No One Claps For The Critic

“We are not enemies, but friends.  We must not be enemies.  Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection.” — Lincoln, First Inaugural Address (1861)

I have always felt that the sentence most essential to democracy — and to free expression — is the 1906 quote, often attributed to Voltaire, but actually from the English writer Evelyn Beatrice Hall: “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.”  Only a couple of decades ago, one would often encounter this statement, but now it appears to have fallen utterly out of fashion, as subsequent generations are less and less amenable to its inherent open-mindedness. It has that Enlightenment Age ring of equanimity to it; hence, the assumed association with Voltaire. It also sounds like something Nietzsche might have said, as it carries the cogency and urgency of his free-thinking ethos.  

When we listen to each other, we truly connect. But how often do we really listen to each other, apart from specific gatherings to hear a speech or a reading? I’m reminded of a poignant line from the film “Fight Club,” when Edward Norton’s character says, “When people think you’re dying, they really, really listen to you, instead of just waiting for their turn to speak.”  That’s a sad but true commentary on where our society is in 2026. I remember thinking this when I saw a counselor years ago, after a death in the family. I said to him, “You know, it’s actually such a rare feeling to be in a place where you can just talk to someone and no one interrupts you.” But that’s what you get for $350 an hour.  

How we connect and relate has changed dramatically since technological advances in the mid-1990s fostered the rise of the internet, and its subsequent manifestation into websites, social media channels, and apps. And, this technological metamorphosis has altered how we connect and relate not only in the new online world, but also in the offline world — what we now refer to as IRL, or “in real life.” As if the modes of life now need to be categorized. But they do.

Ours has become a world of identity that is literally black and white, where viewpoints don’t exist in degrees of consensus, but in strict terms of right and wrong. For the ancient Greeks, understanding derived from discussion, from what they called diálogos, or dialogue.  The word comes from dia (across) and logos (to speak) and was thus defined as “to converse, discuss, or talk with one another.” In other words, conversation.

The concept of dialogue has evolved, but it still maintains the ghost of its original meaning, defined by the Random House Unabridged Dictionary as, “An exchange of ideas or opinions on a particular issue, especially a political or religious issue, with a view to reaching an amicable agreement or settlement.” Imagine that: the words political, religious, amicable and agreement in the same sentence! Note: that dictionary was published in 1973.

However, as the discipline of psychology has developed, we’ve come to understand that people have egos, egos are often fragile, and a synthesis of opposing viewpoints is usually the exception, not the rule, for most critical dialogue. This is especially true in the age of social media, when discussions — if they can be called that — are performed virtually.

I’d like to offer a personal experience as an illustration for how this generally works, specifically in the realm of art. About 10 years ago, a photo of young students at The Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam went viral, as they were sitting in front of Rembrandt’s famous painting, The Nightwatch (1642), but ignoring it, choosing instead to look intently at their smartphones. A few people posted comments criticizing the children, but most responded with self-righteous indignation that the kids were actually working on an assignment regarding the piece via their phones. My Facebook post bemoaning the fact that kids were using smartphones in a museum drew the ire of someone who attacked me for daring to express such an archaic position. But this person didn’t bother to understand my viewpoint — as so often is the case — which wasn’t what anyone else was saying. Instead, I was criticizing the fact that, even if the kids were doing an assignment on their phones, that was still terrible. For the little time they had in an actual museum, they should be looking at the art. Any intermediary device between the children and art was merely friction. The way to learn about art — one would hope — is to look at art. Shame on the myopic pedagogy that had them looking at their phones.

It turns out that all those indignant smartphone apologists now have egg on their faces, as the Dutch government recently issued guidelines restricting cell phone use for children under 12, and social media for those under 15. So today, that scenario would not even be possible. And, in a growing trend — based on research regarding how harmful smartphone use is for children — an increasing number of countries, including Australia, France, Denmark, and Indonesia, have issued outright bans on these devices for children under 16.  

What is it about social media that causes seemingly normal people to make statements that they never would in person? We’ve all experienced this, I’m sure. What is it about the technology of the internet that has made us communicate so negatively?  

Freud called technology “the prosthetics of God,” commenting, “With every tool, man is perfecting his own organs, whether motor or sensory, or is removing the limits to their functioning. Man has, as it were, become a kind of prosthetic God. When he puts on all his auxiliary organs he is truly magnificent; but those organs have not grown onto him and they still give him much trouble at times.”

Freud points to three key mechanisms that can help us understand why social media is the progenitor of negative behavior: repression, displacement, and projection.  

In the case of repression, aggressive impulses that are normally filtered by social norms (what he would call the superego) are not blocked in the anonymity of social media. It’s easy to type a few hostile lines of text on a screen, when you might get punched in the face for saying the same thing in person. And because hyperbole is naturally amplified in written form, online communications tend to be more extreme than they would be delivered in person.  

Displacement arises when a person cannot yell at their boss, spouse, or parent, but they can lash out at strangers, public figures, or commenters online. The internet becomes the “safe” target for displaced aggression.  

As for projection, Freud argues that people often defend against unacceptable impulses by projecting them onto others — seeing in others what they cannot tolerate in themselves.  Online environments escalate projection because there’s little contextual information about the strangers with whom we contend, ambiguous text is easy to interpret as hostile, and the ego can protect itself by externalizing its own impulses. Projection also often fuels comment‑section conflicts and “pile‑ons.”

One of the most pervasive problems inherent in social media is the truism that in the internet age, everyone is a critic. It’s bad enough that people post to express frustrations and find ego fulfillment, but so many people also feel entitled to express themselves without the commensurate thought that should predicate such actions. It’s as if the internet has taken away our capacity for contemplation and rumination that was, until 30 years ago, the sine qua non of criticism. I’m not saying that we shouldn’t have a visceral reaction to an event, a work of art, or a statement by someone. But in the old days, it often took a period of time in which to foster a response — such as a letter to an editor — and often, during that interim, our judgment would evolve, perhaps becoming more refined, or less truculent, and in many instances, we might think better of responding at all. But now, the old adage of write it down and sleep on it before you send it is gone.

There is a deeper implication to this that is often neglected, especially in a free society, and that is, what constitutes actual criticism? And by what definition can one reasonably be considered a critic? As someone who tries to write formal criticism, I ponder this a lot, and the best answer I have come across is the essay by the late 19th-century writer and critic Oscar Wilde, entitled “The Critic as Artist,” which is perhaps the best Platonic dialogue not written by Plato.

Wilde’s intriguing conclusion is: “Criticism is itself an art. And just as artistic creation implies the working of the critical facility, and, indeed, without it cannot be said to exist at all, so criticism is really creative in the highest sense of the word.” Thus, the burden is on the critic to be as aesthetically accomplished as what he or she criticizes. If we applied this standard to most contemporaneous criticism, there would be very little criticism.

The irony in this is that the vogue of many creative efforts today is to supplant the critic’s role by telling an audience preemptively what to think of a work. I pointed this out in a Pittsburgh Quarterly essay last year, poking a little fun at an exhibition by The Frick Pittsburgh, which displayed more didactic wall labels explaining the art than there was art itself. This upset the Greater Pittsburgh Arts Council, which, like Captain Renault in “Casablanca,” seemed to be “shocked, shocked” that a critic would actually critique a show they sponsored. The Council posted a piece rebuking me, ad hominem, rather than addressing the points I made. What should have been a compelling opportunity for dialogue became the basis for personal recrimination.  But the irony of this is, I didn’t actually critique the show, just the overabundance of wall labels.

We are so immersed in the “anything goes” nature of art that artists and curators now reflexively self-justify their efforts before anyone can even challenge them. This is certainly one of the main reasons for the proliferation of artist statements, didactic wall texts, and other such pronouncements. It’s as if we’re all part of a mob outside the palace of the emperor with no clothes, arguing about what benefit his or her “non-clothing” is serving. Is it moral, political or generational? And why are so many clapping and so few laughing?

I’ve already described the temptation for didactic artists to wrap themselves in the flag of morality in the hope of making their work unimpeachable (see: “The War Against Aesthetics in Contemporary Art,” PQ Spring 2023). And certainly, this extends to political causes deemed above reproach. Who could deny the justification of anti-Nazi art, for example? But if one walks into a gallery and encounters a framed piece of paper on which are scribbled the words, “Nazis Suck,” does that constitute art?

Adding a dash of morality to bolster your art’s credibility isn’t risky and has little downside. But how much is too much? And, if we are to be honest, isn’t it really a compensatory act when the aesthetics of a work are weak? It’s like adding seasoning to a recipe when the dish itself tastes a bit flat.

The crisis of art now, according to philosopher Arthur Danto, is that it operates in the post-historical context of Andy Warhol’s Brillo Boxes (1963), in which Warhol figured out how to bleed all the aesthetics out of a work of art, making it purely a mimetic act. Danto calls this “the end of art,” but I would argue that instead of representing a fixed conclusion to the millennia-old journey of aesthetics, Warhol actually circled back to the ancient Greeks, who considered accurate representation the ultimate goal of art. (Consider Zeuxis, who painted grapes so realistic that, according to Pliny the Elder, birds flew down to eat them.) But, because aesthetics no longer are considered the essential characteristic of art in the post-Warhol era, this has left a vacuum of meaning. Thus, interpretation has asserted itself as the required symbiotic component of artistic creation. And what causes more disagreement than interpretation?  

We’ve become accustomed to artists telling us what their works mean, especially when they have no discernable message. Danto asks what the critic’s reaction should be “in the face of the slashed felt, the shattered glass, the spattered lead, the splintered plywood, the crudely twisted wire, the latex-soaked cheese cloth, the vinyl-soaked rope, the neon signs, the video monitors, the chocolate-smeared breasts, the tethered couple, the slashed flesh, the torn garments, or the sundered house with which artistic statements were made.” I could list many more such unorthodox examples in contemporary exhibition spaces.

From an ethical standpoint, should the artist, curator, or third-party entity with a marketing and/or economic relationship to a show be able to post exegetical signs — literally next to the work — declaring what the piece means or or what value it has? Obviously, there’s a potential conflict of interest. This leads us to the question: What is the purpose of a public, exhibitive space? And how much control should curators and sponsors who have a financial interest assert?

In her book, New Museum Theory and Practice, scholar Janet Marstine offers a balanced perspective, noting, “Museum exhibitions historically have tended to be didactic — asserting factual information and exuding an aura of truth or respected knowledge. New museum theory calls for exhibit developers to debate such questions as: whose knowledge should be disseminated? Who decides? How are the decisions made?” After discussing the history of how control of museum didactics has shifted from a scholarly to a political pedagogy, she concludes that we should ask, “If the exhibition includes multiple voices, do they represent a range of perspectives? Does the text encourage you to develop your own informed opinion? In what ways does the writing style invite and/or dissuade from a dialogue of ideas?” Tendentious views can be misleading. Thus, her conclusion that dialogue is the essential element is key.  

Mark Rothko, one of the most original and, arguably, sublime artists of the 20th century, pointed out that we are still in the same predicament as Michaelangelo during the 16th century, when societal mores tried to dictate how and what he should paint: “Most societies of the past have insisted that their own particular evaluations of truth and morality be depicted by the artist.  We should note that Michaelangelo’s nudes were forced to wear, in the end, the appropriate panties and drapes. Authority formulated the rules, and the artist complied. It will be pointed out that the artist’s lot is the same today.”

One would think that the art world, by now, in the 21st century, would be standing at the apotheosis of freedom and creativity, and that criticism would offer boundless opportunity towards nurturing growth and experimentation. But sadly, as we have seen, this is not always the case. Curators, arts councils, and funding organizations often act like old maids dispensing opprobrium to whomever challenges their moralistic sensibilities.  

If I had to say whom I blame for the poor state of how we engage critically today, it would not be Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook, or Elon Musk and X. It would be someone from long before the digital age in history. I would have to cite Socrates, who was always challenging other thinkers in the public forum and trying to prove them wrong. As the philosopher Robert Solomon has stated, “The important thing for Socrates was winning arguments.” He was trenchantly concerned with always being right, and liked to call his adversaries Sophists, when he was the biggest, and most vociferous, Sophist of all.  

It’s too bad they didn’t have social media in his day. Perhaps he could have been simply canceled, instead of being forced to drink hemlock. After 2,500 years, why are we still not listening to what we say to each other and, more importantly, why are we not defending that right to the death?