Eric, There's a lot of truth in what you and Pegelli are saying but it assumes that the poster posts something that can be critiqued. As I've said before, an awful lot of the photographs that get posted on User Critiques are snapshots: tourist shots. How can you critique a shot that has nothing going for it except that it's pretty, or that its subject is something unusual? When this kind of picture gets on here the criticism usually amounts to: "I like it," or "It doesn't do anything for me," or "You should crop out some of the sky," etc., etc. What else can you say about that kind of picture?
I can't see how this helps the poster. Seems to me the proper "critique" for a tourist shot is: "Go to the library and check out three books: one by Ansel Adams, one by Henri Cartier-Bresson, and one by Robert Frank. As you go through these three books, see if there's anything in them that makes you want to run out the door with your camera and start shooting pictures. If not, go back to the library and check out a book by Paul Strand, one by Edward Weston, and one by Walker Evans. If you go through these three books and still don't want to run out the door with your camera, consider taking up music or amateur theater instead of photography.