When Nice People Use Headlines that Make Them Sound Like Assholes

Readers will judge you by your article’s title

Acting like a jerk, even if you mean well. Photo courtesy of Skovalsky on DepositPhotos

Headlines can be mean.

Just look at these titles:

“No One Cares About Your Life”

“Why Your Writing Sucks”

“It’s Not the Algorithm, It’s You”

“Why You Are Destined to Fail”

(I changed some of the wording to avoid embarrassing the writers.)

You get the idea. These types of titles are so common that you must have seen loads of them already.

Yet, when I click them out of morbid curiosity, I realize the author had good intentions and even great advice.

But why?

I get that on a platform like Medium, you want an attention-grabbing headline or else the reader will scroll past your article.

But is it worth the risk of alienating your audience?

Not all readers have a morbid curiosity like I do. Many others would simply ignore your article out of anger. Wouldn’t it be a shame to lose a good reader like that? Some may even remember you as an asshole.

Perhaps you think I’m too softhearted and picky. Nonetheless, with these blaming and…