Well, Fuck.
Self-censorship is the cancer of writing.
“Yikes, language.”
Shashi Sastry, in response to Fuck Publications (on Medium).
For fuck’s sake, let's stop all the shitty self-censored articles on this site, acting like we’re going to be the next Hemingway or that some organization is going to dig up each one of our writings in search of a minuscule mistake. This shit-show of a website has plenty of flaws, but it also has more than its fair share of tolerance regarding freedom of speech. If this weren’t the case, I would have certainly been banned by now (ever read any of my fiction?).
Unless you are already a big name, then you really don’t need to be concerned with notoriety, at least not in the negative sense, and certainly not from your writings on this site. Perhaps you might make it big! I am willing to bet that you won’t. This does not mean that you are worth any less than the big names of this website (or culture in general). This means that you have been awarded the freedom of a perfectly normal, anonymous, insignificant existence.
Censorship is born from a wide variety of sources: fear, a lack of confidence, and a need to fit in or meet a particular norm. If you wish to submit to a particular publication (whether an internal publication or external source), then you will likely have to shape your own writing to fit whatever stupid guidelines have been set in place by an editor who has no place molesting your material. Want some fun? Check out the qualifications of the editor reviewing your work, think critically, then pause to compare it to your own. How does it shape up? Probably not well.
Knowledge of the editorial process is paramount for writers. Editors have a job, just like you and I. They got into editing because it is what they (hopefully) enjoy. Unfortunately, editing someone else’s work comes hand-in-hand with a false sense of power. It is far too easy for editors to develop the sense that they need to find something wrong with your writing. I know this because I’ve been in their shoes. Criticizing one’s work is far easier than providing praise. Not to mention it pays far better.
You don’t have to take my advice. Hell, I am as much of a nobody as you. I have no expertise, no large qualifications, or literary achievements. I earn little to nothing from my writing, and my writing itself is powered by nothing but an internal sense of joy.
I have nothing to lose, and neither do you.
Take my advice or leave it. If you find my writing to be worth a grain of salt (is that the expression?) then know this: there is no one stopping your writing from being published, but you.
