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A note to writers: please do not ask editors to do free labour for you. I do genuinely mean that kindly. Please don't do it. I get this all the time, and I know pretty much every editor does too. I feel like it's quite a tricky conversation. So here's a little thread on it.
On the one hand, community IS important, and participating in community is valuable. Many of us want to uplift others, especially new authors. And, often, we do. We volunteer, we take on positions with little or no pay because we believe in our community, because we value it.
But many editors will politely turn down requests to look over work and this surprises authors. It makes us seem selfish, like we don't care. But writers can't imagine the number of acquaintances, friends, and complete strangers who ask editors to review their writing for free.
We're already swamped and we do a lot of free labour for our community. We're often underpaid and overworked. A lot of editors are also freelancers. Editing is our job. So we need to be protective of our time.
I don't doubt it feels hard to be turned down that way for writers, but it's necessary for us to do our work. For us to live. That goes for freelancers in every profession, because the expectations of free labour are always there.
Asking for that kind of free labour also makes the conversation uncomfortable. Even if you don't intend it this way, you're forcing an editor to explain why their time is valuable, why they can't do this free labour for you. Which also takes time and energy.
The interaction is awkward for everyone. But sometimes it gets ugly. ESPECIALLY when the editor is a woman and/or otherwise marginalized. Especially if the author wants feedback on that perspective. They want to get it right and why isn't the editor supporting that?
If you truly want that editor's feedback, open by offering to hire them. Then it becomes a business conversation. It isn't a favour, it isn't free labour. Then you are colleagues, you are people working in the same field. You show that you respect their time and their work.
Who knows, maybe they'll give you a discount because you're friends. But that's up to them to decide, and don't expect it. By framing the request as WORK you're allowing them to set the terms properly, as they would otherwise. You aren't diminishing or undervaluing what they do.
That way you also aren't putting unnecessary strain on that relationship. You don't get insulted by their response, and they don't need to have a conversation with you that they've been forced to have hundreds of times already with others.
And I get it, honestly. A LOT of writers don't know how this works. They just want feedback. Which is why it's important to be open and honest about this. To share this perspective when it comes up, so newer writers encounter it. So they understand.
Again, really not looking to rant. I just think it's important to discuss this sort of thing openly.
In my case, my time/energy is really dictated by my health. I'm disabled, and people do tend to understand my perspective on this because of it. But all of the above applies to editors/freelancers broadly. It isn't because someone is able bodied that their time is less valuable.
I invite other marginalized editors to chime in on this. There's often a recognition that our perspectives are valuable, but then there's a total disconnect in terms of the monetary value of those perspectives. And that's a serious, systemic problem.
One last bit on community. You know, editors spend a LOT of the money they earn BACK into their community by buying books. Lots of them. They can't actually support their community if you don't pay them.
