On Positivity

I think I’m often seen as a “hater,” and I worry about this perception, both because I care about how others feel and I think that it’s not a complete picture of me. I hold some strong opinions about popular technologies, and I’m not afraid to voice those opinions when I hear strangers espousing their love for Kubernetes or how gRPC changed everything for their team. I don’t mind discussing the pains of SQL databases, or JVM build systems. To me, criticisms of these technologies feel tightly tied to their merit. But, upon reflection, I realize that I’ve also been on the other side of this kind of discussion in online communities, especially when it comes to serverless. My reaction, ironically, has been to shut out this type of negativity and dismiss it as misinformed, jaded, grumpy, or argumentative. As I’ve discovered myself as a perceived hater, I don’t think that my own judgement of others has been fair.

I worry about being fair to these strangers as I begin to feel more empathy towards their position. Likewise, I worry about how I’m perceived because I’ve always felt that the attributes I’ve described are those of pessimists. I don’t think of myself as a pessimist. Despite my bouts of perceived negativity, I think of myself as an optimist. I’m not a “doomer,” and I don’t believe that misguided or misplaced effort was the reason for technology about which I voice criticisms. While I may complain about the complexity of Kubernetes, I don’t deny its impact or importance, nor do I think fools created it. My willingness to express my opinion stems from my belief that smart people are investing time and effort into something, combined with my desire for them to succeed. I believe in the ability of others to do better and improve on something important that technologists are talking about and using daily, and because of that, it’s second nature for me to predict their path and obstacles.

I presume that to many, this duality of “hater” and optimistic proponent will seem like my own moral justification or cognitive dissonance. Maybe that’s good feedback for me to be perceived as I intend, but I don’t feel the need to change solely because others disagree. I think it’s important to hold strong opinions “weakly” and change your beliefs when shown contradicting evidence, but I don’t think that should mean you should yield to popular belief or allow your tastes to be shaped by convenience. I believe strongly in the value of critique and the social value of sharing critique to develop taste, and that’s what I try to offer.

Ultimately, we have a finite amount of attention, and opinions, negative or otherwise, should be saved for something that matters — something worth building. The corollary to this is that a lot of external attention, negative or otherwise, should signal some form of importance exists. I personally think that this is where the saying “there’s no such thing as bad PR” comes from because really only the indifference of others is a statement that what you’re doing doesn’t matter to them. This is why I think it’s an optimist’s job to cherish your haters — it means you’re working on something that matters, even if somebody thinks you’re doing the job wrong.

It can be difficult to find this kind of optimism when you have to choose the tone in which you read others’ complaints and arguments. It’s easy to dismiss commenters who have invested a small amount of effort and attention to counter your large endeavor. It’s convenient to read hatred or anger rather than passion and connection. Maybe the internet has given me a thicker skin than others, but an optimistic filter helps. Rest assured, knowing nobody comments when they don’t care.

Likewise, I realize, as a self-proclaimed “optimistic hater”, through a journey catalyzed by empathy towards my own haters, that it should be the job of an optimistic critic to improve their own perception. I heard an uncredited quote recently that stuck with me:

A statue has never been erected in honor of a critic.

While I don’t necessarily think every critic desires to be remembered or cares about their accolades, I do think that this is valid meta-criticism for critics. If you’re truly an optimist and not just a hater, and your passion was worth the attention and effort, you should make sure that your attention is heard. To me, this means making your intentions clear, expressing why you care and helping a reader understand that your critique comes from a would-be user, not a detractor or dismissive curmudgeon. It also means talking with your feet, exemplifying your solution, and leading a change that you wish would be made. Our time is finite and we can’t always do this, but if you want to be heard over the noise, I think that it’s often necessary to offer more than pot-shots from the sidelines. Build solutions; measure results; prove that you’re right.