Who Critiques These Critics?

   

Adventures In Wienerland!

     

    Yesterday, I logged into my Yelp account for the first time since 2015. I had really only opened the account at the pleading of my then esthitician. She begged me to leave a review and promised a 25% discount if I did! I'd been seeing her for a procedure with the almost playful sounding name of dermarolling. A procedure that is, in reality, allowing someone to aerate your face for 30 minutes. Figuring as I was already inviting her to cause me suffering (all in the hopes of increasing collagen production mind you), I thought it might be in my best interest to keep on her good side.

    The review never mentioned how she tried to up-sell me on services and products I didn't want, lied to me about my results, or how I caught her talking about me behind my back one day when I arrived early. That all happened after the review was safely secured online. I'm sure she was confident, as many business owners are, that I wouldn't dare to amend my words. She's right, to this day I haven't, it just doesn't seem worth making an enemy out of her.

    I couldn't help but notice that Yelp is now (or may have always been) set up so that you can acquire friends and create a social network through it. The need to make everything a social club seems very high-school to me (a place I don't remember fondly). I don't doubt that cliques of Yelp "friends" band together to leave hostile reviews for a place, all because one member of their alliance got bad service. On the contrary, I imagine there are plenty of businesses that have received an undeserved boost because a certain gaggle of Yelpers were chummy with the owner.

    I really don't post reviews myself. It's always seemed to me that the people who post reviews are usually just the people with an axe to grind. If I'd listened to "Rate My Professor" when I was at SDSU, I'd have assumed every female teacher was a "Marxist, feminazi manhater" and every male was a "nasty pervert, who only gives A's to hot, 19-year-old tramps that put out." Instead, I realized that most of these were written in anger by students who didn't do as well as they'd hoped and needed to find someone to pin the blame on.

     Indeed, many of the reviews for businesses I patronize seemed unnecessarily cruel. 

    Of my favorite taco shop, Mrs. Taco, one reviewer wrote, "The food is cheap and greasy"

    Yeah, it's a taco shop, not a Michelin starred restaurant. I smite your paltry review with five, magnificent stars!

    Of the Mackinaw City icon, Wienerlicious, I spied a one star comment that read, "I had to wait in line for almost twenty minutes"

    Really? Talk to the guy three people ahead of you, the one who was ordering lunch for his entire office and couldn't be bothered to phone in. I bestow five hot and juicy stars upon Wienerlicious to smother your negativity, sir!

    I left 5 star comments on both of these establishments via Yelp, along with photos. I shared my own honest, positive experiences. I even made a video on TikTok for Wienerlicious!

 

 

 

    As a podcaster and audiodrama producer, I must admit that almost all my reviews have been achieved via extortion. It's common practice in the industry. I petition another podcast to give me a review and in exchange I'll review their show. Obviously, neither one of us is going to risk leaving a nasty review because we don't want it returned in kind. Bonus points if you dangle having them on as a guest in their face. It's the culture of reciprocity in action.

    I really haven't had many negative comments, only an overly invested "fan" who tried to break me with constant criticism and insults in messenger. I WISH she had left her nastygrams in the comments section actually! The engagement would have been worth its weight in gold! Given the prevalence of the comment for comment practice I mentioned before, you really haven't made it until someone takes a hot, steaming dump on your show. It piques people's interest, "just how bad can it be?"

(I wrote a 17 page post about my "fan" here, should you be interested or find yourself tending to a particularly long bathroom visit.)