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Just saw another post by someone advising not to waste energy boosting people who don't return your support, i.e. don't promote anyone's work unless the implied quid-pro-quo is delivered upon. Knock it off with that shit, seriously.
If the only reason you're boosting me or my work is because you want me owe you, seriously, don't fucking bother. If you don't like my stuff, don't pretend. If you like it, share it because you want other people to have the experience you did.
If I shout your work's awesomeness from the rooftops, you owe me jack squat. I don't care if we're on the same level, or I'm a god compared to you, or you're a god compared to me, I promote a thing because I believe in the thing, full stop.
Mutual support is great, and yeah, if you've got a friend who you know loves your stuff because they're always demanding you make more of it and immediately consuming it, and yet they NEVER mention in public that they like it, either they're lying to you or they're being selfish.
If you love a thing, yell about it. If that person's lack of yelling about your stuff makes you feel less inclined to yell about their work... maybe you didn't really like their stuff in the first place. So maybe your recommendations mean nothing, and people should ignore them.
I've honestly got to the point where I trust people's recs of other writers' work about as much as I trust their recs of their own. There's always some other reason for a 3rd party promo these days other than "I actually really loved this." It's an exhausting web to untangle.
So I'm not going to add to that. I'm just not. If I enjoy something, and I'm in a good place to be using social media, you can bet I'll be talking about it on here. I will also explicitly mention if I'm talking up a friend to support them personally.
But under no circumstances are you EVER expected to boost my work in return unless you just genuinely think it should be read by more people. Don't condescend to me, and certainly don't try to indebt me to you. I do not play that game.
