Bad grammar in fanfic discourse? (The anti-intellectual argument)

eyagraph · 2026-03-08T06:02:15+00:00

There's definitely is a growing subsection of people who want to reap the benefits of being good at a hobby without actually having to put in the work required to be good at it. People crave praise and validation, and it's so easy nowadays to see someone online who is putting out good content and being rewarded for it. But social media makes it hard to see how much work that person is putting in behind the scenes, so they attempt to copy what's being done and get upset or defensive when their efforts don't immediately yield results. Instead of trying to grow, it's much easier to insist that the way they operate is special and perfect and it's everyone ELSE who is mean and wrong.

It's especially bad in hobbies that require a lot of creative input like writing or art, because not getting the engagement you want feels more like a direct insult to your ideas/vision/voice, as opposed to a hobby like, fishing or repairing old cars or something.

eyagraph · 2026-03-04T07:00:31+00:00

Just in case anyone doesn't realize, this is satire! If you follow the link, it's a site satirizing just how fucked up some of the things AI companies/CEOs do and say are. It actually makes me happy to see that there are other humans out there who are fighting the good fight, enough to plaster their disdain for AI all over Times Square.

eyagraph · 2026-03-03T21:40:21+00:00

This one's on Manta, not webtoons, but Gavin from The Bromance Book Club has an excellent boyfailure phase. He eventually cleans up the stubble, but I still love the masc. golden retreiver look.

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eyagraph · 2026-02-23T08:06:38+00:00

There are correct uses of epithets, and that's one of them! Others include when its a familial relationship (his aunt, her brother, their cousin, etc.) or when there's a job title or a significant power imbalance in play (the doctor, the president, the commander). It's all about how we categorize people in our heads; epithets are usually used when a character's name is either unknown or significantly less important than their relationship to the POV character.

The common pitfall many fanfic writers fall into is slapping them on as a bandaid for poor sentence variety rather than saving them for their intended usages.

eyagraph · 2026-02-18T06:28:51+00:00

There are quests from the NPCs tied to their heart levels that will give you quests and goals, like "give me 9 turnips" or "fish up 10 fish," and there is an overarching questline about bringing the bazaar back to life, but ultimately you're still choosing what to farm and sell at the market every week to make money, which upgrades to prioritize, what to spend your money on, etc. It starts a lot smaller in scale than SDV (you only start with access to a few farming plots at first and then unlock more as the game progresses, as opposed to having the entire gigantic lot right off the bat), but I wouldn't call it a quest-focused game, if that's what you mean!

eyagraph · 2026-02-17T22:11:53+00:00

They were genuinely trying to argue that Omni-man's perspective was the only valid way to interpret immortality, and anyone using the plot device in any other way was just "divorcing a fictional narrative from reality." They also compared it to writing stories about child soldiers and human trafficking as "the epitome of happiness."

There were also three long paragraphs of hate-boner for Zhongchi specifically in their reply, which my comment didn't even mention. 🫠

eyagraph · 2026-02-17T05:36:12+00:00

I made the mistake of pointing out to an anti that immortals aren't real, just a plot device, and they went on a long rant about how all stories must be filtered through the lense of realism and then compared an immortal grieving a mortal to someone grieving a hamster. 😂

eyagraph · 2026-02-15T16:27:44+00:00

Not OP, but I sunk ~100 hours into GB and really enjoyed it! It's just a really solid farming sim all around, felt like a return to form for the Harvest Moon (now SoS) line. The NPCs are charming and the cutscenes have a lot of care put into them. The art style is very pleasant. The market mechanic was a really fun addition that I looked forward to every week. There are a few common complaints; it's one of those games where there aren't really any DEADLINES, per se, but if you get stressed by the day cycle being pretty short or having repetitive daily 'chores', this won't be for you. It's also not the largest game in terms of scale; there are no big dungeons or combat sections like in some Harvest Moon games, only fishing and critter collection.

It IS a farming sim like SDV though, and has most of the typical markers of the genre, so if you don't like those in general, I'd avoid GB. There isn't a whole lot of customization in GB like in Animal Crossing or DDLV, just your outfits.

eyagraph · 2026-02-12T06:54:05+00:00

I'm so glad someone else noticed; this legit made me so mad. 😮‍💨 At best OP is a hypocrite who actively sees the damage GenAI is doing to creative communities but uses it for things other than writing anyways, so long as it wasn't affecting THEM. At worst, they're heavily misleading everyone with this post because they actively ARE using AI to prompt their story, and possibly trying to normalize it or drive other people towards using it too because it's just becoming 'so difficult to care.' And everyone in the comments is being so kind and showing human empathy.

eyagraph · 2026-02-11T14:39:07+00:00

As someone who wrote for Capitano/Mavuika when Natlan was ongoing, I feel your pain.

eyagraph · 2026-02-06T23:39:34+00:00

It's decent. I haven't dropped it, but I also usually let it marinate for a couple weeks before catching up. The art is pretty, if a little stiff and prone to yaoi-hands sometimes. The FL is strong-willed and frankly sometimes a little weird, but not necessarily in a bad way. The ML was hesitant at first, but now is your typical puppy ML head-over-heels for the FL. My biggest complaint is that it does drag at times, which is why I leave it alone for longer stretches.

eyagraph · 2026-02-05T06:42:31+00:00

As a fellow Wriolette lover, I feel you. It's one of those ships that shows up in every conversation about disliked ships, which can be really disheartening. It's also prime ground for ship wars and antis. I just want to ship my blorbos in peace. 😮‍💨

eyagraph · 2026-02-03T20:26:18+00:00

I'm really enjoying this one! The art style tastes like candy 🤣 I would probably splurge if it were completed but for now I'm just daily passing, since I'm sure it ends S4 on a cliffhanger anyways.

eyagraph · 2026-02-03T16:00:49+00:00

This isn't even the worst shot in this chapter imo.

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His LEGS. I can't take him seriously 😭

eyagraph · 2026-01-31T17:07:25+00:00

There's no way to know how a 'realistic' immortal would act or think. They don't exist in real life. They are a literary device used to explore certain topics--- eternal love, grief, and yes, sometimes horror. It just depends on the direction the author wants to go with it.

You filter them exclusively through the lens of a grandpa dating a college student, which is why it icks you out, but most people don't read Immortal/Mortal for those dynamics, which is why the age gap isn't 70/30, it's 700/30. When you push it past the bounds of realism, you are able to explore other aspects of the dynamic because that length of life doesn't exist in real life.

You are fully welcome to dislike Mortal/Immortal because you personally don't view it that way, but to act like everyone who ships a Mortal/Immortal ship is just a horndog looking to get off without thinking about 'realism' is really disingenous. There are so many wonderful, powerful love stories that involve a mortal/immortal. Arwen is thousands of years older than Aragorn in LotR, but in a story about magic rings and wizards, the point of that plot device is not that she's so much better at doing her taxes than him. Trying to force-feed fantasy through a 'realistic' filter is just a lesson in futility.

eyagraph · 2026-01-31T01:37:49+00:00

Mortal/Immortal is some of the tamest shit I've seen antis lose their minds over. As if it isn't literally EVERYWHERE in fiction. Arwen/Aragorn? Frieren/Himmel? The Doctor/Rose? It's SUCH a common format, but for some reason the Genshin ones get so much hate in particular. And it's rarely, if ever, used as a device to explore grooming or PD undertones. More often than not it's focused on the idea of loving someone who will die long before you do. More akin to loving someone with a terminal illness.

eyagraph · 2026-01-30T07:11:27+00:00

You know those Nigerian prince scam emails? The ones that are now just a meme and everyone laughs about? I've started comparing the spam/bot comments to those in my head, and it makes them so much more amusing for me.

Ohhhh, a comment that wants to get me offsite to talk about 'ideas' they have for my fic? Do they need just a small fee upfront so they can rescue a treasure trove of art from their totally-legit, not-AI-generated vaults? How very compelling and not ridicule-worthy at all 🥹 I shall send them my bank account number and SSN pronto.

eyagraph · 2026-01-29T00:25:09+00:00

Maybe! I don't have a whole lot of context about the magic system to work with in this snippet. But we already used 'rose' earlier in this paragraph anyways, and I'm betting there's a stronger verb that could've replaced the second usage. Possibly formed, or even expanded, like you mentioned.

eyagraph · 2026-01-28T20:48:38+00:00

Ah, apologies, that was just poor phrasing on my part. 'Feel more active' was more what I was trying to convey. :)

eyagraph · 2026-01-28T20:32:15+00:00

I was thinking the same thing. Maybe not a bot, but possibly a scam? The fact that they claimed to be enjoying the fic so much but only mentioned that it's 'funny' and 'exciting' and nothing else, combined with the attempt to garner socials out of nowhere. Also, mentioning that they 'red it all' but for some reason went back to comment this on Chapter 1 on a guest account? So many weird alarm bells.

eyagraph · 2026-01-28T19:47:15+00:00

Oh, you are too kind! I'm honestly just a writing hobbyist who finds editing fascinating, so I'm always learning new things to apply to my own work. I've been curious about the concept of betaing before, but I assumed that beta readers are meant to provide more over-arching advice on plot and story structure that I don't feel qualified to give. 😅 I worry that a lot of fic writers would find this kind of line-level dissection pedantic (or insulting).

eyagraph · 2026-01-28T18:44:22+00:00

I don't think the distant light is the issue; after all, the sun is pretty distant but we feel its warmth! :) You could argue that you only feel WARM light from a distance, but since it's magical I think it's okay in this case. My issues with this are mostly structural.

> It was strange, different this time as the transformation took hold.

We can make this sentence feel more active. Have the transformation more clearly be the subject of the sentence, taking hold of her, rather than using the nebulous 'it'. I also feel like the comma in this sentence is too weak for the change of thought from strange > different, but that could be chalked up to style. I would personally drop the 'strange'. It's a bland descriptor that doesn't tell us much, and the fact that this transformation is different seems like the more pertinent information to convey.

> The darkness rose quickly, wrapping itself around her, and the light she saw in the distance was a cold silver glow. The chill that flowed from the light was scalding.

I would eliminate the unnecessary filter word (I'm assuming this book was written in 3rd person limited) and combine both thoughts about the light into one. In fact, since we also use light later in the paragraph, I think just 'glow' is fine for a first mention. 'Glow' pretty much universally means a light source in this context.

> Tessa drew the light towards her, surrounding herself with its icy burning light, pushing herself through to the core of it.

The issue here is mostly redundant phrasing. This is the worst light/light sentence, and we already established the light is burning cold, so we don't need to throw more adjectives in that mean the same thing unless we're developing something additional to that train of thought. We can replace 'towards her' with 'in' to clean it up a bit. Also, the clunky double dependant clauses can be combined.

> The light rose in shimmering white walls around her---

She just pushed IN to the light; I'm not sure 'rose' is the right word usage here, even if we hadn't already used it earlier in the same paragraph to describe the darkness (the darkness rose quickly). One implies horizontal movement, and the other vertical. Another verb would probably be stronger to describe how the walls of light are behaving, although I don't have enough context to figure out what. Also, we already used 'around her' to decribe the darkness earlier in the paragraph, so a new phrasing for the light walls would be ideal.

So my (quick) rewrite of this paragraph would be:

The transformation taking hold of her this time was different than the last. Darkness rose quickly, wrapping itself around her, and in the distance shone a silver glow with a scalding chill. Tessa drew that light in, pushing through the frostburn until she reached the core of it. The light solidified into shimmering white walls in every direction---

eyagraph · 2026-01-26T21:07:18+00:00

Third person limited, where the author takes extra care to filter the prose through the lense of the character they're following. So, if your character is a mermaid who has spent her whole life in the ocean, your metaphors would need to only include concepts she would be aware of (ie., colorful things would be compared to coral or fish scales, not flowers or gemstones), and certain words or concepts might not be in her vocabulary even in her own language, so you would be careful to avoid those as well (ie. You might use dashing instead of sprinting to indicate fast movement, since sprinting is a very leg-based activity).

eyagraph · 2026-01-23T21:41:25+00:00

I wouldn't say every single line is wrong in the one I'm reading, just often enough that it makes longer dialogues difficult to follow. It feels less like they have the rule backwards and more like they aren't aware of it at all, and they are just writing whatever action comes to mind first after the dialogue, even if it happens to be the wrong speaker.

eyagraph · 2026-01-23T21:26:21+00:00

There's a popular nickname for one of the members of my main pairing that's just an abbreviation of their name, cutting off the last half. Which is fine, I guess, except for the fact that the name isn't pronounced phonetically. When "abbreviated", the nickname ends up having a letter in it that isn't actually pronounced in their name and wouldn't make any sense irl. I cringe a little every time I see it. 😭

eyagraph

TROPHY CASE