Posts made by faraday

@collective said in How should IC discrimination be handled?:

But I feel like there is a little accidental goal post moving going on by suddenly limiting this discussion to hypothetical historical games.

Given that the OP's original question specifically included them I fail to see any goalpost-moving here.

@arkandel said in How should IC discrimination be handled?:

For instance would you feel about a vaguely racist characters belong on a MUSH set at a time slavery was still legal? Would you find it appropriate (or how inappropriate) for a Victorian age PC to use a slur against Chinese NPCs? How about sexism if the game is set in the fifties("you mean a woman is in charge of your team?!"). How about playing homophobes?

@collective said in How should IC discrimination be handled?:

Let me start this by saying that I don't think 'Theme' trumps human beings. I just don't. If a hypothetical game runner does, they should post a notice saying so in policy or character gen, so I can move along and find another game.

Let me be clear - I fully respect and support your right to have games free of whatever RL discrimination makes you uncomfortable. (In fact - come play on my BSG game, which is exactly such a place). I fully support games' rights to say "it's alt-history Wild West, where slavery never existed".

But if a game is going for 'costume drama realism', and discrimination is a part of the theme, then I don't think it's fair for one player to force other players to alter their characters to ignore that aspect of the theme. Fade to black? Sure. Handwave abuse instead of using the words on screen? Sure. Try to avoid each other as much as possible? Sure. But if you're a preacher and my cowgirl gunslinger walks into your church, I think you have a right to react to that ICly.

@collective that example seems reasonably innocuous and I have no problem with it. But what about the examples I cited? Or if that comment you made had been in direct reaction to something going on IC at that moment? Obviously everything is case by case but it seems to me that many of the cases become pretty problematic if the antagonist is displaying thematic views.

@collective said in How should IC discrimination be handled?:

That having been said, you were quoting me to illustrate a point I was not making and I do not believe could be reasonably inferred from the text. That's not kosher. Not even a little.

I was quoting you to illustrate a point I (and others too) honestly thought you were making. A simple, "Yo, that's not what I meant" would have sufficed in place of assuming the worst and going on the attack.

Back to the topic, I said back on page 1 that I can see both sides of the argument. I'm not arguing for or against either having -isms or not having them. Games should feel free to make their own choices.

What I don't get is this the idea of the whole "opt-out" thing. It's one thing to say "sexism doesn't exist in this theme". People can deal with that (see: Arx or BSG). But "sexism totally exists in this theme but your cowgirl gunslinger PC can opt out of it" seems problematic.

How does she opt out of it? Is the ranch owner PC forced to hire her even though thematically he would have reason not to? Are the 'proper lady' PCs of town forced to not give her side-eye even though thematically they totally would? Etc. etc.

FTB on an assault scene or avoiding a specific plotline is easy. I genuinely don't comprehend how one would "opt out" of pervasive historic discrimination.

@collective Wow. I point out how maybe your words came across differently than you intended while also supportively saying there's nothing wrong with it, and you decide to attack with I can't read English and I'm making straw man arguments?

Every time I think maybe people can have a civil discussion on MSB and decide to give it another try I'm proven wrong.

@sunny said in How should IC discrimination be handled?:

@Collective and I are surely not saying it now, but it's sure being addressed like we are.

I seriously don't know what you're talking about. Who do you think is misrepresenting what?

I see:

@collective said in How should IC discrimination be handled?:

And yes, I know my characters are not me. But I also don't think it's entirely unreasonable to ask why the 'right' to be vile and hurtful to other people is so much more important than anyone else feeling welcome in a given environment. Because those words hit the players with the same force they hit the characters sometimes.

That certainly comes across to me as saying that it's bad for people to argue for the "right" to have IC -ism in their games. And there have been other comments in this thread to that same effect. If that's not what was intended, then it's just a miscommunication.

Now bear in mind I said earlier that I prefer to avoid RL -isms too in RP. They make me uncomfortable. So I'm not saying there's anything wrong with that viewpoint. But I'm just genuinely puzzled by the assertion that "nobody's saying it shouldn't be allowed" when I think some are.

@sunny said in How should IC discrimination be handled?:

"I don't want to deal with this in my fun time" =/= "Nobody anywhere ever should have to deal with this in their fun time." I'm not really seeing anywhere in this thread where somebody said the latter, but it sure as hell seems like the former is being responded to as if it were the latter. Nor is anybody making the point saying anything about the people who like to RP this stuff, let alone that they're bad people.

I have seen several posts in the thread that are shades of 'this shouldn't be allowed on games' including statements like 'those (-ist) characters shouldn't be played period' and describing IC -isms as 'fun at someone else's expense'. Now maybe that's not what those folks meant and it's just a misunderstanding - that's fine. But as @surreality said, this isn't the first time this discussion has come up and those points you highlight have most assuredly been made before.

Saying that people should be able to out on a personal level is no silver bullet either. What if you're, say, a woman character in an era rife with sexism? Does that mean nobody can be the slightest bit sexist towards you? Men have to hire you? Etc.? It's complicated. Which is why I think it's good to discuss.

@surreality said in How should IC discrimination be handled?:

I don't believe in protagonists or antagonists as viable concepts on a MU*, period, regardless of any -ism either may or may not possess. They don't work outside of short-term NPCs, because a game is necessarily an ensemble cast.
A game isn't 'Iron Man 2', it's 'The Avengers'.

I think we're just using different terms for the same thing. Yes, a MU is an ensemble cast with many protagonists, plural. By this I'm using the definition "main character" - in contrast to "supporting character". Most MUSHers want to be one of the heroes, not one of the extras.

My point was that in mainstream fiction/TV/movies/etc. the "main characters" aren't usually the ones spouting racial slurs, unless they're the bad guy or in the midst of a rehabilitation arc. They're also not the ones locked into oppression, unless they're in the middle of a 'bust free from the oppression' arc.

Given that as the cultural norm, it surprises me that people expect MU characters to really be any different. There are just more of them in any particular story than even in the biggest ensemble cast.

@thenomain said in How should IC discrimination be handled?:

But being not even as accurate as a Netflix costume drama is why I always look at any period game with suspicion.

I think that touches on an interesting point though.

Very few would bat an eye at a Netflix period drama where <insert historically mistreated group here> was mistreated. But a lot would bat an eye at one where the protagonist was going around mistreating people, or spent the entire show being mistreated.

We generally want to see our protagonist battling evil, or overcoming their obstacles to succeed against the odds. That works just dandy in books, movies and TV shows.

The problem on a MUSH, IMHO, isn't the departure from historical norms in and of itself, it's the scale on which it's done. Instead of one protagonist being "the special one", you've now got a whole town full of them.

@ixokai said in Period Piece Face vs Modern Face:

I don't know how to turn that into a discussion: when I seem to see people different. I assume thus others see people different. How the hell do you figure that out? and how the hell does any trial happen with witnesses?

Yeah it's interesting, because to me? I could totally see similarities in the faces. You're absolutely right about the nose, lips, etc. being different. But until you pointed that out my brain literally didn't register those things. I think it's because I focus mostly from the eyes up? Which isn't so much "facial recognition" as "gaze recognition" but still...

Then again, I also know that I see faces differently than most people so who knows.

I am honestly baffled by this. What is it about Chris Hemsworth or Cate Blanchett's face that has anything to do with whether they can play a period role?

Cate Blanchett - The Missing

Chris Hemsworth - In the Heart of the Sea

Since 8th Sea opened, I've gotten a number of queries about the status of Ares, so I figured I'd just post something about it.

As far as I'm concerned, Ares is not yet ready to be released. There is code in GitHub, but it's my development sandbox. It's not stable. I make no promises that anything there will be backwards-compatible with what I do tomorrow. In fact, I'm in the process of an experiment right now that completely overhauls the entire web portal.

Kraken and the 8th Sea folks chose to move forward with a public game despite (and fully cognizant of) that instability. Kraken's already had to chuck and redo his code a couple times because of underlying infrastructure changes. It is not a path for the faint of heart, and not one I recommend yet.

But soon. Really, it's in the home stretch. Apart from the web portal overhaul and a few little bugs, the only thing left to do is documentation. So, y'know, people who are not me will actually know how to use it. I consider having a solid foundation of tutorials to be an essential part of the 1.0 release.

Anyone who's interested can follow updates on the website and see the latest release of Ares in action at BSGU.

@downwithopp said in An Apology to BSO and BSU.:

When I first read this thread, my intent was to apologize to @faraday - who I put in a terrible spot, because we had communicated numerous times as friends and I had worked within the framework of BSU to help her when I could.

I said it once before, but seriously - leave me out of this. You didn't need to post here to apologize to me. You apologized months ago when I kicked you off BSGU. And you have my email.

I really do want to believe that your apology is sincere. The original post sounded heartfelt, which is why I reached out to say thank you for that. But I don't appreciate being continually used as a prop in your crusade here.

If you are indeed truly sorry, then just say so and leave it at that. No excuses, no arguing, no 'I was frustrated because...', no 'I didn't come here to fight...'. Just 'I'm sorry. I screwed up. I'll try to do better in the future. The end.'

@mietze said in An Apology to BSO and BSU.:

I'm glad that you are having a good conversation with @faraday. That's wonderful. But you know, naming someone as responding favorably to your apologetic advances unlike others will also be taken as weirdness and kind of manipulative also.

I said thank you for the apology. Beyond that, I'd just as soon be left out of this.

@tempest said in Regarding administration on MSB:

Faraday appears to be super mega invested in turning this into rainbow unicorn times.

I have said, like, a bazillion times that I am not opposed to negative feedback and criticism. What I am opposed to is hostility and vitriol. And if your argument is that a community is incapable of having a discussion forum without being complete and utter dicks to one another, then that says more about the community than it does about me.

@arkandel said in Regarding administration on MSB:

But it's nice to think that hey, some of these folks are more than names on my screen and that, maybe, I am occasionally more than that on theirs too.

This.

And I know, I know, I'm beating a dead horse. I'm sorry (kinda). But this is why I think it's sad that the negativity is cutting out some percentage of our MU* community from participating in all the good things that having a MU-wide community center offers.

If it could truly be kept behind the wall in the hog pit, then maybe it's no different from it being on a different forum entirely. I have my doubts, but I'm trying to give @Arkandel and company the benefit of the doubt here.

@arkandel said in Regarding administration on MSB:

Sometimes I think those sections are as, or even more useful than the rest of them put together.

Yeah. One other response to @ThatGuyThere's remark about what purpose they serve... games come and go. I may not be playing with certain people on a game right at this moment, but it's still nice to have a central place to come and chat with them about stuff.

@thatguythere said in Regarding administration on MSB:

To me I think it comes down to what you see the purpose of this board being. the purpose for me is a site associated with any one game that issues with games (both negative and positive) can be discussed without the powers that be on the games being able to shut down the topic.

And that's a valid purpose. But my view of the board is more in line with what @Arkandel said before - I see MSB as more of a community center for MUSHers to connect beyond the games they play on.

I think it provides value in bringing different perspectives from other "spheres" of MU* gaming together when we discuss aspects of MUSHing. For instance, some of the stuff talked about re: WOD games has been interesting to me, even if it's not very relevant to my games.

It lets people relate more as players, independent of their in-game personas. I'm not sure how many knitters are on BSGU for instance, but it's nice that knitters from all over MUSHland can connect here and chat about knitting. We've seen this have positive impacts when the community comes together to help each other - like the gofundme things that have happened now and again.

It lets us advertise our games - to recruit new players - and our projects - like the status updates on Evennia.

And yes, it lets us air our grievances in a forum that individual game owners cannot silence. This is an important thing, but it is not the only thing. I would argue it's not even the most important thing, though I understand others disagree on that point.

@thatguythere said in Regarding administration on MSB:

Though in your examples the only things I would consider worthwhile would be the policy and code discussions, on a game I consider babbling about movies or sports to be a negative on a channel.

That depends on your POV right? I mean we've got a whole section here for "Tastes Less Gamey" including a thread about hockey and IIRC one about basketball. There have also been various threads about all sorts of "pop culture" things. To me that sort of stuff builds community, even if I personally keep the <Sports> channel on mute because it's not my thing. (I like sports, I just don't follow it closely enough to have any comment beyond "Go Steelers!" :))

But my point is - we don't normally see those discussions turning into dumpster fires on our games. The community as a whole is capable of reeling itself in when there are enforced standards.

@thatguythere said in Regarding administration on MSB:

If you want a board with the level of discourse seen on game channels then it is a given that we will never be happy on the same one since games channels to me are only useful for the occasional Hey anyone want to RP? shout outs, otherwise they tend to been dead silent or filled with nothing.

I didn't mean literally just the "<Public>" channel - I meant public chat channels in general. And perhaps our experiences have been different. I've seen numerous games with chat channels filled with constructive policy discussions, theme discussions, code discussions, and chats about everything from healthcare coding to superhero movies and sports teams. Occasionally somebody goes overboard, but for the most part these conversations are civil and harmless because many (most? I hope?) staffers don't tolerate anything different on our games.