Nick's Random Gibberish (11) : Are We Inherently Attracted to Negativity?

Nick's Random Gibberish is a weekly post here at Nick's Book Blog where I, Nick, will talk about random topics from personal posts to discussion posts.

Today I thought it would be a good idea to talk about the ugly side of blogging. Before I get started, please know that this is my personal opinion and I'm in no way trying to attack anyone. These are just things that I have observed throughout my 3 years as a blogger and I'm also genuinely curious about everyone else thinks. 

One thing that I have noticed is how my negative reviews usually get more views than my positive ones. I've also noticed a similar trend on my Goodreads reviews. My negative reviews always have a ton more likes than my positive reviews. Even if you take a look around a book's Goodreads page, 90% of the time, the top review, that is the most liked review, is usually a negative review. That makes me a little sad, especially when it comes to my own reviews. I put a lot more effort into my raving reviews because it's so much harder to write a positive review, at least for me. So to see my lousy ones get more likes upsets me a little bit. Plus, part of me is disheartened because there are many times when I actually want people to check out a book, and leaving a negative review makes me feel like people won't want to try a book out because of me. I personally don't have anything against negative reviews, but my observations have led me to conclude that the blogging community, in general, is attracted to negativity. 

Which brings me to my second point : the drama llama. If you're on Twitter, then you know that there's some new drama popping up on a weekly basis and the subsequent dragging of the drama for DAYS. There's always something stupid going on and people are always drawn to these situations like moths to a flame. It's almost as if a lot of us thrive on the negativity that is drama. I was having a conversation with a friend a few days ago about how much the blogging community has changed over the years. When we both started blogging, there was never so much drama. There was never this tension between authors and bloggers or between bloggers. We used to be a happy and cheerful community where everyone respected each other and the primary purpose was to share your thoughts on books. It's no longer that same community anymore. It was expected with the way blogging expanded, but at the same time, part of me believes that this negativity could have been avoided and can still be avoided. What I personally do is simply not take part in the drama and not add fuel to the fire. When I see something going on, I vent about it to friends in private, but don't personally approach it. It's easy to get lost in that sphere of negativity. Trust me, I've been there and getting out is HARD. I also feel like we get offended REALLY easily and that just worsens situations that could have been tamed. There are always going to be people doing something stupid, we just need to try not to take things personally so as to be happier members of this community, in my opinion.

We as individuals need to re-evaluate our role in this community and think about how we can make it a much peaceful community that sticks together and deals with whatever drama that comes in a smart way, not an impulsive way. We also need to think about how there are two sides to every story and not attack one person without knowing the complete story. My friend Jeann at Happy Indulgence wrote a wonderful post titled : Spread Love Not War, that you all should check out. Maybe, it will be inspire you like it did me. Let's all learn to love, respect and avoid being such a negative community. 

How are some ways you try to spread positivity in the blogging community? What are your thoughts on what I had to say? Please feel free to be as honest as you want in the comments below.