What Would it Take to Repair the Community?

[simplications]

@GreenFlashlight said in What Would it Take to Repair the Community?:

Beginning from the assumption that a victim's story must be litigated is indistinguishable from beginning from the assumption that victims are liars until proven innocent. I acknowledge that there is no perfect solution in a situation in which it is impossible to be neutral, but that does not stop me from being deeply disappointed at the direction the advocacy in this argument is leaning toward.

When the topic is narrowly about accusations of creepy/abusive/manipulative behavior I have to agree. It's frustrating to look at this thread and my own participation in it and see what looks in retrospect like advocacy toward limiting investigation into problematic actors. I came late to an understanding that the subtext of this discussion was all about that specifically and not really at all about the other kinds of lower stakes but still harmful group dragging that I was motivated to talk about. I suppose that's a natural risk of jumping in without being fully informed and I think I regret doing so at all now. I'm barely motivated to discuss the topic I was hoping to (and thought I was) anymore either because I worry it's trampling on a discussion about how to best protect vulnerable members of the community from actual predators. Reading back through this thread now with that in mind I feel like maybe this site isn't even the right place to try to address it. The waters here are certainly murky and I can't tell who is participating in good faith, who just wants to continue fighting a tribal battle I thought I understood enough about (holy shit was I wrong), and who actually stands to benefit in some manner from a decision one way or the other.

[Devrex]

Beginning from the assumption that a victim's story must be litigated is indistinguishable from beginning from the assumption that victims are liars until proven innocent.

Strong disagree. Beginning from the assumption that an allegation requires additional inquiry is beginning from the assumption that I the admin do not yet know the facts. All I have is a statement. It's probably true, absolutely, but if you read what I said about having been manipulated in the past into taking actions against the abused by an abuser with a sob story, you will see that earnest good actors can care about discovering the truth, no more, no less. You presuppose an opinion or a judgement call on the reporter when that's just not always the case.

Yes, there is a systemic problem wherein victims are blamed and reporters go unheeded. I will grant you this. I am sorry that you are hurt, angry, and, apparently, feeling threatened by the idea that there should be some inquiry. But inquiry itself is not the source of the systemic problem. The source of the systemic problem is the shitty cultural soup that we're all swimming around in, breathing, and the answer to that is to be aware that those biases exist and to be as impartial as you can be, not to say, "Oh shit, Green Flashlight talked smack about Player X, I must believe this unconditionally without so much as seeing a log."

[reimesu]

@simplications I think the only way we can really keep going to protect people from bad actors is to a) establish what the bad behaviors that we want to see people protected from are, b) establish how much responsibility on any given game the player base needs to do in order to protect themselves, and c) have places where we can keep talking, honestly, and hopefully kindly.

I know people are going to be up in arms about my point b) but the thing is this: there's nothing wrong with staff saying, "I only have so many spoons, there are steps you need to take, too." At the very least, how about a blanket "I am not comfortable around this person and am requesting a No-Contact Order?" Mail it to the person and CC staff so there's some kind of...paper trail, and then if the person who's going no contact gets paged or @mailed again, there's that request already in place. (It's a theory, a suggestion, not a "my will be done," btw. A jumping off point for discussion.) I mean, at least on Ares, there's multiple easy ways to report a page convo or a scene to staff. Otherwise, there's screenshots and logs.

[GreenFlashlight]

@Derp said in What Would it Take to Repair the Community?:

And yet it's strange how almost every society in the world has structured its systems of justice around the premise that an accused is innocent until proven guilty, which requires, you know -- proof.

First, I disagree that we are talking about systems of justice. We are talking about systems of punishment, which is not the same thing. Healing is justice. If you think I am advocating for silently and instantly kicking people off games the first time someone pages staff, then you do not understand me at all, nor my stance on how to effectively deal with victims. I went into it years ago and will not bother repeating it because I could not convince people then to stop viewing this as a matter of authority figures needing to "solve" problems with punitive dominance displays that focus on the abuser over the abused, and nothing has changed since then to make the audience any more receptive.

Second, refusing to believe a victim is itself an accusation that the victim is a perjurer who must prove herself innocent of the crime. It is not and cannot be a neutral position, because neutrality is impossible in the case of accusations. You must choose which party you default to believing is innocent of an offense, and you have. I will never change your mind, and cannot ever affect your ability to implement whatever policy you want, so I'm not sure why you bother arguing with me at all.

[Tez]

@reimesu said in What Would it Take to Repair the Community?:

Also, the people no longer welcome on this board are the ones who want to bring the personal attacks.

At best, this is disingenuous defamation. I would like to hear how this is not in fact a mod making a broad personal attack on those unable to answer it.

Personally, I want to hear from the people who've been scared into silence for the last few years.

Me too.

[reimesu]

@Tez I'm not saying this is why people were banned, except Kestrel. I'm saying this is behavior that is no longer welcome. (I'm not speaking to past bannings, just the one that I was involved with.) Hope that clarifies it.

[Derp]

@GreenFlashlight

I disagree.

@GreenFlashlight said in What Would it Take to Repair the Community?:

I will never change your mind, and cannot ever affect your ability to implement whatever policy you want, so I'm not sure why you bother arguing with me at all.

Because I disagree.

I think the better question at this point is, if you think that we're all tyrannical victim-blaming authoritarian misogynists? Why are you still here?

What do you think you're accomplishing? What's the end goal, here? I don't understand. You're already said that you don't think you're going to change my mind or any of the policies implemented and you have an entire other forum full of like-minded people to support you, so why this? Why here? What's the point?

[simplications]

I'm gonna bow out of this discussion. I appreciate everyone who participated in good faith. I also regret coming in hot to a situation I had cold details on. It's easy to come out swinging when you think you're completely in the right about something but I still need to eat that crow.

I showed up wanting to address something that was, in retrospect, part of unresolved baggage I had from an era in my life where I'd fallen into Us v. Them thinking. This whole experience has given me a reason to rethink how I perceived a group that seemed nothing other than nasty people who enjoy dragging others.

I actually went and looked up in the Hog Pit archive what appear to be some of the conversations that bothered my friends who left the hobby and while the people posting there weren't, let's say, operating at their most kind and generous I recognize that sort of stuff is the product of avalanches of smaller moments of social friction. The posts were hurtful comments based on IC stuff and sort of reveling in the apparent misfortune of those they didn't like, for far lower stakes than the abusive behavior that's being discussed here. And well, that's just how the human animal sometimes operates in groups. Should those people do better? I like to imagine that they already are, or are trying to, and I don't see the value in holding further grudges.

I feel able to let go some unnecessary baggage, focus on the lessons I learned about my own conduct, and try to do better myself. Thank you for the opportunity, and mea culpa, apologies, for what of my own mess I left on the floor. I hope the best for everyone that truly wants to take steps toward improving our shared hobby's community. MU* is something special.

[GreenFlashlight]

@Derp said in What Would it Take to Repair the Community?:

@GreenFlashlight

I disagree.

Great, cool, thanks for clarifying that. I hadn't been sure if we were actually in complete agreement but just engaging in a series of typos that made it look like we disagree with one another's positions.

[Ganymede]

@GreenFlashlight said in What Would it Take to Repair the Community?:

Second, refusing to believe a victim is itself an accusation that the victim is a perjurer who must prove herself innocent of the crime.

Between the opposites of honesty and fraud is a gray area, one that I swim in professionally on a daily basis. If an accuser presents an allegation, I can believe that allegation while still desiring or demanding an investigation of the allegation. More often than not, the accuser's belief in the truth is based on their perception of events which an accused admits has occurred, but for which they have a different perception.

If staff undertakes an investigation of an allegation, that is indicative of a belief in the truth of what has been said. If staff demand evidence prior to undertaking that investigation, then that is indicative of their disbelief. As such, my inclination is to investigate every allegation as they come. But just because an investigation results in little or no other evidence, that does not mean the accused is a perjurer. If people are prone and allowed to make mistakes, then misapprehensions should be seen as such.

In the end, my experience is that there is very often little or no evidence available, and investigations are sometimes handcuffed by the need to keep the identities of the accuser anonymous, so as to avoid collateral damage arising from the reporting.

[Misadventure]

@Derp & @GreenFlashlight

I want to hear well-spoken and crafted arguments on many sides of any topic.

I don't care if it changes minds, that is very rare. (Again, RL says 30% conversion rate would be stunning).

It may shape thoughts and expectations, or open new areas for thought in a reader. Sometimes that can take years to percolate through a mind, and it's still worthwhile.

I tend to ignore charged or pejorative language. It feels like begging the question too much.

I wouldn't want to see one specific topic be the only topic forever. And I am one of those dumb people who seems to ask a series of extremely similar questions because it helps me understand something.

I also happen to think (demand of myself) that people can disagree and be in the same place and not do damage to one another.

I think all that and am comfortable posting here. Whatever that means.

[Ghost]

Here's a well-spoken and well-crafted argument:

I don't think that everyone involved in this chat is interested in repairing things or making things better, but instead doing damage or attacking others under the guise of well-crafted responses that are designed to fly under the radar of "board rules" but directed enough to allow for going to another forum that does allow for personal insults to high five each other "Hah! GOOD ONE!"

Here's my explanation.

Say one were interested in CREATING AN ENVIRONMENT WHERE VICTIMS AREN'T BLAMED. How can that be achieved while saying that other people are trying to create an environment where bad guys can roam free, how a desire to make sure innocents aren't wrongly accused, while those people are trying to simply come up with a solution that makes sense? Accusations and these "theories about super agendas" are, in fact, victimizing others. So by attacking people for having a civil discussion...it would be victimizing people in the name of...ending victimization?

There's a logic that doesn't flow in some of these behaviors.

• Personal attacks are bad, so I'm going to make personal attacks because I interpreted your statement as an indirect attack
• I don't like people theorizing things about me, but that's because your agenda is to...
• I'm not okay with you talking about trying to be civil and respectful now because back in March of 2004 you said....

The reason why no one is shifting or yielding on these points (myself included) is because some of the counter-arguments have been proposed alongside accusations of extreme things like "trying to bring Cullen back!" or "fascist!" or "I bet you're probably someone banned for the forum trying to trick everyone into letting you back in!" Sure, these things make for great headlines, but these arguments aren't designed in any way to be civil. They're designed to throw hate. I myself have even been referred to as "one of the most vile personalities on the forum EVAR", not that anyone has an actual problem with me hunting them down to belittle them publicly in front of others. Again, looks great on headlines but isn't productive at all.

But that's kind of the point, isn't it? These accusations and clever wordings aren't dealt in private because having the audience to "OOOOO" and "OHHHH" like a rap battle IS kind of the point at play, and it's NOT normal, it's NOT civil, it's NOT respectful, and it's not designed to...make anything better. There is little point other than to throw shots and jabs to come over to "teach people a lesson" when they're trying to "discuss a concept with civility" other than to crash that party, pour gasoline on it, and laugh with your friends.

Worse yet, there's a lot of stretching in the community ethics-wise in terms of "This person is so horrible that my horrible behavior in response is both fun and justified"...thus completely dismantling the importance of "not being horrible" to begin with. In the end, it's really about "Who gets to hold the lash." So, with the topic in mind, I think that people need to take a good, long look into WHY they're involving themselves in this conversation. If it's not to DISCUSS WHAT IT WOULD TAKE TO REPAIR THE COMMUNITY WITH RESPECT AND CIVILITY then please do everyone a favor and create a topic on your forum that -does- allow people to be fucking punks towards each other, invite people to discuss it how you want to there, and call it a day. You can act like that with the people who show up for that.

There are people that are trying to enjoy an environment where they can discuss things without having to dodge bullets constantly, and the fact that these discussions (intended to be civil) continually involve people popping in to shoot bullets is probably key in terms of what the major hurdles are to actually establish some form of mature civility in the community.

I think people should meditate on that. There's a lot to think on, there. Clearly there are open wounds that have festered, but in concept I think people need to consider things like: "If someone were to BEG for civility and a cease-fire, would you honor that?"

I just think there's a lot of value in stepping back and taking a look at the big picture and asking the following question:

"There are 2 forums, and it appears that most of the people who dislike each other are on separate forums. So why so much reaching across the aisle to ensure that you're continuing to interact with people you don't like?"

And, I say this respectfully, I skimmed past a lot of the personal insults and whatnot on BMD, and it doesn't appear that BMD has a problem with people from here coming over there to insult them, sooo....what's the point of this? Is it okay if people try to discuss this topic without being attacked, or what?

[Devrex]

@Misadventure said in What Would it Take to Repair the Community?:

@Derp & @GreenFlashlight

I want to hear well-spoken and crafted arguments on many sides of any topic.

I don't care if it changes minds, that is very rare. (Again, RL says 30% conversion rate would be stunning).

I appreciate hearing this, because most of the time I feel like I'm just...beating my head bloody on a brick wall whenever I post stuff.

[Misadventure]

@Devrex

Sometimes it's "... not because they are easy, but because they are hard, ..."

Sometimes it's The Sunk cost fallacy.

[Devrex]

"There are 2 forums, and it appears that most of the people who dislike each other are on separate forums. So why so much reaching across the aisle to ensure that you're continuing to interact with people you don't like?"

And, I say this respectfully, I skimmed past a lot of the personal insults and whatnot on BMD, and it doesn't appear that BMD has a problem with people from here coming over there to insult them, sooo....what's the point of this? Is it okay if people try to discuss this topic without being attacked, or what?

This. So much this. When I dare to read BMD...I wouldn't post on there if paid...or when some of these folks come over here...what I see is:

• Lots of virulent insults...the one that really stuck with me was mouth making ass cheek flapping sounds, just...vile stuff.
• Lots of hyperbolic accusations that paint everyone here in just the darkest possible terms regardless of whether there's any grounding in reality for those accusations.
• Aggressiveness and sarcasm aimed pointedly at specific people.
• Extreme distortions, such as characterizing "You're intelligent but I don't agree with your behavior right now" as a...personal attack? Really? A compliment as a personal attack? What?

It's gotten to the point where I HAVE considered just begging people to leave us alone. If we're really so awful then it would make no sense to continue interacting with us would it? Why would any of them want to be unbanned? This makes no sense and I know that it is seriously hurting people at this point.

The worst I think that's been said, by contrast, at this point, is that bullying is taking place, and I mean...name-calling, accusations, tossing up old baggage, sarcasm, sneering, aggressiveness, etc. etc. is bullying behavior. It does not make the person engaging in the behavior an irrevocable bully, it does not make THEM a thing but it does state that the BEHAVIOR is bullying behavior.

The other thing that has been said, repeatedly, is that the bans were the result of failing to ignore repeated warnings and requests to stop engaging in a behavior, but it keeps getting twisted into other stuff. But ultimately it baffles as to why anyone would protest the bans or want to come back.

There's so much cross-talk going on that it's not even funny, when we could just be at peace in separate dadgum forums.

Instead it's just. Poke. Poke. Poke. Virulent insults! Poke. Poke. Poke. Accusations! Poke poke poke poke! WHY?

The ones who hate us now have every opportunity and tool to go hate us over there. We're not bothering you. Stop bothering us, stop insulting us, stop accusing us. The moment you guys leave us be we will no longer be talking about any y'all, as evinced by the two flaming months where we did not talk about any of y'all. We had other things we wanted to talk about. If you feel the community at large needs to be warned about us because we don't share your views then I think the 1100+ posts y'all got over on BMD have adequately warned whomever you feel needs to know.

Irony: some of the behavior you're warning people about on these players you're saying are soooooooooo terrible is...folks who wouldn't LEAVE YOU ALONE when ASKED REPEATEDLY TO LEAVE YOU ALONE.

Oh hey, that's what a buncha y'all were banned for too. Pot and kettle, anyone?

Just. Sod OFF already.

[Arkandel]

@Devrex said in What Would it Take to Repair the Community?:

The ones who hate us now have every opportunity and tool to go hate us over there. We're not bothering you.

Who is being hated, by whom, or why?

I read and post on both forums. Am I with 'us' or 'them'? Who hates me?

[Derp]

@Arkandel

Dude, come on.

https://brandmuday.mythicus.net/topic/44/bannings/1399

That's pretty blatant. Let's not pretend that some of the BMD users have no axe to grind. They're grinding it pretty openly, and that thread in particular is just the launching pad for them coming over here to stir shit up.

You don't get a black mark for being a member of both forums, but I'm telling people this now: if you're coming here just to shitpost and troll, you're not engaging in good faith, which is a violation of the Code of Conduct, and I'm pretty done with it.

ETA: The general 'you' naturally, not you specifically.

[Devrex]

@Arkandel Neither. You're coming over here and having reasonable discussions. I don't care if people post on both boards.

I mean the specific users who come to this board, engage in sarcasm, engage in lots of accusations and poking and saying rude and awful stuff, and then when that is answered, mostly in a measured way, I might add, go back over there to accuse specific users over here of being rapists, rape-apologists, rape rape rape rape, stalkers, etc. etc. etc., while adding a few more gems along the way.

If you don't do that, which you don't, you're not who I am talking about.

Really I need to stop looking at BMD; a few times posts have been brought to my attention and I've taken a breath and gone to see to see if I could get context, but the stuff going on right over here is enough. The aggressive sarcasm, name calling, all that stuff, is happening right over here. I don't care what is done over there, ultimately, but I'd like to be left alone over here, I'd like the rest of our users to be left alone over here, I'd like to go back to where we were 2 months ago where all this was not happening. It didn't start happening till a few folks got bored and came over here to see if they couldn't provoke us into saying stuff they could yell about.

[Selira]

@Devrex said in What Would it Take to Repair the Community?:

It didn't start happening till a few folks got bored and came over here to see if they couldn't provoke us into saying stuff they could yell about.

hey, can you stop putting words in my mouth and ascribing motivations to me? i've laid mine out clearly on both here and BMD. this isn't what happened.

[Devrex]

@Selira By now a LOT of people have come and done this. If you feel that your posts were not sarcastic, not aggressive, not pointed, not accusatory, and not cruel, great, guess you're in the clear. I could start going through this thread to find specific instances from all the posts that have bothered me but I frankly do not have the energy. Maybe all the folks who got aggressive truly don't believe they did, but holy wow did a lot of them come across as aggressive and cruel, even before I read their counterparts on the other thread...a move I sincerely regret making.