Success Quote by Stanley Schmidt

Consensus is the telltale sign of harmlessness. Stanley Schmidt’s line is an editor’s provocation disguised as a rule of thumb: if your work draws no heat, it probably isn’t taking a real position. The first clause weaponizes “hate” as a diagnostic tool. Not because hatred is admirable, but because strong negative reaction often means you’ve touched a live wire - challenged someone’s priors, stepped on a vested interest, or refused the soothing neutrality that lets readers feel informed without feeling implicated.

The subtext is about risk and institutional courage. Magazines love to claim they “spark debate,” but they also chase subscriber comfort, advertiser safety, and social-media-friendly agreeability. Schmidt flips the incentive structure: a publication that truly aims to provoke thought should expect friction as a cost of doing business. Agreement, in this frame, isn’t evidence of clarity; it can be evidence of careful sanding-down, a politics of palatability.

Context matters: Schmidt is a writer and long-time editor in genre culture, where fandoms are both passionate and punishing, and where editorial choices can ignite intense backlash. He’s not romanticizing outrage for its own sake; he’s describing the ecology of attention. In a media environment that rewards blandness with broad reach, he argues for a narrower, sharper ambition: publish work that some people will reject because it refuses to flatter them.

There’s also a quiet warning. Provocation isn’t the same as quality, and hate can be manufactured cheaply. Schmidt’s standard is tougher: earn the disagreement by making readers think hard enough to risk being uncomfortable.