I’ve been bloggin, tweeting, writing, and keeping a general internet presence for more than ten years. If you put yourself “out there,” at some point someone will hate you. Some people will really hate you and write nasty things on the internet that demean your intelligence and question your value as a human being. Occasionally, there will be people who threaten you. There may be even people who locate your address. How does one deal with that?

Putting opinions and thoughts and words on the Internet is not for the faint of heart. The first year that I began blogging, some blogger with lots of traffic wrote stupid things about my research, and I freaked out a bit. A wiser friend told me not to deal with bad criticism and to give others credit for recognizing stupidity when they see it. When I started writing pieces for the popular press, the criticism rolled in on the comment sections. I learned how to lightly skim comments without actually reading them. An anonymous grad school website made rude comments about my scholarly merits. I had already built up a pretty tough skin, so none of it bothered me.

I have never been threatened, so I’m pretty lucky in that regard. I’m not sure how I would handle all that.

A recent article in the Guardian by a young author is a case study in how NOT to handle online criticism. She tracked down the address of a woman who wrote a bad review on Goodreads and went to her house. The author understands that she had stepped over the line into Crazy Town, but she still did it. She made herself more pathetic than the rude reviewer. She’s a recent graduate from Harvard. Youth and lack of experience with criticism explains a lot.

Taking criticism is part of modern lilfe. If you’re a professor or a teacher, student can leave reviews online. If you own a business or a restaurant, there’s Angie’s List and Yelp. These websites have empowered a whole class of people to tell off others who seem to have more power, money, or success. In some ways, these new avenues for criticism is very democratic. It’s useful for me as a consumer. Well, useful-ish. I’ve learned to how to read all the comments and find an average opinion.

Dealing with negative comments can be annoying for producers of words and ideas, but critical comments aren’t always terrible. Some criticism is valid. I’ve had to rethink and rework blog post and articles at times. I’m not perfect. And since I really do enjoy debates, I actually love smart criticism. Dumb comments from anonymous sources should simply be ignored. I can’t imagine caring enough to track down the address of a critic.