wherein one reader takes issue with the idea that Sasuke's actions might, just possibly, be wrong

[edenfalling]

I love ff.net. It is the gift that never stops giving... particularly in Naruto. I mean, I get occasional weird comments on practically everything, but the proportion of character partisans, canon police, people who did not actually read the story, and other types of oddity is noticeably higher in that fandom compared to my others. For example, one "review" of What Isn't Broken (Can Still Be Fixed):

-------------------
>
> These types of stories are very challenging (Sasuke returned to the Village), especially so with many secrets out of the bag. Even more challenging is to make them Believable.
>
> Now, most readers already have in mind when they begin to read these stories is this: Sasuke was wrong, and petty for avenging his family. He is a ice cold, selfish b***. He shouldn't have left Konoha to begin with. Naruto (And Sakura) is right.
>
> I am going to tell you now, I am NOT one of those people. There is a lot more depth to his leaving then many Naruto fans want to believe. It is utterly annoying when Authors just sum up Sasuke Uchiha's character with three words or less (Selfish, B***, Cold hearted, etc.).
>
> I am one of the few people who can actually see the logic in Sasuke's choices. For one, just because most people doesn't have the guts to avenge there dead family doesn't necessarily mean that it is wrong. It is obviously not a healthy choice, but to go so far and to say that it is Wrong, isn't right. When it really comes down to it; how many people can say they stood up for what they believed in, and without backing down once? Yeah, not very many.
>
> Sasuke Uchiha had a goal in life. He had told everyone from the very beginning of that goal, in a voice that said he was going to carry out no matter the damn consequences. From. The. Beginning.
> Everyone knew he wanted to kill his brother, and the reason why. Most ignored it, or didn't give it a second thought (Naruto & Sakura, villagers), while others tried to placate him by helping him improve every now and again (Kakashi). His 'important' people (Though it is only hinted, and even then it is friendship that spawn over the course of 1 to 2 years. Nothing really worth giving up a life goal over, truthfully), are people who never really understood him. If they had, then maybe he wouldn't have felt the need to leave in the first place.
>
> Everyone always just put the blame fully on Sasuke, but that isn't fair at ALL.
>
> My point to this ramble: You pretty much killed this story for me the moment Sasuke stepped out the jail, and was already calling Konoha home. No. Just freaking, NO. To soon, and to damn easy. You want to make this believable and 10x awesome-er? Add depth, and more conflict. Hatred had been what Sasuke Uchiha was all about for years. Do you really think that kind of dark, and murky stuff just goes away? Especially with the power of love (Yes, I can tell your going to likely go there.)
>
> My advice for you: Step in the character shoes before you write a story about redemption without anything clouding your judgment. The argument that Sasuke is wrong, and Naruto is right, Is. Not. Enough. WHY is Sasuke wrong!? WHY is Naruto, right!?
>
> Can you really blame a guy for hating the Village that was behind ripping his family, and later discovered, brother, away from him? Sasuke Uchiha just has the guts to do something about it, while most people will just crawl into a corner and cry about it.
>
> Also, if I was the one writing this story (I am obviously not), but while Naruto was ranting when he first visited, I would have made Sasuke ask this: Why do you automatically assume that you, or anyone else in Konoha, have anything to do with something 'precious' to me? Had it never occurred to any of you, that you aren't?
>
> -------------------

Um. Okay then. Obviously you have FEELINGS about Sasuke. How nice for you. Please do not splash them all over me, as I think they have curdled and gone rancid.

In any case, I replied as follows:

What I take from your extended "review" is that my interpretation of the characters and the events in the manga did not mesh with yours. Here is a piece of advice: If you want a story about Sasuke that fits your exacting personal standards, it would be much more effective to write your own, or perhaps to submit a detailed prompt to a writing meme, than to send angry screeds to people who have somehow failed to read your mind when writing stories that did not have you as their intended audience. I honestly have no idea what you hoped to accomplish with this rant except to make yourself feel righteous and me feel sad and/or ashamed, which, frankly? You failed at. I wrote the story I wanted to write, which is true to my reading of the manga and characters, and I do not care that it failed to please you.

Have a nice life.

--Liz

Because sometimes there is really nothing else you can say.

Comments

[sholio]

... I find myself irrelevantly stuck on the number of asterisks in "B***". Four letters, really? Boat? Barn? Brit?

[edenfalling]

I think -- I am not sure, mind you, but I think -- that the asterisks are an artifact of ff.net censorship bots, which might explain their standarized number even on words that ought to contain more letters.

(Possibly 'butt'? *wry*)

[heliopausa]

That's very intriguing. Currently on my screen, on ffnet, it's spelt out in full, as 'bastard'. (I was once censored by ffnet for referring to Balaam's ass, though.)

[edenfalling]

Huh, you're right -- it shows up as "bastard" on the site itself, but what I received via email was censored. Outlook doesn't censor any of my other email, so I'm pretty sure that's on ff.net's shoulders. Weird. Maybe it's related to the way long reviews get truncated and instead you get the following note: This message has been truncated due to length. To view in full, please visit site.

[sholio]

Oh, that's really interesting! :D I had just assumed the author of the comment was too lazy to type out all the asterisks -- though what edenfalling said about ff.net truncating it makes sense too -- but it's really bizarre that it'd be censored on the site but not in the email. Standard ff.net inconsistent rule application, though, I guess ...

[edenfalling]

What's even weirder than that is that ff.net has an "automatically filter profanity" setting option, which I have turned OFF. And yet they are still censoring the email copies of my reviews!

[krait]

Hahaha, I noticed that, too. Knowing nothing about Naruto, I decided that the missing offensive term was going to be "bard". Because someone frothing at the mouth about bards is hilarious and kinda reminds me of an Oglaf strip. :D

[edenfalling]

*sticks tongue firmly in cheek*

Yes, damn that Sasuke! How dare he have such a resonant voice and such talent with wordplay and such skill with the guitar! Bards are the voice of temptation, the sensuous lure that draws the youth of our nation away from sober and upright pursuits! They must be silenced! SILENCED, I SAY!!!!!

[krait]

Yes, your Honour, I killed the bard! But he kept playing the lute at me and singing an extremely catchy tune; it was completely justified!

[branchandroot]

And this is one of the reasons I do not post on ff.net. The crazy, it is strong there. I love comments as much as the next writer, but /damn/ is it crazy o'clock half the hours of the day over there.

Personally, I hope they have a bile-scorched and wizened life, which is looking like a sure thing so far.

[edenfalling]

I have become more and more disenchanted with ff.net over the years. I mean, I never thought the site was all that and a bag of chips, but it has been the central fic repository for a lot of fandoms for a very long time and as such has a lot of stories never posted anywhere else, and also sometimes I just want to read a gen-ish power fantasy in which overpowered characters beat up a lot of villains, which are much easier to find on ff.net than, say, Dreamwidth or AO3. (Or gen-ish hurt/comfort, because I get bored of porn easily, and while I don't like the way a lot of ff.net leans toward "ewww, slash is icky!!!" it does mean I'm more likely to find emotionally intense gen friendship over there. Smarm, I think, is the old term.)

But yeah, the crazy can get wearing. And also the lack of transparency in mod/admin policy. I have pretty much hit the point where I will continue updating any WIPs I already have posted over there, but I don't feel any urge to post new fic. I'm just too tired.

[lexicology]

Wooow. That's a lot of crazy. Gotta love FF.net.

...Also, it occurred to me, reading this, that the problem with saying things like, "well, at least he stood up for what he believed in and never backed down," is that if someone makes a good and reasonable argument about something, you should back down, for at least the length of time required to consider it fully. Backing down occasionally is kind of among the minimum requirements to interact with humanity in a way that is not sociopathic.

[edenfalling]

Yeah, never backing down, changing your mind, or listening to anyone else is NOT a character trait to admire and hold up as an example. Here's an example of how that works! Let's ignore Sasuke when he A) decides that Naruto's friendship means enough to him that killing Naruto would gain him the Mangekyo Sharingan... and then B) doesn't go through with it, because his teammates have become so important to him that he's not willing to throw them away just on the chance that their deaths will help him kill Itachi. Instead, he will take an option that risks no one but himself.

Now, having successfully not listened to Sasuke, we can talk about how friendship is self-evidently not something for which it is worth giving up a nihilistic and probably suicidal life goal. Right. Death trumps life, every time. How silly of me to think otherwise, and also to think that forgiveness is, you know, a thing that exists instead of an obvious delusion. If I had also failed to listen to Sasuke, I would never have committed such errors. *wry*

I also like how the reader implicitly accuses me of hating Sasuke and calling him an ice-cold bastard. Way to not listen to me, dumbass -- because I never said that in the story. *headdesk*

[lexicology]

I know, right? I always found that story to be incredibly sympathetic to Sasuke. I kind of get the impression that this person just didn't read beyond the first few pages' worth of story, and just sort of decided that you were going to be their straw-author for the day, or something.

[edenfalling]

Apparently TRUE sympathy for Sasuke means I must consider everyone else in the manga as part of a giant conspiracy against him -- anyone remotely associated with Konoha is GUILTY!!! (even if they were, you know, eight years old at the time of the Uchiha massacre and/or would have roundly condemned it had they known) -- and also I must write Sasuke monomaniacally focused on revenge (and yet willing to switch targets from Itachi to Konoha in general? oh my, how can we justify his change in attitude toward the brother whom it was his LIFE GOAL to kill?) and carrying out this revenge in bloody detail with no possibility of reconciliation whatsoever, because anyone who opposes his TRUE AND JUST VENGEANCE is obviously a shallow evil meanie who deserves to die.

Any other interpretation of the manga is evidence of BIAS. And everyone knows that BIAS IS WRONG!!!

No really, trust me, it gets better.

[redwolf]

Wow!

What did these people do before the internets? Bearing in mind that you can pretty much find anything to scratch your itch, including willing victims for the discerning cannibal, why on earth do they troll stuff that they don't like? A belief that the world must bend to their will?

I always default to the perpetrator being stupid teenage girl and it makes me sad when it's more likely to be someone who managed to survive to adulthood without anyone smacking some sense into them.

[edenfalling]

I have no idea why people do stuff like this. I really have no idea why they do so at such length.

I suspect, based on their profile page, that this person is probably fairly young, but yeah, it's depressing to think that many people still think and act this way all through their lives.