When did it stop being about the books?

I've been watching all the goodreads drama unfold over the past several weeks and all I can say is it makes me sad.

When did it stop being about the books?

Now we've got people being called with threatening messages in the middle of the night, people being outted with pictures and addresses, authors declaring war on bloggers, reviewers declaring war on authors, authors declaring war on other authors...why is any of this happening?

When did it stop being about the books?

I love reading. I love books. I want to read books and enjoy them. This is why I first joined Goodreads, back in the day before I even was an author.

It kills me to see everyone forgetting why they first joined this site. Isn't it about the love of reading?

Who cares about reviews. Really. Is a bad review really going to change everything in your world? Is it going to destroy your career? Good lord, no. I read books with bad reviews all the time. Some of my favorite books have received horrid reviews.

Hell, I've received horrid reviews. So what? I didn't venture into writing thinking that everyone would love everything I write. I'm not a God. I do tend to write shit from time to time. I accept that not everyone is going to love what I do and I'm not going to try and change their minds.

So can't we all just try and return back to a certain center of normalcy and remember why we're here? We love to read. We love to write. We love to share our opinions...good or bad.