In Life, Never Read Below the Line

Why I’m taking an extended break from print journalism

Photo by Flipboard on Unsplash

I’ve long been adept at avoiding any kind of malicious criticism, which considering my line of work, is a great fortune. Many of my peers have been psychologically poisoned long-term by things people have written about them. Words which if the internet didn’t exist, would have never touched their eyes.

Unlike lots of journalists I know, I don’t read any online comments under my work. In truth, I don’t read my words in print at all. What’s the point? It’s done, I’m not ashamed of myself or my choices, I like my own writing and I’m very well aware that other people’s opinions of me aren’t my business. If a clickbaity headline or pull quote that I never said is added to the piece, I’d prefer not to know about it. I certainly don’t seek spite out elsewhere and I snap the laptop shut the second I happen upon a hint of it. I don’t want to read incivility masked as feedback when it’s targeted at any woman, because every word feeds the beast.

But that doesn’t mean I don’t know it’s there. We all know it’s there.

Perhaps a line needs to be drawn between the different kinds of work I do. There is a sense that public criticism is the cost of doing business when you use your public profile to make money. Practically speaking, that is obviously true. Whether or not posting a video of myself making a wooden frame deserves vitriol... well. You make your own call on that one.

But when I work as a journalist or get featured in print journalism, the idea that either as a person or as a writer I’m fair game for hundreds of uncivil and insulting missives just doesn’t fly. Often, I earn precisely zero pounds for these pieces (and even when I do profit financially, it’s often less than the childcare cost to write it). These articles contribute nearly nothing to my career. I gain no new ‘followers’, get my name in front of very few new faces. The only real advantage and why I’ve continued to do it is that it demonstrates I can still cut it in my first professional field. This is for my ego entirely and as someone who has worked for themselves for 11 years, I likely need to get a grip. Who gives a shit if I’m still getting bylines? If the only answer is 27-year-old me, I need a self-shake. After all, we’re all allowed to outgrow the goals we set ourselves when we had something to prove.

I was recently interviewed for a piece in a broadsheet. It’s not my first rodeo, but I hadn’t realised that the entire article would be about me. It was hard to find the time to answer all the questions the journalist sent, I had way too much on my plate, but I said yes, because well, I say yes to lots of things. In no way was the piece a misrepresentation of what I said, nor do I feel embarrassed, full of regret or annoyed at the journalist. I just really didn’t need to be a part of this piece in that particular newspaper, because it was red meat thrown to the crowd.