The Case Against Real PBs

[reimesu]

@faraday

1. I didn't call Gany out for several reasons.
   I actually was of the opinion that Gany wasn't attacking Ghost personally, but his arguments. Ghost's response was, IMHO, because he's not fond of being called out. But, by the time I was there to read Ghost's response, Gany had already self-edited and my input wasn't actually needed, in spite of Ghost later trying to get me to call out Gany, which was an action I found blatantly manipulative, much like his response to you.

2. There's two of us modding this board, one of whom has EXTREMELY limited time to deal with anything and not enough spoons, and then there's me, a menopausal bitch who is trying very hard to stay fair and not give actual opinions when what is called for is trying to stay unbiased. For the record, I'm EXTREMELY biased and Derp is reining me in because I'm feeling pretty extreme and if I get as honest as I'm actually feeling, things are going to go south real fast.

3. I'm watching an awful lot of people backseat mod when they don't want to step up. Anyone want to come be a third? Please do apply. I'd welcome it. But mods have lives, this is a slow forum and this is about as active as we're likely to get, since, as aforementioned, there's two of us and one of us had his personal time severely curtailed and the other one has limited spoons. Then again, criticising about how the mods do it when no one wants to be one is also a time-honored tradition.

4. We're not getting clearer community guidelines. Period. There are not enough spoons to try to make up rules when the overwhelming rule is "don't be a dick." However, if anyone thinks we should remove this thread, DM me, I'd be all for it. I'm one of the people who actually found this entire thread insulting.

5. I'm trying like hell to be fair, here. As it happens, I think I'm being fairer to Ghost than everyone else because again, personal bias: I'm insulted as hell, I've watched him ignore me, ignore everyone who's insulted and he's only paying attention to Gany, Derp and you, Faraday. My response to my own known bias is to try to be more open-minded, which is clearly biting me on the ass.

Anyway, thanks for your input, I'll take it all under advisement.

[Derp]

@reimesu

I am 100% on board with everything in this post. All of it.

[faraday]

@reimesu said in The Case Against Real PBs:

I'm watching an awful lot of people backseat mod when they don't want to step up.

You specifically asked for my suggestions; I gave them.

But frankly, no - I don't want to be a mod on a forum that for years has consistently said "thx but no" to my pleas for a different moderation style.

It's your (collective) right to choose how to run the forum. It's my right to be disappointed and frustrated when every conversation in even the "mildly constructive" section devolves into a flame war.

[Ghost]

@faraday here's constructive for you.

There will never be a forum for this hobby that isn't toxic, because dating way back even before WORA it was made pretty clear that when presented with two options...

1. A forum for people to share ideas, be friendly, and support each other
2. A forum to attack, slander, and outright fabricate lies against people who perpetrators feel "negatively impact their make-believe time", resulting in a 20%/80% split between actual attacks against truly dangerous players to 80% attacks against mostly innocent people who are just seeking a social outlet

We all know which one wins. People are still fighting to keep the Hog Pit open so that they can review and reread 10+ years of unethical, cruel bullshit mostly conducted by people who attack others to maintain some semblance of being "the vocal moral authority" despite mountains of unethical behavior.

What people often don't say is that the forums aren't toxic because of the admin, but because of the constant heat the admin get from these "Super ethical people" who feel the "Super ethical way" of dealing with every last annoyance is to "super ethically make public displays of what happens to those who resist." The amount of dumb peer pressure and heat these admin get, thus having to be careful if they want to to continue to partake in the hobby themselves, I'm sure is downright a pain in the ass.

This forum and others like it should absolutely be shut down, wiped, and for the better of the community (and refuse to save any data from the Hog Pit and laugh as people cry about it as if 30 family picture albums of great memories are reduced to ashes), and the community as a whole would be better if ethical people actually treated the people fighting for the right to be recreationally cruel to others like the problem they are.

But hey, we can keep at it if people want, too. All this demanding pounds of flesh didn't work 15+ years ago, so I'm sure it'll eventually stop being something that never works and only creates greater rifts and start being something that yields results.

I'm sure I'll get a third strike eventually, but the real secret is that me going away will change literally nothing except the amount of time I check reddit. It remained a cesspool 10+ years ago when <name> was ruining the community and 15 minutes later the same thing was said about a different person by the same "Super ethical majority" of people with their pitchforks and torches. They're always going to have a new target. Me? I'm just in the privileged position of being outside of truly being able to be retaliated against, and have stopped caring enough to refrain from speaking to those people like they can bully me.

But it was true back then as it is now with this community. There are simply some egos who have gotten to the point where they feel that if you incur their wrath that others deserve the mistreatment, and any HR department could tell you that the community is a quid-pro-quo environment with plenty of retaliation...so tread lightly who you "check".

This, I feel, is constructive.

Literally read the first three posts in this thread again.

I honestly (and out of boredom and no recent posts) posted a little editorial about how I personally find TS with PBs to be creepy, in the mildly constructive section of the forum no less. I think it is. Sue me. It was an opinion.

It took 3 posts before someone decided that it was about me "shaming people for their likes" (despite multiple "my opinion" and "not slut shaming" statements), and then when even a forum admin performed the first personal attacks and I stood up for myself (albeit with a snide tone) and others came in to do so as well (including people who don't even use the forum anymore), and the attacks came before any questions (that never came) like "ghost what was your intention?" or even "Hey you're coming in too hot, so before I make this combative could I ask you to tone it down?" Instead? Combative responses, personal attacks, and I was pretty grateful for that apology after someone else pointed out some of the unfairness taking place, which probably would never have happened otherwise.

I'm pretty sure all of this re-iteration of strikes or whatnot, for some, is probably more about seeing a ban happening more than any moral or ethical stance, because the level of schadenfreude some of these people have towards others is pretty disgusting. This coming from the same crowd of people who hate Derp and make jokes about how no one chats here, anymore, like they actually care.

There's just a severe film of dishonesty and "protecting friends who do bad" in the entire hobby that has persisted, and it's going to be at every forum involving this particular crowd of MU-users.

I really, constructively, wish people spent more time pushing back against the people who were the source of the issue.

And while I'm not directly attacking anyone, the simplest resolution lies in the fact that if you dislike my opinion so much that you can't refrain from being Combative or performing personal attacks, you could block me and never deal with me and spare me the time of having to sit through some explanation about how it's my fault you got ugly.

I could get hit by a bus tomorrow and not a single facet of the community's problems would skip a beat.

[faraday]

@Ghost said in The Case Against Real PBs:

There will never be a forum for this hobby that isn't toxic

https://forum.aresmush.com/. It is not toxic. It also has no real traffic, because you're right - a large chunk of the community wants the hog pit (or the other place's equivalent) and the rest (understandably) just go where the people are.

Electric Soup back in the day wasn't toxic either. It had very little traffic compared to WORA, but we were happy in our little peaceful corner of the world. I was sad when it closed, because then I was left with "WORA or nothing" and I chose nothing. MSB gave me hope for something better because it at least tried to have a constructive section.

@Ghost said in The Case Against Real PBs:

This, I feel, is constructive.

What I advocate for is a forum that is both constructive AND civil. I don't think you can truly have one without the other.

Your points are often valid, but are presented in such an antagonistic manner that they get lost. People just end up reacting to the flames. So no, I don't feel that's constructive from a forum standpoint - and I say that as a friend who genuinely enjoys chatting with you 1-on-1.

[Ghost]

@faraday Yeah, my delivery doesn't help. I know this and you're welcome to say so. Regardless of my good-or-neutral intentions, my delivery often sucks ESPECIALLY when it comes to the topic of unethical people or sexual harassment/illegality in the hobby. Personal experiences and traumas, etc.

Edit: No need to mince words, here. I've been stalked, sexually harassed, threatened, and been the target of "preemptive smear campaigns by people who actually did the wrong" by a number of well-known figures in the community. I've seen people defend pedophilia RP. I've seen some downright abusive behaviors conducted against ND people, ESL people, and emotionally compromised people. In a number of these cases I chose not to share receipts because I believed speaking out would only make a spectacle out of myself as someone else's 15 minute entertainment monkey. I'm done feeling like some of those people are entitled to civility from me, especially when lack of civility seems to drive their self-esteem as they act out for others to cheer them on for.

I get spicy about some of these issues (and my delivery) because there are other personal elements at play. People lie. I guarantee you someone just read the paragraph above was nodding in agreement, because the # of people I know with similar experiences had been a recurring theme for years.

...and for the life of me, I, as a person, cannot understand an environment that "protects" one category of people for bad behavior, but then admonishes people outside of their inner circle for similar behaviors, all the while claiming the overall behavior is wrong. I believe it's all related to "protecting the # of people who are willing to roleplay with you so that you aren't lonely" due to the also common theme (in years of MUing) where I watched people refuse to defend people they knew were innocent as to avoid rocking the boat or losing RP, themselves.

Literally an HR person on Earth could explain this, why it happens, and why a retaliatory environment is filled with unwillingness to defend one's self. #/edit

But in an even-handed world, an environment where people are cheered on for mistreating others (deserved or not) for a number of biased reasons will never be an environment where the most vulnerable people will be safe, because bullying is bullying, and true fairness never includes an element of positively rewarding cruelty.

That needs to be fixed for such a forum to exist and be a positive experience, and frankly the people who will never ever ever stop rewarding themselves (and their friends) for making examples out of others and laughing about being cruel will let that happen, so long as they remain welcome on the forums and the games.

I think people should consider that before they consider that the opinion on PBs of someone who isn't even affecting their gametime to be the end-all downfall of the hobby, even if it is the kind of argument designed to be read by an admin.

[Hella]

@faraday said in The Case Against Real PBs:

Your points are often valid, but are presented in such an antagonistic manner that they get lost. People just end up reacting to the flames. So no, I don't feel that's constructive from a forum standpoint

I agree with this. There are some good points in what is presented, but they get buried under the antagonism, which is not restricted to just Ghost's posts. This whole thread has been a good representation of the general issue, which is that there's some interesting content and discussion that could happen, if it wasn't overshadowed. I've never thought about the issue of using celebrity PBs or not before and those posting in this thread have made some really good points that have helped me give the matter more consideration. I still don't know where I fall on the issue but it was helpful to read the various stances posed here.

[Ghost]

@Hella Hey thanks for the feedback and if you have any bit of it you want to discuss I'm 100% down, no snideness, and would be keen to chat.

[Derp]

@Hella said in The Case Against Real PBs:

I still don't know where I fall on the issue but it was helpful to read the various stances posed here.

So I guess my hot take is as follows:

Real talk? It’s not an issue. Or it’s only as much an issue as, say, “the use of electricity is bad for the planet” is an issue. You can talk about ethical considerations until the end of time and possible ethical ramifications, alternatives, etc, but to what end? It’s already so ingrained into the culture as to be normalized, almost necessary for many of us, so all of this is academic at best.

It’s not going to change. Nobody but a very vocal minority wants it to change. It’s not a conversation that’s going to do anything but stoke tempers and make people look like wacky inflatable arm flaily tube men.

It’s a thing and it always will be, forever and ever, amen. No use in fighting it.

[Juniper]

Admitting I didn't read most of the discussion between here and the initial post.

PBs of real people's faces has always come off as a little strange to me and I have always preferred digital art because it doesn't feel like I'm using someone's likeness without consent. AI image generation has been a huge benefit although it still has a lot of kinks to iron out regarding ignoring instructions in favour of stereotypes. And there's ethical considerations with generative content, although it's not like I was ever paying digital artists for their work or making money off RPing so I don't think it matters much.

[Ghost]

@Juniper tldr you basically align with my original point. I never did like PBs because I found the usage of the likeness of an actual person to be somewhat "non-consenting". Prefer art.

[Macha]

Like I said, I see the point from either way. If I was any GOOD at AI, I might be inclined to use it, to take an image close to what I see in my head and make it even MORE closely aligned to how I picture a character.

[Juniper]

@Macha AI is a tease. I always feel like I'm 1 edit away from generating the perfect image but never quite get there.

[Macha]

@Juniper THIS. This would drive me NUTS and drive me away from trying it.

[faraday]

Using famous people for PBs is kind of meh, for reasons previously outlined.

Using AI to generate PBs (many of whom, let's be honest, are just going to be: "put Chris Pratt into a Starfleet uniform" kind of stuff) is kind of meh.

Not having PBs at all is kind of meh (for me anyway - which I now realize is partly due to my visual imagination being poor on the aphantasia scale, so descs just go in one ear and out the other.)

I see no good answer.

[Macha]

@faraday That was a super interesting link, thanks.

Is it weird I can sort of picture things in my head, sometimes, but reading descs.. the puzzle pieces don't click together?

[Ganymede]

@faraday said in The Case Against Real PBs:

I see no good answer.

This is usually the case when matters relate to personal tastes.

[reimesu]

@Macha I have the same problem. It's why I like PBs.

[Ghost]

Another idea I had or came across a while ago was to complilate a collage that encompasses the look and vibe of the character. So their face is ultimately less important to their vibe and presentation, right?

It's fun to do this anyway to get into the character design mindset.