Critical Review

I had a class in college where I sat next to two people who had several other classes together. Every day they would talk about the creative writing class they shared earlier in the morning. I was privy to all the gossip in that class, but able to hear it from a completely removed place. Every time they spoke, they blasted all the other writers in the class and talked about how terrible the stuff was. From what I could gather, everyone in that class took turns writing something and passing it around, and then they would all critique that person. I never once heard them deviate from their harsh critiques, until it was their day to write a story and pass it around arrived. That day, it was long, drawn out excuses about how they'd rushed to write their story, they knew it was terrible, and so forth. Then the other person would assure them that it was an amazing story, worthy of publishing and awards. The crazy thing is that they always seemed to believe each other.