fuck you writers group

I looked at an event board and found this online writers group. Basically you're in like a zoom meeting for a three or four hour period. You periodically all go into the room to meet and discuss how your writing is going at different intervals.

I have always had an interest in writing and do it pretty much in secret. I've tried writers groups before and was always put off by the hacky people who think they're going to be the next Stephen King or J.K. Rowling with their uninspired, unoriginal, Law and Order ripoff short story that they think is perfect in it's unedited, unfinished glory.

I thought maybe this group would have been okay. I try to register. The registration wants me to name off the synopsis of the story. I kept it vague. Call me paranoid, but I didn't want to spill the the details of my story. I doubt it'll ever end up published anywhere, but I don't want someone in some snowball's chance in hell to steal it. It's actually an original idea, and not some 10th rate true crime story or Harry Potter ripoff.

Anyway, I get an email rejecting me from being able to participate in the group. All for not following their arbitrary rule of wanting every detail of my story in there. Maybe I would have discussed it with these people.

I'm dead certain it would have been like the other writers groups I have been involved with. You'd have some know-it-all who got published in some very small time, obscure ass publication that is long out of print and they'll be talking down to everyone about what publishers like and want, like they know all of the ins and outs of the industry. Meanwhile their "novels" are not only poorly written and lack any originality, they are also wayyy under the industry standard for what word count is considered a novel.

Then a bunch of snooty, even hackier "writers" who think after writing the first chapter to a Law and Order rip off that they have a multimillion dollar idea and they don't respond to any feedback and usually never even finish their fucking stories.

Anyone descent in these groups usually leave pretty quickly. Real writers write, hack writers act like a celebrity and focus more on screaming "I write" than anything else.

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anonymous Other June 25, 2026 at 10:37 am 0 0