The Hater's Dilemma

When I was about 12, my mother made a bet with me. If I could go an entire month without going on a tirade of criticizing someone, something, or some group, she’d give me $200. We didn’t have much money then, so she must’ve been pretty confident in her side of the bet. Or maybe she just thought that, on the off chance I kept it, the $200 was worth it to try and curb my hater tendencies. I didn’t last more than a few days.

Critique was one of the only tools that (I thought) I had. We expect teenagers to have this angsty attitude. It’s kind of what they’re known for. Yes, it’s hormones, yes, it’s a lack of knowing, but more prevalent is their relative powerlessness. Critique becomes leverage. It is a way to claw back some agency in a world where adults control things. Teenagers have a mini-adult mind in a big-child’s body; it’s a frustrating and humiliating experience. (Ya know, besides the free rent.)

The issue is that many of us retain this “gift” of critique well past our teen years. Overthinkers, sideline activists, philosophers-without-action…we tend to radiate a strange, stuck energy. Think the neckbeard know-it-all who is too smart for his situation in life and resents everyone around him because of it, but is too cowardly to change it. Or the bitter friend who thanklessly offers unsolicited feedback each time you show her a glimmer of hope about a new project - interestingly enough, she’s never done anything out of the ordinary, yet is an expert on why your thing cannot, will not, and should not work. All of us have these tendencies, some more than others.

People who believe that they are otherwise powerless or don’t want to risk the vulnerability that comes along with giving a damn about something, regress to an immature framework of viewing the world. A big-child’s brain in an adult-adult’s body. This humiliating “stuck” that accompanies this is not always apparent to the hater. They may tweak many superficial things without realizing that their real potential and growth would be found in falling, scraping their knees, and creating something imperfect.

For the ego, it feels instinctively comfortable to critique. You get to feel smart and important with little to no effort. The “well, acksh-ually”s and “I don’t know how I feel about…”s let you keep your hands clean. You commit to nothing. Why join an ideology when you can posture above them all? Why organize when you can point out how corrupt the groups are or explain how nothing will change without X, Y, and Z moonshots that will likely never happen anyway?

There is merit in critique. Many times, the critic sees what the zealot cannot. The critic serves a purpose, especially in an era where social algorithms reward ideological extremity and social justice movements get flattened into brand aesthetics.

But constant critique, compulsive contrarianism, and nuance-as-avoidance are not discernment. It’s fear. It’s what happens when the desire for control gets stuck in neutral. It’s not just childish. It’s a blatant refusal to grow up.

So I’m making another bet with myself.

Not to stop critiquing, but to risk doing.