Table of contents for Blog comments
I haven’t had to do this on here very often, but pretty regularly on my work blog, I have people comment who are . . . well . . . less than nice, we’ll say (or just wrong). While sometimes it’s pretty easy to handle comments I don’t really appreciate over there (often with more facts to back up my story), it’s a lot harder to do that in the realm of mom blogging.
If you’re posting about how cute your kids are or how you’re struggling with this behavior or how you’ve come to a self-discovery, it’s more than just annoying to have someone contradict you or treat you unkindly. It’s a bit of a personal affront—sometimes even an attack on your children or your parenting!
There are a few ways you can handle this. The best ways (the ways you would tell your children to handle this):
- Ignore it. If you’re really lucky, your bloggy friends will even come to your defense. Just the other day, I saw a friend of mine share a personal story and someone called her out for being unchristlike. I was the first person there after that comment was left, and I vehemently (but hopefully respectfully) disagreed. Several subsequent commenters did the same.
- Settle it privately. If your blogging platform allows, email the person directly. You could explain that, while you don’t particularly appreciate the way that they’ve phrased their concerns, you’d like to know if there’s something you could do better in your blogging (or parenting, if you’re really feeling generous) in the future.
- Use concrete facts. If the person is disagreeing with a factual assertion (instead of just your opinion), you can provide more information on the facts you’re citing, such as their sources.
- Point to your blog comment policy. If you’ve already written one, and this comment violates the guidelines you’ve set forth, inform the commenter privately (via email) or publicly (via the comments on that post). Take whatever action you say you will in your policy (deleting the comment, banning the commenter, etc.)
Possibly less productive:
- Call them out. In the very next comment you make, point out that they’ve been unkind, that that kind of behavior would be unacceptable from your children, and it’s unacceptable on your blog.
Downright counterproductive:
- Tit for tat. Reflect everything they’ve said back on them in your next comment or, worse yet, track down their blog and make a similar comment.
There are a few other solutions that I’m not sure what category to put them in:
- Play the martyr. Face it, we’re moms: we can do this with the best of them. As we should all remember from being children, guilt trips and the martyr card don’t really solve anything though.
- Delete it. If your comment policy says you’ll delete abusive comments, or negative comments, do it. If you don’t have a comment policy, the general bloggy community shuns deleting comments just because they disagree with you. However, on a personal blog—it’s your blog.
- Block that commenter. Depending on the nature of the comment, it may take only one comment to warrant blocking them, especially if it’s in your comment policy. Even if it’s not, it’s your blog, your family and you. Protect them if you feel you need to.
What do you do when you receive a negative comment? What has worked for you? What hasn’t?
More WFMW.
10 replies on “Handling negative comments”
I have my comments moderated and I don’t post rude or inapproprite ones. I also have my comment policy on my blog, in which I state that my blog is not a forum for debate. I will post challenging comments if I think commenting back will be constructive or allow me witness.
I enjoyed reading your blog!
I don’t mind negative comments–my articles are often written from a Devil’s Advocate POV so I figure if I can dish it out I should be able to take it! I did recently have a commenter react negatively to another reader’s comment–great idea to defend your readers–I’m off to add my response!
I never thought I would need a comment policy. Then I began to get comments from one person callingme irresponsible and uneducated because she disagreed with some of my parenting choices.
Having a comment policy is a MUST!
Sometimes people can misunderstand a comment and take it the wrong way, I always try to keep that in mind when I get a comment I percieve as negative. When I respond to a comment that I think is hurtful, I just turn it into a lighthearted joke, makes them look silly and me look good. Your regular commenters will always come to your defense. Once when I got some really nasty comments, my regular readers came to my defense to such an extent that the bad commentor actually cancelled her account due to the backlash she received.
I am just noticing that people are having blog comment policies. I try to never delete a comment and welcome comments that disagree with me so long as they aren’t nasty about it and are good-spirited. I think it generally goes without saying that a blogger can delete comments if they want. I think I have deleted 3 comments in 15 months.
That being said, having a written policy can’t hurt and it IS a good idea.
I finally wrote a comment policy after getting a couple of nasty comments on one of my blogs. I’ve had some luck with responding with a comment that basically says I welcome differing viewpoints, but I do ask that comments are respectful.
I’ve also had a lot of luck with blogging friends backing me up. 🙂
I was SO glad when I learned that I could moderate my comments…now I’m not worried what people say because I have veto power!! yay!
You commented on another blog about your son having a diaper rash, so I followed you here to see if you’ve tried Butt Paste. I recently used it on my son when our Resinol wouldn’t clear him up. I swear he was better the next morning!!
@Tina—He is better now (finally). I’m pretty sure it was a yeast infection and the antibiotics for his ear infection weren’t helping. The Lamasil killed it for us. Thanks for check up though!
A couple people have mentioned moderating comments. In some circumstances, this is necessary, but generally it’s frowned upon as slowing the conversation (or taking up all your time, if you’re lucky enough to be so popular!).
I delete and move on. No sense in making a scene with it and scaring the blog. Just delete, move on, nobody is the wiser. 🙂
I’ve been meaning to thank you for helping me out on that post, Jordan! I could understand where she was coming from, but I totally disagreed with her. It was so nice not to even have to address it. My blogging friends had my back! Any sorrow I had at being called “unChristlike” was totally gone when y’all stuck up for me.
The comment really didn’t bother me as much as the fact that she signed “anonymous.” If you can’t leave your name on a disagreeing comment, then it’s probably a good idea not to leave a comment.
The only comments I’ve had to delete (2) were ones in which the person inadvertently left some identifying information, like my location or last name.