Bannings
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Honestly, I don’t see communities fracturing as a problem that needs fixing. Sure, the way it happens is a bag of suck wrapped in crap coated in a thin layer of “I can’t believe it’s not irony.” But it’s like cell division. We go off and do our thing, they go off and do theirs, and the community grows from it.
I think it depends on context. The fracturing of MSB was in response to an injustice, however trivial that injustice might be in the grand scheme of things. That injustice has not been corrected and is still being perpetuated, which seems to me like it must eventually become a problem for the whole community as resentment and distrust fester.
Sure, maybe. But we ain’t gonna fix it, that has to be on them to want to fix. And right now they don’t want to, or can’t, or whatever. Better to focus on ourselves and doing right by our slice of the community, in my view.
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I think it depends on context. The fracturing of MSB was in response to an injustice, however trivial that injustice might be in the grand scheme of things. That injustice has not been corrected and is still being perpetuated, which seems to me like it must eventually become a problem for the whole community as resentment and distrust fester.
The unfortunate thing about ‘responding to an injustice’ is the over-correction. There is already an us-versus-them mentality where just who ‘us’ and ‘them’ are isn’t always clear.
But it’s divisive, and easily exploited. Some folks are banned from one forum; some feel unwelcome in the other. Some are in the in-crowd on one, some are not.
Now, I’m a relic of a different era so hopefully I’m wrong. But I don’t have to like it.
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Honestly, I don’t see communities fracturing as a problem that needs fixing. Sure, the way it happens is a bag of suck wrapped in crap coated in a thin layer of “I can’t believe it’s not irony.” But it’s like cell division. We go off and do our thing, they go off and do theirs, and the community grows from it.
I think it depends on context. The fracturing of MSB was in response to an injustice, however trivial that injustice might be in the grand scheme of things. That injustice has not been corrected and is still being perpetuated, which seems to me like it must eventually become a problem for the whole community as resentment and distrust fester.
In my opinion, I think these are things that have always existed in the mush community. Resentment and distrust has always been thing. Distrust of staff, resentment of other players getting X thing or perceived preference, etc etc, the list goes on. While I’d agree that just because it’s existed doesn’t mean you have to accept it. But there has to be a willingness to accept that I doubt these aspects or facets of the community are ever going to truly go away.
Realistically, how would that injustice be resolved? I feel the damage has already been done. Even if MSB is wiped clean, it’s staff admonished and shunned, you can’t exactly punish people for how they run a forum. You can’t fire them or call the cops on them. Beyond that, would anyone here truly wish to go back to it after everything that has already occurred? Maybe, but I feel the number would be low as we’ve already heard people state that they wouldn’t.
There has always been schisms within the muverse. A game is run poorly, a number of disenfranchised players will go make their own game in an attempt to ‘do better’ than the original. There will always be this person who ‘hates this staffer’ and this person will defend them to their dying breath. These are things we’ve all seen countless times. If anything, this suggests that we’re doing what we’ve always done, even if that means what we’ve always done isn’t always good. I think the only way to correct that behavior is that people have to change. And people, well, humans are gonna human, for better or worse.
I don't know what I'm doing. Poke at Seven Nations sevennations.aresmush.com port 2021
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some feel unwelcome in the other.
i will say about this: it’s very clear that there are some people that will feel ‘unwelcome’ wherever people actually have a voice to call them out. like, people felt ‘unsafe’ and ‘bullied’ by my very reasonable posts on the other forum.
of course those same people are going to feel unwelcome literally everywhere my name is attached. because the issue isn’t what we say or do; it’s the judgement that they’ve already attached to us.
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I get the feeling a lot of y’all think I believe injustice is corrected via punishment or winning a dominance struggle.
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@Testament You are right, that there isn’t an external thing that can be done. Could it be healed? Yes and no. I think most (and I can’t speak for all, or anyone really beyond me and my opinion of what would happen) would be happy if the bans were lifted and an honest apology given for the events. An admission of error even without the apology. Only they can provide that, and it is rather obvious they won’t so it is somewhat academic.
Would it heal it? No. But it would cauterise the wounds in the community. There are pretty obvious fundemental differences in opinion and ethics, the fact VulgarKitten is welcome probably means many would not be comfortable being there even ignoring Derp’s track record. So there wouldn’t be some rejoining. But it might take some of the fire and heat out of the division. And much as they will frame that heat as only existing with ‘us’, the fact they are reading the forum and feeling the need to create new lies suggests they are perhaps as wounded as everyone else over this.
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@Testament They apologize for hurting the people they hurt, and after listening to the grievances and getting their opinions on how to improve the relationship, make changes to ensure it doesn’t happen again. The people who have been hurt accept the apology in a spirit of wanting healing over payback, and help enforce the changes that are meant to ensure it doesn’t happen again.
It’s hard on both sides, and if I believed it would happen, I’d still be over on MSB. But I hold out hope that one day they make an overture.
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@GF I respect your outlook and optimism on it. Need far more of you around.
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I can only speak for myself but I don’t need or expect anything. I agree it’s too late to really fix what went down and the only thing we can do is make this place whatever we want it to be going forward. A clear ‘this was bad administration, I personally not a mealy-mouthed passive-voice entity made a mistake’ statement from Ganymede would be nice on a personal level but I can’t see anything making me want to go back to MSB even if I was unbanned at some point.
It would be nice if the mods at MSB now stopped saying things like ‘this vague person was banned over abusive DMs’ in a way that implied maybe I or maybe someone else who never sent any ABUSIVE DMS did that. It sucks to feel like you’re being subtweet lied about in ways you can’t respond to. But they will or they won’t and I do just need to stop reading, or at least stop investing what I read with any feeling, for my own bloodpressure.
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But hurt and divisions will happen again. And again. And again.
Maybe this is the time to focus on being able to handle that in a healthier way than feeling the need to wedge everyone into one box to preserve other people’s comfort, and allow for some separation that maximizes people’s participation and ability to chat with each other while also allowing some space between personalities that don’t get along.
Unity in coming behind and supporting struggling community members will always be a thing imo no matter if there are six boards. We are great at gossip and word of mouth.
But I don’t know. I’m okay learning to give up the convenience of only logging into one place if it means that all places are less pressure cooker.
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I’m gonna stop you right there. Never, ever, ever, ever accuse me of thinking. How dare you?
You should count yourself lucky I was being as restrained as I was. Quite frankly, I suspect you of more than just thinking. I believe I have witnessed you reflecting, considering, and even ruminating.
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@mietze hurt and divisions will happen again and again, sure. tiffs, spats, etc. but i would say /this/, what happened on MSB, doesn’t happen all that often. this situation happened very specifically because of power invested in one person.
but in general, yes, having a few places to login that are less combative is also fine.
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T Tez forked this topic on
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Just noting there was a line on admin accountability that went here.
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@Tez Yeah, I don’t think there’s a real good solution to that. The person who owns the thing, be it a forum or house or business or whatever, has ultimate power and final say in how they want to run and operate it. In the end, they are only beholden to thesmselves and their own whims, altruistic or not.
In those situations, the only real option is voting with your feet or wallet. I don’t shop at Walmart, I don’t go MSB. And since I don’t give MSB my money, my feet are the next best option.
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I think it depends on context. The fracturing of MSB was in response to an injustice, however trivial that injustice might be in the grand scheme of things. That injustice has not been corrected and is still being perpetuated, which seems to me like it must eventually become a problem for the whole community as resentment and distrust fester.
This whole thing is already the result of quite a lot of resentment being allowed to fester. I don’t have a solution for how to navigate accountability when someone fundamentally does not own their shit, but it might be worth reflecting on how this portion of the community helped contribute to our division beyond simply commenting after we were told not to.
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but i would say /this/, what happened on MSB, doesn’t happen all that often.
I dunno, it used to happen fairly often on games. An abuse, or perceived abuse, of power would happen and people would leave and start their own game.
The main difference is that this has happened to us, so it’s naturally more impactful.
