it looked like the bastard brother of FanFiction.net, but I didn't care, because for once there were SMART people who wrote things I could actually READ without puking, which wasn't exactly the case on FanFiction.net. I'd happily go around, reviewing at random...helping the administrators of Fictionpress construct a better environment for authors and readers alike.

But now, in short, all is going to shit. It's becoming uncontrollable and hectic like FanFiction did (and has? I don't know, I haven't been there for years). There are entire forums dedicated to review-hungry writers, starved because their story didn't fit the narrow appetite most of the teenagers who've devoured the site have...which is drama, sex, "slash", and pretty much everything that one could find on FanFiction.net but with original characters. ENTIRE FORUMS, people. 

Don't get me wrong; at first I was sympathetic and even contributed to these forums, but I quickly gave up, because I realized that reviews are similiar to drugs in that you never get enough, and quantity usually replaces quality when the addiction sets in. Nobody is writing to write anymore, at least not in the genre I generally stick to, Young Adult. They're writing to get people to notice them. They're writing to become the Fictionpress version of YouTube's 'lonelygirl15'. I'm seeing this happen right in front of me, and sorry, but I really feel the need to pull out of the whole thing (much like I did with FanFiction.net).

I've been looking around all night for forums on Fictionpress where I can post these thoughts and get some earnest replies, but have found none; no, most every forum is one of the following:

POST HERE AND I'LL/WE'LL REVIEW YOU!!

ROLEPLAYING!

HEY, WHEN IS THAT GUY WHO WROTE TWILIGHT GONNA PUBLISH NEW SHIT?

UMM...I DUNNO, JUST RANDOMLY POST SO I CAN GET SOME CREDENTIAL IN THIS DAMN PLACE

CHEESE!

WHAT DO YOU WRITE ABOUT?

WHAT'S UR FAVORITE MOVIE AND STUFF?

MORE ROLEPLAYING!

SLASHTASTIC STORIES HERE!!

COME HERE AND DESCRIBE IN ELABORATE DETAIL WHAT YOU LOOK LIKE! 

And etc.. I was surfing around in this schlock, mouth agape and swearing to myself, wondering out loud 'Who the hell are these people who are completely ruining the beauty of Fictionpress?', and then I finally gave up. There is no one out there who is looking for criticism, much less criticism to Fictionpress itself; the site is practically reforming itself to suit the egos of the insecure new writers that are registering in waves to post their newest self-pity-ing drawls.

I suppose that the site can be likened to the USA, if you want to get political; a great, wonderful idea, but eventually ruined because too many people want to get their way, and ASAP too. Sometimes (I hate to sound like a Web Fascist, but...) it's just best to keep good things the way they are...but it's too late for Fictionpress. 

And yeah, there are people who are exceptions to the new majority of the site. But those people are just way too hard to find. And the few that are out there rarely update anymore (a big *ahem* to you guys reading this; you know who you are), which could, if I might just throw away all my modesty, include me. Maybe we're all just ready to give up.

So keep your eyes open, people; there might be a certain generation of Fictionpress writers who are ready to throw in the towel and find greener pastures. Thanks for reading ;)

 Alrighty, I posted a new story.

Yeah, I've gone for...what, a few weeks, maybe one, without writing ANYTHING, I believe, and that includes emails, and I'm able to push out (what I believe) is a pretty intelligent little turd that might just turn into full-blown diahrrea. If you'll excuse my metaphor. 

So yeah. Part of the reason for my posting this after an eternity of nothing is to inform my nothing audience that I am still alive and also to let the public know that there is perhaps a new talent on the rise....if the latter is the case, sorry, but I'm going to have to get rid of this livejournal pretty quick. It wouldn't look good on the back flap of the book ;D.

 

I can't write anything at all.

I can't even be one of those authors who write a long, thick NOTHING, just a terrible book that's 400 pages long and can't say anything at all....

...yes, this post is about writing, I can't imagine what else one would assume it would be about judging solely on the title...

Anyway, I'm even having trouble writing now. What's wrong with me? Something out there has to pop up and re-inspire me. I can't get The Grasshoppers going. I can't get Watcher Boy going. Both are equally juvenile ventures. In fact, I'm wondering if maybe I shouldn't just trash the both of them and restart from scratch, writing a new, compelling piece that EVERYONE will want to review, because they will have the high honor of being (dumdadadum!) the FIRST.

In fact, I should do that with every single story that I write. I should make a new account for each, and a new email address, and I will post the story and promptly forget the passwords to all these profiles so no matter how popular my writing gets I will never be able to answer to a single lick of the critic's praise, and likewise I will not be able to correct what the critics criticize.  Why not go through with it? After all, online communities are just that: online. 

It's like how there's a neat little charity going on for the children in, say, Somalia, and you imagine these starving little kids in their paisley burkhas, and yet you STILL walk by that plate because even when part of you really wants to at least throw a fiver in there, the other part is absolutely convinced that what you yourself and what all your contacts are immediately going through and experiencing is, respectively, more important than what some Muslim brat across the world could possibly be bearing. 

What you might be thinking: "Jesus, does this guy actually think this way?"

What I might answer: "No, not conciously."

And maybe you'll think the same to yourself. Because if everyone realized that it is actually impossible to 'feel' for people you have no actual connection to who live in a place you've probably never been, there would be a lot less suffering in this world, and also a lot less money soliciting.

Jesus, why do I write? Honestly, why - do - I - write? 

Seriously, just look at the childish, immature drabble I've written. There's no Mark Twain-esque Americana in my passages, no Garrison Keillor-ish desert dry humor...just the writings of a fool, a retard, an idiot. Even worse: a beginner. Good god, what will I do. 

Oh, I know. I'll comb through my hundred-thousand reviews of gushing praise (THERE'S some humor. Sarcasm to be narrow)...hmm, let's see...what do they all essentially say...ah --

"You're weird" and

"You could be better". 

Thank you my adoring public. Thank you so much. Dirty bastards....ah, but please ignore me...I'm in a bad mood, and my backspace is angry, and I'm tired but I want to finish some books I've been reading instead of doing other things I should be doing right now 

(off subject: wow, tomorrow is Sunday. Sunday in Spanish is 'domingo' [the Spanish don't capitalize their weekdays...or months, for that matter. Spanish is a beautiful language not because it is next to French in its rapid, machine-gun vocabulary, but in the fact that every teenager alive today would be better off using Spanish rather than English. Or at least in my opinion they would. I'd rather see an uncapitalized 'lunes' instead of some dumbass going off on his schedule all 'M0nd4y!!!1'. Cheap little twits.] I should go to a coffee shop and get a nice, creamy  iced chai latte, which, next to "Strawberry-lime Daiquiri", sounds like the gayest drink on the face of the Earth, but it tastes like pumpkin pie I tell you.)

(off subject: cont.: the last time I got an iced chai latte the dumbass high school twit put espresso in it. Espresso! Jesus, I don't even work in a coffe shop, but I know that espresso is rather bitter, and I know that something called 'iced chai latte, in medium please' should certainly NOT be bitter)

, but that's not the point. The point is, why do I have to be stuck in my freshman days? No, in my middle school days? Why can't I mature and appreciate the world that I've had to go through years wasted away by growing up to get into? Why can't I write about the Mississippi River? Or even World War II? Anything other than what I'm compelled to write now.

Maybe some deep thought and extensive reading will help. Or maybe my lovely iced chai latte in medium.

 

I'll be full of myself for a minute and presume that you know me from Fictionpress if you're here. If you do, well then good, my reputation precedes me, and I have completed my first step in rising to fame: Someone actually SEEKING ME OUT. Amazing. This has never happened to me before, reader, and it probably never will again because most people will have choked from reading so much pretentious drabble already. Props on making it so far. By the way, I love you.

But I didn't just say that.

What I should be talking about is a story on my profile known as The Grasshoppers. That's right, I've pretty much forgot about Watcher Boy in place of that piece of crap. But in my honest opinion, Juto is just an older, homosexual Asian version of Benjamin. They're both obsessive. They're both attracted to people who are 'bad for them', i.e. Miss Anorectic for Ben and a track coach known as Sam for Juto. They both have strange friends (though I haven't revealed Juto's friends yet) and both are past-oriented.

Their differences: Juto has a destination, while Ben does not. Juto's obsession with his old track coach, Sam, destroys the chance of new relationships, but Ben's obsession with that certain group of 5th grade girls seems to intensify his surrounding relationships. Ben knows his obsession is strange and wrong, but Juto rarely self-analyzes, being so focused on finding Sam.

Never before have I looked at the characters like that...maybe this journal thing isn't so bad.