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Jul 2015

Well uh... it IS a trope! A trope is any resource used to tell stories, not bad nor good! Main characters having differently colored eyes is a trop so... that's not really hate? Post the comment for more context if you could please.

As for how I deal with them... I accept them because people criticise for a reason. The reason being that they don't like it, so, okay.

uhh they said, different coloured eyes trope trope tropes
something like that

If someone's read two pages of your work and find that sufficient to call it a trope (did they mean just the part about the eyes having different colours, or did they consider your whole comic a trope because of it?), I probably wouldn't take it too seriously (though I totally understand that it's not very pleasant). You're making a long form comic from what I understand. I don't know how many pages you're planning on making, but I think it's pretty obvious the two first pages can't be seen as a fair representation of the whole comic. You haven't even had time to fully present the main character yet.

If you have a look at the list of tropes on for instance tvtropes.org, it's ENDLESS. There are so many tropes, they cover ALL sorts of storytelling tools and plot lines and character traits etc., that it's almost impossible to write a story without touching on some of these. From Wikipedia:
"The word trope has also come to be used for describing commonly recurring literary and rhetorical devices, motifs or clichés in creative works."

Example: You have for instance alliterative names; names in which the first and last names begin with the same sound, like Peter Parker and Bruce Banner. Stan Lee did this a lot, and this is a trope. But it doesn't stop people from reading comics about Spiderman or watching films about him! Alliterative names can help characters stand out and be more memorable - a good thing. But if you overuse it, it will have the opposite effect - a bad thing. So tropes aren't all bad, but you have to use them the right way. Some tropes are very popular, and people keep coming back to stories using certain tropes.

You could have a very long conversation about tropes, but to be short; they aren't all bad - it's mostly when something becomes a cliché that it might get boring. Tropes are storytelling devices and conventions, and sometimes using them makes for a good story - and breaking them in the right places might make it even better smile

If the person who left the comment just called it a trope and didn't give any advice or constructive criticism to help you improve, I wouldn't take them too seriously. I mean, in general I think people here know that it's better to keep even your constructive criticism to yourself unless a person has asked you to give it. But comments like that aren't constructive in any way, and even shows a lack of understanding of what tropes are really all about, so there's no help in it at all :/ What was that person hoping to achieve with a comment like that?

So I hope you won't worry too much about it. Some might think eyes with different colours are cliché, but I happen to like it nonetheless ^^

Well maybe just looking at the character then.
if it was me looking at it and thinking that I'd at least wait for the story to develop more idk.

If they are only hate comments, without ideas on how to improve my skills/make things better, I ignore them.

A trope is just a theme that appears in fictional works. It's impossible to write any kind of story without tropes. They're not necessarily bad. I don't know what the comment said so I can't make any judgments on whether or not the person meant any harm, but pointing out a trope isn't necessarily a criticism. Tvtropes, an extensive online trope encyclopedia, even has an article on heterochromia2. Even if the person WAS being rude in their comment, don't let it get to you! You can't write without tropes, and lots of tropes add depth and quality to your story and characters!

Using the word trope as a form of an insult is a bit like insulting a story for using grammatically correct English. You use words and sentences?!?! That's SO overdone.

Tropes are just another literary device. Show me a story without tropes and I'll eat my powerful amulet given to me by a kindly old bearded wise man in a bar.

I've never gotten hate comments on Tapastic, but i've gotten some on tumblr. some i just ignored because it was just really simple and stupid. others would twist what i said and that's when i'd answer back, ask them to ask again without being anon, then block when they failed to answer.

basically, i dissect what they say and share it publicly. i ask them them questions, analyzing whatever stupid thing they said to the last letter, and make an articulate argument. most people who post flame/hate do so thoughtlessly so when they're confronted with something thought-out, they usually can't answer.

but like others have said, perhaps your commenter meant trope in the literary device way - not as something mean :/

@ArtistHan

others would twist what i said and that's when i'd answer back, ask them
to ask again without being anon, then block when they failed to answer.

Now, that is really bad. I also tend to nail them as you do, but I also had to learn that at some point you have to let go. That or risk an ulcer.

Haha I've only had to do it a few times. Once you do it a few times, the others don't dare do it~ Learning from example hehe I don't like hate, and I feel that I don't have to be the patient one when I never consented to it. If they're gonna come at me, then they're going to have to deal with the consequences. People usually flame because they feel like they can get away without consequence. Well, maybe they can do it to others, but I don't want to deal with that. It's my blog so they have to play by my rules. If they don't like it, then they shouldn't be such shitty people initially. :/

Honestly hate is an interesting thing to me. One of the most genuinely helpful critiques I ever got was one of the most harshly worded messages I ever got about my comic. (They tore the comic a new asshole and straight up said it was trash, it's stil technically hate at that point, haha I mean their points were valid where stated but still) Most hate really is just the pointless blathering of some enraged moron on the internet, tho.

In general though I tend to just laugh hate off, or even respond very kindly to it. I had one person even message me back apologizing because I was so friendly in response to their weird rant about how my art sucked it made them feel bad, haha. Either way it really isn't something to get worked up about, people are dumb, and can be cruel, and ultimately you'll just have to learn to live and either deal with it or ignore it.

If they're being actively insulting - using foul language and clearly just commenting to be mean and disruptive ("This is shit", "Why do you suck so much", etc., etc.) - then I delete the comment if I can, and never respond. There is no response that would make them, or me, happy, so ignoring it is the only way to go. The same goes for people who are being actively creepy, though luckily, I haven't had any of those.

If it's just a negative comment, I let it stand - not everyone is going to love my comic, and they have as much right to express that as anyone else. As long as they aren't being disruptive or trollish, I leave them be.

And if I get a harshly worded critique, I respond to it and ask for further detail; if someone has gone through the trouble of typing up something long enough to qualify as a proper critique, the least I can do is respond and try to analyze what they've written; they might have spotted genuine flaws in my work that I can improve upon.

But the general rule of thumb is to not engage with hateful comments; delete and ignore, because there is no fight there that you can possibly win. They just want to spew hate.

Either ignore them or report them.

However if someone does give a genuine opinion as to why they might dislike your comic, give it an honest read and wonder why they might not have enjoyed it.

Sadly, and I mean SADLY, I have yet to receive any hate. But I know it's coming. I know it's on the horizon.

I haven't gotten much hate in the last few years since I ended up on my current hosts, but I have a policy of letting them stand unless it's a personal attack on me or my readers. I'm usually more than happy to have someone find and hate my stuff. It means the number or people seeing my stuff is increasing.

I dunno, to me it's really funny, imagining some poor sod getting his knickers in such a bunch over a free comic that he absolutely has to write me some elementary kid comment. Life advice: trolls really do implode if you laugh at them. That said, I very rarely get outright hate. I do get some passive-aggressive stuff occasionally and the once I had a dude complain about the website design (of a hosting site!!!) quite vocally. He seemed to be truly offended by having to scroll down to read each page because it did not fit all in one piece. I kept that because it was hella amusing. The only things I delete are slurs against people groups and stuff.