Soccer Moms Writing Angry Restaurant Reviews -- two perspectives

[Arch0wl]

Last night I started complaining to my girlfriend about the negative effect poorly-written, knee-jerk reviews are having on a local coffeeshop. I felt like they weren't qualified to be reviewers and shouldn't have been polluting the dialogue with their stupid remarks. In response, she remarked that she wouldn't want to read a "good" review at all; she'd rather read angry soccer moms writing reviews about Denny's.

The difference in the perspective came down to what, exactly, you think a review should be.

PERSPECTIVE 1: THE IDEAS ARE VALUABLE

It's a tragedy that these animals should have been released from their cage. Dialogue is a collection of ideas beyond ourselves, and their participation in dialogue pollutes it. Reviews are transcendent in that they communicate something beyond the person writing it by contributing ideas to the dialogue. The reviews can be executed poorly or stupidly, and we gain something from reading the well-written ones.

PERSPECTIVE 2: THE ACT OF WRITING IS VALUABLE

It's a miracle that someone so technologically illiterate should have such a spark of passion that they would figure out the hurdles of using Urbanspoon just to post an angry review of a restaurant. Their experience in itself is interesting. Moreover, it's wonderful thing that someone who would normally never write anything is being driven to write with the height of their emotion by this provocation. We should encourage this form of participation.

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Even though I obviously think my perspective is right, I'm not justified in thinking that. There is not a non-arbitrary factor on which I can say "this view is right", so ultimately it's a matter of perspective.

I'm interested in hearing what you think. As a side note, I suspect that people who believe #1 will be far more likely to ascribe universality to their view.