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But what if you don't want to have no conversation, but just want to look cool to your likeminded buddies, whoever they may be? Then giving reasons for your opinion would be an inefficient strategy because people might like things for other reasons than you do, so you'd be different. Uncool! Clearly the best option is to shit on things as vaguely as possible so you don't have to justify yourself, because god knows you're neither confident enough to logically defend your opinion nor bothered enough to actually articulate it in such a fashion. #sheeple (I disagree with you on underrated, though you have a point as I have seen it used both ways in a way that is somewhat above the barber's estimation. Perhaps he is using a more society-wide estimate, while we are using something biased by like 2-3 popular topics in the community created by people with poor diction?)

I also agree on SoL being an important element in writing. The problem shows up, when writers can't really balance the contents of their story well enough. As @@RedK said, it's fine for SoL to make majority of the game's content, at least in terms of modern standards (although, I'd still digress - even moege or charage can be written differently - they don't particulary require SoL as sole supporting element), but things get different with story-centric prose. Whereas an average charage or moege can survive solely on influx of SoL elements, more active genres require action and catalysts for these to actually happen. Good prose tends to minimize SoL elements to brief periods between chapters or events, where the action unfolds and remain used solely as subtle character-building devices. It's said, that "real characters" gain soul only through "real ordeals" - obviously, SoL itself isn't enough to actually construct an interesting character with deep personality, unless you're planning to create the next generation of Mary Sue's.

SoL segments are perfectly fine in a charage or moege imo.