I agree

Yes, once I was. As Susan says above, there's usually at least one useful point you can take even from a really negative review (I tend to leave it in a drawer for a few weeks until I'm in a state to process it). However (as James has noted above) in this particular instance the main point was "I loathe this paper because it doesn't agree with me, and I'm going to say it's worthless as a result". I ended up publishing the paper elsewhere successfully; the journal wasn't quite as "prestigious" as the first, but I was treated much more fairly. It's made me wary of that first journal, to be honest. My advice is: keep persisting - we've all gone through it, unfortunately. It's horrible, and I wish we didn't have to go through it, but in certain jurisdictions it seems endemic. I think the anonymous nature of reviews allows some people to be thoroughly unpleasant.

Personally, I would never treat another person's paper like that. I do not have a problem with people taking a different approach to me. Moreover, I always try to be polite and constructive with reviews, even when I'm rejecting a paper, so that the person can rework it and submit it elsewhere.

I hope you find a good home for your paper just as I did with mine too.

All the best, Katy

Yes, it happened once. I send a letter to the editor in chief explaining how wrong and biased was the review process and asked for another opininon. Fortunately, editor in chief agree with me and cancel the decision and send my paper again for a new peer review and it was accepted

never

My two cents, as an author, editor, and reviewer: briefly, many colleagues are not willing to understand that original research articles and encyclopedias are not the same thing. And many editors often just read the reviewers' reccomendations without going through comments an authors' replies. Maybe I am wrong, but I have had several experiences of this kind.

James Marson

Best wishes

Nicola