Listener Feedback & A Grumble (Patreon)

This is a little bit petty and I (Chris) apologise for that in advance but what is the point of having a Patreon if you can't occasionally post something that is a little indulgent.

These are some tweets from an FYI thread I got tagged into on Twitter. The person responsible has 4 followers so I'm not going to put them on blast. I am however going to complain a bit here...I don't have any issue with receiving critical feedback about the show. The vast majority of feedback we receive is positive but still it's fine to have criticisms and people inevitably have different preferences and perspectives. For some the extended banter segments are an annoying distraction, for others they are part of the podcast's charm. Matt and I don't completely ignore feedback, there is often valid points being made, but we also want to still enjoy making the podcast so that means things like banter and sarcasm are non-negotiable because without that we wouldn't be acting like ourselves.

So when I receive feedback like the above I can't help thinking about how myopic the person's perspective is. If you say 'For me...' then fine but when you declare things like 'the Sam Harris episode fell flat' (it really didn't it was one of our most popular episodes, received praise from various people we respect who know Sam personally, and even briefly had Sam following our accounts) or sarcasm is never funny as if they are indisputable facts, you just come across as someone who doesn't have a sense of perspective.

I'm critical of a lot of the content I consume but I'm always clear that my criticisms are just my opinions but I frequently encounter people online who seem to lack that level of self awareness. If I was being cruel, I would say they appear to lack appropriate theory of mind abilities to entertain that their opinions ≠ objective facts, but I don't think that is true. In most cases the people are perfectly capable of entertaining alternative views, it's just that they don't bother too. This is why I have no issue calling it myopic...

Sarcasm, cynicism, and banter are non-negotiable components of the podcast (and my personality) so if you don't like those... might be best to find another podcast that is more suited to your tastes. That this person finds my 'sledgehammer' wit to require effort to parse is perhaps most telling but in any case... yep, this is just a rant. Sorry y'all! 

Sometimes you just gotta grumble!