The Beast and I

Ana,

Sooo....its okay if Zeeshan can be ``honest`` about his feelings on other writers` work, but other writers cannot be ``honest`` about their feelings towards his work?

A double standard, dont you think?

I`ll tell you what offended me about Zeeshan`s ``criticisms``, which to me are not fueled by valid observations about the piece, but his own agenda - which I`ve seen him posting on various articles, and all his posts sound noxiously the same. It`s as if he has four or five core statements which he repeats whether the piece is a personal narrative, a fictional story, or whatever.

Anyway, he says:

I wish my ignorance was limited because I haven’t a clue about your gender.

It does reek of this “sentimental” feminity which is mostly a good thing for a female readership and last I checked my testicles were intact.

What the hell does Jawahara`s gender have to do with the merits of the piece? Next he`s going to say all women suffer from ``hysteria`` and should be on Freud`s couch. This is the kind of chauvinism and bias that women writers have had to contend with for centuries. As if women`s writing is inferior to men`s, in content, theme, and tone. If a man wrote this piece would he have so many objections to it? Plainly put, I think he is a misogynist and thinks writing by women is by default of poorer quality than men`s.

You know your way around a trope or two but in some places you just overdo.

That’s what I leave your story with. Overcooked with undernourished metaphors.

Sorry, but what exactly does this mean? Fancy phrases but no examples to back up his point and no suggestions of how to improve. This suggests that he doesn`t really know what he`s talking about, just wanted to say something impressive and not be accountable for it.

Fine, he thinks the narrator is lazy (``lazy cop-out``... ``seductive/seduction`` .. (more like a lazy one)...`` etc. etc.). He accuses her of being emotionally manipulative and influenced by bad erotica. These opinions, although harsh, are his right to assert. But to end his post with ``Stay tuned for the story I wrote a year ago but will be up here soon and you get even over there if you want vengeance.`` suggests to me that Mr. Mahmud takes this all personally... very personally. If he is here to compete and tear down others` writing to prove his own superiority, it`s a poor trick, very tiresome, much more than the old trick of setting an Interact board alight.

He can stay and continue to waste our time with his poorly-thought-out criticism, but posting links to the author`s photograph and calling her ugly is an immature stunt. We got rid of 12-Head for doing the same all across the boards. Looks like Mr. Mahmud is trying to take his place.

what you write is fair game, what you look like is not. jawahara didn`t put her pic up here, zeeshan obviously went looking for it, to me that crosses a line.

the end.

shandana

Farzana, I see your point and so, I do apologize if any of the people who liked my piece felt discounted by my interaction (for lack of a better word) with Zeeshan. Yes, I did take his bait and maybe shouldn`t have done so. Oh well!

I also do not think he should be banned from the board or be censored. He has his opinions and chooses to express them in the way he does. I can learn to skip past his comments and not respond to his obvious flame-baiting.

That`s all on this topic from me.

I will email you, Farzana.

Thanks everyone for your interactions on this story. If there is a next time from me, I promise not to let the interactions be hijacked.

So by being here, Zeeshan, whose ugly stick are you sucking?

Oh right.

All I made fun of was her looks because I was bored with her saying the same thing three times. Christ...there oughta be a law against boring people.

Bad prose and cliched metaphors are what they are. Calling it an accquired taste is just hiding from the real problem. I dunno, it`s easier to ignore anyone who`s louder. The volume does not change the content, it`s only our ears.

I said it before and it still makes sense. You cannot tell someone they`re minisnakeywakey is popping out their shorts and say it in a such a way that they`ll hug you and kiss your brow.

I`m not quite sure what is so difficult to comprehend about ``those who promote shit should be discouraged`` because that`s what it is. Sure crappier stuff will always have a larger audience. Crappier things with lesser intelligence will always always sell more whether it`s film or prose. But doesn`t mean the intelligent people should support crap. As I see it, chowk is not a place to think freely more than a place to suck each other`s ugly sticks. I refuse to lie or be nice when my intelligence is insulted by crap and craplovers who take themselves far too seriously. I`ve never understood why I should not expect the same level of quality from an adult who is pakistani who comes to the english language after his own native one rather than an American or an Englishman. Good work is good. It doesn`t mean if it`s a paper in Kala Shah Kaku or one in...hell...Glasgow. Crap is crap. Just because a Pakistani (or whoever) wrote it, he/she isn`t going to win brownie points from me because we were born under the same timezone.

Obviously me being the villain nobody will take anything I say seriously and they`d rather call Jawalalababakaka`s writing ``an accquired taste`` than a nest of cliches and several fart-like metaphors. I still stand by a few well written lines in there though, I`m not going to become two-faced just because Jawalalakakababama pissed me off, then proceeded to bore me.

Ah well...who cares.

God Bless You Mr. Godot.

Jawahara:

On a different note...you said you had put yourself out there knowing that some would like your piece and some would not. A creative effort is bound to be interpreted differently, and you well know that. Which is why you did not get into a discussion or sit to explain, as over-explanation can sometimes kill a piece. Fair enough. However, you have engaged in a non-literary argument with one interactor, and you say your reason for doing so is that he has not been too kind to your readers. I liked your piece, and what a third person has to say about my likes and dislikes does not bother me unduly. Besides, I think the readers can defend themselves (if such defence is needed at all) and by making an issue of it, the readers might in fact feel reduced. For, if there is anyone you should be talking to, it is us.

There are people here who need to prove their `difference` to draw attention. You need not have expended so much energy there. Had this been a political article or something on a contemporary social issue, then I can understand as the ramifications are entirely diffrent.

As regards the particualr personal attack, take it from someone who has been there and got it in ample measure, it is not worth noticing. If you are secure about your special readers and your creativity, then you should know that the writing on the wall is not what you assume to see. Really.

(I would like to get in touch with you. Could you email me at farzanavee@yahoo.com ?)

godot: Stop being flippant...it also ends up sounding patronising.

ummm....errrr....i know i`m supposed to be on vacation from chowk, but i think this whole argument has drawn out long enough.

can we all remember what this board is about...can we remember why writers put their stuff here out on chowk? it is for feedback on the work itself and not personal attacks against those who write, and those who happen to like what is written?

i don`t think zeeshan should be booted off this board, because he expresses an opinion. i don`t particularly care for the way he expresses it at times, but guess what folks. . .this has been going on long before zeeshan entered the picture. a particular piece not being one person`s cup of tea does not mean that personal attacks should be made against the person who wrote it...or the people who do like it. but again, some of us know bloody well that this has been going on for a long time.

zeeshan, it would have been good for you to just read what jawahara said in #19, and move on. . .she acknowledged that some of your criticisms may have been valid, no matter how you put them. i`m trying to recall a conversation you and i had about constructive criticism. you made your remarks in the beginning, and it was clear how you felt. i don`t quite understand why this needed to be dragged out.
and if you had actually come on my board and told me that you didn`t like what i wrote. . .i would have thanked you for you opinion and moved on. . .we all write differently about different subjects. no one says here that you have to love this piece, and obviously you don`t. i see your need to be honest (or arrogant, according to some), but no...you do not have to be cruel in order to critique. and if others like this piece, there`s no need to reduce us to sheep. i can assure you that some of us would not be putting those people down who happen to like your work, because everyone`s tastes are different. which is why `crap` gets to exist right next to great pieces of work in bookstores.

as for the rest of you. . you know you can choose to ignore his posts and move on, we `ve been down this road before, many times, with other interactors. but i think you need to think seriously about this urge to boot someone who expresses an honest opinion, even if he doesn`t express it in the most mature of ways. if zeeshan is a threat here, so are the rest of us. and if any of you don`t like what i`ve said, that`s fine. . .but please, when 85-90 % of a fiction board is all about personal attacks and defending each other rather than talking about the piece at hand, something is really wrong, and it`s really pathetic. this board was about `the beast and i`. . .nothing else.

thank you for reading, and please don`t bother responding to me. i`m back on hiatus from chowk, and will not interact any further.
regards
ana~

oops just to clarify...when I said post # 45 was cheap didn`t mean shandana`s, but zeeshan`s which seems to have made a comeback as # 51...

Fascists.

Now if what you were really saying was true, I`d post another ``defensive`` post here.



Whatever then now I`m bored and you can twist any meaning, satisfy any assumption out of anything. I am defending nothing. To a certain extent one has to give to a damn. You on the other hand, posted the same thing three times. Your second post being the same as the first one.



But after all...



When you look like this...



[SOME MATERIAL DELETED - InterActor Advised to refrain from personal attacks - Chowk Staff]


Heh heh G`night.

Jaya -

I, for one, think you are very pretty...also quite sensitive...but I see the beast has turned you into a very strong person...hai! how I wish I was also a fiction writer...!!!


Zeeshan -

Thanks for the pics, man! It helps tremendously to put a face to a name! Just for that, I vote for you to stay...!

I love applause.

Oh Zeeshan, how pathetically pedestrian of you. I am even less impressed with you than I was before which was something I didn`t think was possible. *yawn*


Since you didn`t seem to be getting what I was saying I had to repeat it...dumb it down, whatever.

#45

that was really cheap...

I second and third that.