Filed by Lance at 9:04 pm under Fightin' Words, General, Love, The Arts

What’s the value of a critic?

What’s the value of criticism?

They’re two completely separate things.

Criticism is love. It makes us better, and makes us step up into our own potential. Criticism is hard, because it means that who we are or what we have accomplished is incomplete and ineffective. Criticism is necessary, because it makes us evaluate, change, and grow.

Isn’t that the same thing as a critic?

No, I don’t think so. Anybody who wears the badge of “critic” isn’t really out to make things better. It’s the job of a critic to make things simple.

If someone capable of criticism is with us when we create, when we interact, or when we just are, they recognize what’s going on, and focus on what we need to do better.

A critic is on the outside, and takes all of the nuance and effort that goes into just about anything we do, and makes it into something simple. “Recommended.” “Two Thumbs Down.” “Good.” “Terrible.” “Divine.” None of these descriptions understand what is actually happening, or seek to understand what’s happening. A critic makes all of the work to be done and all of the subtleties of what’s in front of them simple, easily digestible. A critic might use an entire newspaper column to do it, but all a critic does is make an incredibly complex event palatable for you, the uninitiated, who might think something incorrect about whatever it is the critic has reviewed.

I’ve never found critics in newspapers or blogs (or whatever) very useful. All critics do is take what they see, and tell you what they think it is. Criticism and its messengers, on the other hand, are essential: these are the people in my life who care about me enough to understand, and then tell me what needs to change and — more importantly — why.