Most sensible, live and let live kind of people understand that their dislike of a book, story, movie or painting doesn t mean said book, movie, etc., should never have been placed in the public consciousness. Most sensible artists understand this as well. Having a negative reaction to something and expressing that reaction is not the same thing as saying someone can't or shouldn't write. Criticism and negative commentary are not synonymous with censorship. Equating the two is an oft-effective tactic to shutting down debate on the relative merits of any given creative work, but it s also an intellectually dishonest one.
Artists presumably place their work in the public arena so that other people can experience it.
Even the most arrogant of creative people probably don t operate under the delusion that everyone is going to just love what they ve done. It therefore seems to me that artists should always be girded for the possible negative reactions, and should be able to chalk said negative reactions up to the fact that we don t all have the same tastes and levels of aesthetic appreciation for things, as opposed to thinking negative reactions are the result of some nefarious plan to stifle or suppress creativity. If it's honestly just something one is doing for oneself, then it seems to me one would keep it to oneself and never share. Having said that, I would, however, also add that I absolutely believe writers and other artists have just as much right to dislike what their audience has to say as their audience has to dislike the creative work in question. And much like the audience has a right to express its reaction to an artist s work, an artist has the right to express an opinion about their audience s reaction.