[Poruku]

So, recently, this thread was posted: https://neus-projects.net/forums/showthr...2#pid50152

And subsequently locked, for a reason I'm not quite grasping. I think many people posted a lot of very important points and discussed things in a mostly civil manner, even though there were disagreements.

That being said, I'm not trying to revive a locked thread, what I want to talk about is the more general matter at hand being transparency and how bans are being investigated and dealt out. However, if people want to shed light on things, go ahead. If this thread gets locked too, that's fine. If I'm out of line, let me know.


My perspective on recent events

Much like Mother's ban, this ban came out of left field for the banees. One second they're playing the game, and the next second they just got banned, sometimes mid-rp. I spoke with Croakie and they didn't seem to know or understand why they were banned. She even made a post asking why, and it got no replies. Even more puzzling is Lumi who barely speaks in ooc, etc. No replies to any of the threads.

When it happened, of course, everyone jumps into voice chat and tries to understand what the hell is going on. Everyone is speculating about what exactly happened. 4 players including a major leader just got removed for a week, messing over plans for many and delivering a sizeable emotional blow, and for what? We don't know. Am I going to be next? Am I gatekeeping? The ban message doesn't give us any information and the people who got banned did not get any heads up. So of course, everyone in the community is now free to make up their own mind about what exactly happened. People speculate, and talk to each other in private, sharing even more speculation and rumors.

And this goes on until a thread is posted.

The thread barely elaborated on the issue out of a desire to protect the people involved, something I can understand, but it also made it fairly ineffective at clearing the air and clearing confusion. In addition, we have seen multiple fair points and replies being made with no response from the admin team about them. What are we supposed to believe?

Then, the thread is locked, and we're supposed to move on?

I trust the GM team, but I think this is a problematic way to handle things, and I'd like to make my points concise:

1: Little to no communication with the accused
Based on the fact every banned player was confused and made a ban appeal, it's safe to assume the GM team did not reach out to them to get their side of the story. And based on the fact Lumi and Aegis got banned, we can assume they didn't get the full story due to this. This is unfair to the accused because it means the evidence gathered will be entirely in the favor of the accuser. Not only that, but it also means they will get no warnings and thus have no opportunity to rectify their behavior. Even worse, they'll get suddenly banned mid-rp, having the rug pulled out from under their feet. A very stressful and confusing moment.

2: Whoever talks to the GMs first has the advantage
Related to point 1, a big issue here is that the GMs are clearly weaponizable. I'm not saying that the accuser had bad intentions, but what I'm saying is that whenever there is an OOC conflict, whoever messages the GMs gets an advantage as they can feed any evidence they see fit to the team and nobody on the opposing side will know. This, in my opinion, is not a very healthy part of a community, as it means the GMs aren't being used to solve issues, they're being used to ban. So when you reach out to a GM, you're going with the nuclear option, and you better strike first as it gives you the high ground. This brings me to the last point.

3: Bans based on OOC drama are counter-productive
What was even accomplished with these bans? Massive confusion, frustration, stress, disruption of events in game, increase of hostility between players, and the player base being left to speculate. A one week ban without a proper explanation and reached understanding beforehand is essentially pointless unless your goal is to completely kick out some people from the game and never have to deal with them again. Because these people will just come back after one week and guess what, everything is worse now because people are scared, they feel antagonized, they still feel confused, they wonder if they should even continue playing.

I believe people should not be banned so quickly for this sort of thing as all it does is send a bomb in a warzone. It sets a grim precedent and it simply does not allow people to learn from their mistakes. Even worse, it can make people fear the GMs.

There's a big difference between a ban given because a game rule was clearly broken, and a ban given for unclear OOC drama reasons. The latter needs to be addressed much more carefully. It's something to solve, not to punish. DM people and give them warnings, tell them what's going wrong, hear their side, make them understand, tell them what needs to change. If they keep doing nefarious things with that knowledge, then give them a sizeable ban. But this? This just ain't it.



I apologize if this post is making unpleasant things resurface, but I just had to speak up about this personally. Nobody asked me to do this, I barely ever speak with any of the players involved. But as a bystander, it just felt like it had to be said.

[Kyratio]

I'm going to preface this post with the fact that everything I'm about to type is absolutely coming from a place of frustration and I normally try my best to not let myself act off such things, but a part of me is hoping that maybe it'll manage to get things through to certain people. I'm sorry if I end up accidentally offending someone or being to aggressive, I'm going to do my best not to, but some things I feel need to be said. And even then, I might not say it all because I really am trying my best to be respectful here.

I'm going to start with the biggest thing, and that is how the admin team handles and treats the community. I've only experienced this game and community for roughly a year, maybe a bit more, and I continually see problems pop up in the community again and again, and old players saying "Oh this happened in the past, I already know how this is going to play out." Usually with the expectations that nothing is going to happen from it. A prime example is the very thing this thread is mainly based on. A large portion of the community spoke up and voiced their frustrations (In this thread especially), many were even offering their own suggestions and ideas for how the community and admins both could do better, myself included. 

However, there's a common denominator here, and after being with the community for what most here would probably consider a short amount of time, I understand why "Oh this happened in the past, I already know how this is going to play out." is consistently the response. Every time anything of note happens, there has been a common denominator. The admins go silent and only respond when entirely necessary, or directly called out. I understand that this could've been a case of formulating a proper response to handle everything properly and communicate as well as possible, but the issue is that, these responses are only ever given to alleviate or better the public eye. I've not once seen a proper response given to remedy anything whatsoever up to this point in relation to backlash of any sort.

Normally I try to put myself in the shoes of others as to broaden my spectrum of opinions on matters like this, but for now, I'm just going to vent my own frustrations with this fact. What that does for me, is makes me feel like there is little to no actual respect towards the community and it's more of a "Oh no, the community is acting up again. I'll just give them as much as they need until they shut up and I can move on." If I'm honest, that is where the majority of my frustration is coming from, that exact feeling that I consistently get from the admin team (ALMOST) as a whole act in. I'm not going to say every single admin, just most. I respect Balthie's past attempt to genuinely go out of their way and address these issues, I respect Karidan and value the things he does in the background with how he properly treats players and gives them genuine respect.

Next up, something that absolutely, positively both surprised and disgusted me with a certain area of the community. Not the whole community, but it's surprising how many. In a somewhat recent thread, (This one specifically) I... I understand that when something is said or asked enough, or something that is super obvious to someone as a really old player feels as easy as breathing, it can be frustrating or even headache inducing when someone asks you about these things. It's like, "Well duh, this." But... Even then, even in those scenarios where you're done with someone, frustrated and absolutely just GROANING at their very existence, why would you choose to openly berate them and act like their opinions are worthless rather than walk away and let someone else help them? 

Now, I'm going to speak from my personal opinion here, just as I have been the entire rest of this post and say that, I believe the reason why, aka, answering my own question, is that some of the community are defensive about this game, and they feel attacked when any single problem is brought up about it, or things related to it, such as, this very topic itself, or bringing up the mistakes of Dev/the admin team. I believe this very concept is a huge reason why a lot of the community is so split and unable to come together to really push any huge fixes to itself as well, if I can be so blunt.

Ultimately, if the admins continue to just blatantly ignore any backlash or complaints from the community or just give only when necessary, nothing will change as the community itself is split so wide that there's practically a whole discord server for every 5 person group badmouthing the admins or talking badly about other players just trying to have fun. And mind you, having discord servers for groups isn't a bad thing. But it is a bad thing when it's actively being used to exclude or specifically made to keep secrets or to be exclusive in some way or form in regards to this community when it's made FROM this community.

I will now get back to feeling nice and enjoying my time with my friends and those I care about doing things other than this. Take care, and to anyone I may have offended, I hope something nice happens to cheer you up.

[Plunger]

1: Little to no communication with the accused
Based on the fact every banned player was confused and made a ban appeal, it's safe to assume the GM team did not reach out to them to get their side of the story. And based on the fact Lumi and Aegis got banned, we can assume they didn't get the full story due to this. This is unfair to the accused because it means the evidence gathered will be entirely in the favor of the accuser. Not only that, but it also means they will get no warnings and thus have no opportunity to rectify their behavior. Even worse, they'll get suddenly banned mid-rp, having the rug pulled out from under their feet. A very stressful and confusing moment.

I think it's important to remember that just because you know someone OOC'ly does not mean you know what goes on behind closed doors and I don't really see what kind of information could have been conveyed to or given by the accused that wouldn't immediately set off red flags as to who reported or was targeted in this case. As soon as you ask them what they were saying about Blank then it looks like Blank reported them, end of story. It shouldn't be on the victim of harassment to just grin and bear it because the harassers feel it is unfair.

2: Whoever talks to the GMs first has the advantage
Related to point 1, a big issue here is that the GMs are clearly weaponizable. I'm not saying that the accuser had bad intentions, but what I'm saying is that whenever there is an OOC conflict, whoever messages the GMs gets an advantage as they can feed any evidence they see fit to the team and nobody on the opposing side will know. This, in my opinion, is not a very healthy part of a community, as it means the GMs aren't being used to solve issues, they're being used to ban. So when you reach out to a GM, you're going with the nuclear option, and you better strike first as it gives you the high ground. This brings me to the last point.

This one seems pretty simple to me. If you don't want to be banned for OOC conflict, harassment, insults, etc. don't participate in that behavior? No one is forcing anyone Out of Character to harass people or insult them and assuming that someone reporting that behavior is also at fault is essentially victim blaming.

3: Bans based on OOC drama are counter-productive
What was even accomplished with these bans? Massive confusion, frustration, stress, disruption of events in game, increase of hostility between players, and the player base being left to speculate. A one week ban without a proper explanation and reached understanding beforehand is essentially pointless unless your goal is to completely kick out some people from the game and never have to deal with them again. Because these people will just come back after one week and guess what, everything is worse now because people are scared, they feel antagonized, they still feel confused, they wonder if they should even continue playing.

If they antagonized, confused, or like they should quit over this imagine how the actual victims of harassment or abuse feel.

It's section one of the official rules for the game:

https://neus-projects.net/wiki/index.php/Game_Rules

And in my opinion the most obvious use of the rules beyond cheating. What else are you meant to do to curb OOC drama if not ban them? It's meant to be a punishment, they should feel punished when it comes down on them so they can learn that actions have consequences. If OOC drama is allowed to simply run rampant in the community then it'll only get more toxic and that toxicity will become more and more public facing.

[Dezark]

I'm gonna go through a bit here since I want to just give a little push to previous matters I said after reading the recent responses on this..


By no means mind you, do I agree or disagree with things but that also coming from a mindset of ''if you fuck up on this that on you'' sort of thing, it something I've been told for both situations in games I've played, RPs I've done, even jobs before that I've been dumped with in the past have been something similar to that; so when I see someone get banned I don't enjoy the fact it happened, or how it done specifically; but I've also played a part in bans in the past few years, where most of it is just me informing a GM in GM-Help when something happened, or brought it to a GM attention when we get the occasional hyper troll; it a usual that happens and such.


On the regard of little to no communication given, and the following of what was said by Plunger in response to that.--

In the regard of "I know this person oocly so it doesn't seem fair" isn't quite the case I would go with it.. but I can understand how it might come across on this, I will say typically GMs have a normal sense of regard where "you know what you did, that why this happened." which as I mentioned earlier is a "if you fuck up on this that on you" type of response, and that isn't great. Now I'm not saying "oh who reported me? I want to know who did this so I can compare what was said and tell you why they're wrong" or go after someone; obviously that not the answer to this. My honest to god suggestion and hope for GMs to consider, is just doing a check up in the higher up channels with the leaders, like I said in my larger post after the GM's address to the banned had dropped after a number of days for them to get it out. I was in even in a VC with balthie and another who was affected by it discussing things and hearing what they could say for answers to questions other had on that, there wasn't any intention of bad blood or otherwise, but the factor came in still of the lack of communication being a major key.

My suggestion that I hope will at least be considered on the side as a thought is, have a GM (or GMs) bring said person into a DM/DM group and just talk with them; let them know "hey this is what happened, we saw this going on in ----- server or we were given stuff that followed ----- being said and we've been keeping updates following that. Just go over the bans and help them find some clearance on what happened, so they can honestly say "okay I understand" and if they wish to do a ban appeal, it can be addressed from there. If the ban appeal denied, that happens; but the purpose following the ban is for someone to acknowledge what they did wrong, sit down and accept that. Even if it takes a few days before coming back to ask for another chance and show they do accept what happened, they acknowledge it, etc.

Now onto the lesser notes, mainly what drove me to give some response on things here specifically from Plunger...

Plunger

1: Little to no communication with the accused
Based on the fact every banned player was confused and made a ban appeal, it's safe to assume the GM team did not reach out to them to get their side of the story. And based on the fact Lumi and Aegis got banned, we can assume they didn't get the full story due to this. This is unfair to the accused because it means the evidence gathered will be entirely in the favor of the accuser. Not only that, but it also means they will get no warnings and thus have no opportunity to rectify their behavior. Even worse, they'll get suddenly banned mid-rp, having the rug pulled out from under their feet. A very stressful and confusing moment.

I think it's important to remember that just because you know someone OOC'ly does not mean you know what goes on behind closed doors and I don't really see what kind of information could have been conveyed to or given by the accused that wouldn't immediately set off red flags as to who reported or was targeted in this case. As soon as you ask them what they were saying about Blank then it looks like Blank reported them, end of story. It shouldn't be on the victim of harassment to just grin and bear it because the harassers feel it is unfair.
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To this, I addressed mainly saying that I don't think it the matter of knowing someone OOC'ly to the factor more so that there was indeed a lack of addressing to this specifically; it a issue that been brought up before and that alot did voice suggestions so that things could be worked out a bit better, though they're just that still; suggestions & food for thought. The matter of "if you ask them what they were saying about --- then it looks like --- reported them" is again something mentioned, obviously they can't give that given how people can be with that, and it not the case of the "victim of harassment" having to bear with it as Polk was saying, more that the people struck with this ban were sudden, and caught in a sudden crossfire as it can be seen, rather than saying "x has to deal with what y doing to them" it more that "x took it to GMs and whatever else was with that, got y smacked without any actual talk beforehand." sort of situation, for how they're mentioning it I believe.

Plunger

2: Whoever talks to the GMs first has the advantage
Related to point 1, a big issue here is that the GMs are clearly weaponizable. I'm not saying that the accuser had bad intentions, but what I'm saying is that whenever there is an OOC conflict, whoever messages the GMs gets an advantage as they can feed any evidence they see fit to the team and nobody on the opposing side will know. This, in my opinion, is not a very healthy part of a community, as it means the GMs aren't being used to solve issues, they're being used to ban. So when you reach out to a GM, you're going with the nuclear option, and you better strike first as it gives you the high ground. This brings me to the last point.

This one seems pretty simple to me. If you don't want to be banned for OOC conflict, harassment, insults, etc. don't participate in that behavior? No one is forcing anyone Out of Character to harass people or insult them and assuming that someone reporting that behavior is also at fault is essentially victim blaming.
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As someone who been on the regard of OOC conflict, harassment, insults, etc. and seen them second hand/left voice chats with people who've specifically gone off on this regard multiple times. It not something as simple as "don't participate in that behavior" to put it bluntly. You could do absolutely nothing, and still be blamed for that, purely by association cause x happened to say something to y, or just have a second hand agreement with x view toward y adding onto that. I know alot specifically who fit that grouping more so in the previously mentioned on this. Again I don't believe there any sense of claiming "victim blaming" here, this is the case I have seen from others who been caught in a ban before as well; where when one person has gone to a GM with something against them, and than the reporter gives issue to the reported and than is brought to the GM for that; they have been given shit in response or given harsher responses for reporting said person. I'm not saying it right for either side, or to blame x for y on that mind you, I'm just making this clear to that statement specifically.

Plunger

3: Bans based on OOC drama are counter-productive
What was even accomplished with these bans? Massive confusion, frustration, stress, disruption of events in game, increase of hostility between players, and the player base being left to speculate. A one week ban without a proper explanation and reached understanding beforehand is essentially pointless unless your goal is to completely kick out some people from the game and never have to deal with them again. Because these people will just come back after one week and guess what, everything is worse now because people are scared, they feel antagonized, they still feel confused, they wonder if they should even continue playing.

If they antagonized, confused, or like they should quit over this imagine how the actual victims of harassment or abuse feel.

It's section one of the official rules for the game:

https://neus-projects.net/wiki/index.php/Game_Rules

And in my opinion the most obvious use of the rules beyond cheating. What else are you meant to do to curb OOC drama if not ban them? It's meant to be a punishment, they should feel punished when it comes down on them so they can learn that actions have consequences. If OOC drama is allowed to simply run rampant in the community then it'll only get more toxic and that toxicity will become more and more public facing.
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Alright so I'm gonna keep this limited but just go to the regard of "victim of harassment or abuse" and "victim blaming" is used a lot in a regard that mind you, I can understand how both sides feel for this. It not fun specifically, but let me state; that in response of "What else are you meant to do curb OOC drama if not ban them?" is many things, I have heard from GMs specifically saying they're trying to NOT use banning as the only answer to this matter. 

What the answer of "oh well they got banned for this and now they're back" really does is open up people to repeat that same thing to them, to talk shit, proclaim that they will do x,y or z, or otherwise at them as others had done. I know many who still do it, who still give them shit or otherwise over just working with them, or those in the buddy group with said person who've said "yeah fuck them let's kill them off!" and those people know who they are. The answer to this whole matter, isn't "well so and so got justice so fuck them!" it only continues into worse things. TCBlade is my big example for this both cause I know the associated following this response was left in the dark on some things or told otherwise by others, and given what final following of "if you don't do ---- I will sue ----- for everything" speaks enough on that that the shit I've heard from the associated following to that point, shows plenty.

I'm not saying people who were banned, permabanned, muted, whatever can't do better; what I'm saying is the idea behind the response gives fruit and feeling to what others follow and shit on specifically for that, and that isn't something we need or should encourage. Yes the people who got banned were given that as a punishment, if they don't know what even lead to it, no they're not going to learn. No I don't think we should give them straight logs showing x,y,z said this as people know how others type by this point, or what emojis, etc. they use. What I think is as I mentioned, that personal talks should be held with the people so they can voice their defenses in private, rather than putting it up for others to see personally, modmail exists in the SL2 General Discord to allow players to contact GMs on that, and I think having something as a encouragement for private appeals would be good on that so that any GM can give a proper response following it. If it happens, or not is completely up to Dev and GMs and is just my two cents in the end.

For the sake of clarity, this just my opinions and thoughts to the response given, feel free to take this as a grain of salt on that, as that what I do otherwise to others in return, I'm not going to sugar coat or take sides with things as I typically prefer to keep a neutral viewing on how people handle and approach things in the end; and will ultimately voice either my agreement, disapproval or middle ground to thoughts as I go.

Take this all as you will honestly, if there any disappoint, anger, unhappiness, etc. otherwise to this? That's fine; if you need a video to help cheer you up and lighten that anger, unhappiness, disappointment, etc. feel free to hit me up on Discord and I'll give you a cute animal video I watch for such myself, and if you'd prefer instead to just hold those emotions toward me.. than your not the first and I hope your day gets better at some point. 

[MegaBlues]

I think that there's some disconnect going on. Some are assuming that anyone who gets banned was a bad person purposefully targeting others, while some believe that those who were banned made genuine mistakes and want to improve. There's likely a bit of column A and column B where people aren't realizing the impact of their actions, and also a bit of people not communicating when they have a problem and letting things fester and explode.

I'm also all for showing evidence in public, but unfortunately, there have been multiple instances of doxxing, as well as attempts both well-known and not, from people who are still part of the community. And even more unfortunately, doxxing isn't something that can be undone, even if met with a permaban, so erring on the side of caution is understandable. Especially when the publicly known-of cases were dealt with overly forgivingly, from what I know.

I think that there should be more proactive communication on all sides, really. If you have an issue with how someone is treating you, tell them. If there are repeated issues with a player, tell them. If you're feeling stressed from in-game responsibilities, say so. I'm sure there are a few bad eggs, but I'd like to think that actually "bad people" are rare, and these are just cases of mismanagement, lack of communication, and general immaturity.

[Plunger]

I think that there's some disconnect going on. Some are assuming that anyone who gets banned was a bad person purposefully targeting others, while some believe that those who were banned made genuine mistakes and want to improve. There's likely a bit of column A and column B where people aren't realizing the impact of their actions, and also a bit of people not communicating when they have a problem and letting things fester and explode.

I'm also all for showing evidence in public, but unfortunately, there have been multiple instances of doxxing, as well as attempts both well-known and not, from people who are still part of the community. And even more unfortunately, doxxing isn't something that can be undone, even if met with a permaban, so erring on the side of caution is understandable. Especially when the publicly known-of cases were dealt with overly forgivingly, from what I know.

I think that there should be more proactive communication on all sides, really. If you have an issue with how someone is treating you, tell them. If there are repeated issues with a player, tell them. If you're feeling stressed from in-game responsibilities, say so. I'm sure there are a few bad eggs, but I'd like to think that actually "bad people" are rare, and these are just cases of mismanagement, lack of communication, and general immaturity.

A not insignificant amount of people are conflict averse and once again I don't think there should be any responsibility placed on the shoulders of those falling victim to abuse or harassment to voice their discontent with the perpetrators. The behavior is already against the rules, with zero tolerance, that should be the end of the story. The ban isn't to force people to leave the community, it's a consequence of actions and a time to reflect on what led to the ban and hopefully prevent those actions from being repeated.

I would be interested to hear what peoples suggestions would be keeping in mind that anything involving providing evidence or detailed explanations on harassment cases would only result in revealing the identity of the victim.

[lordpidey]

Giving time to reflect on actions isn't helpful, if those who are banned were not informed as to what actions lead to the ban.

As far as what my suggestions are:

Unless RL crimes are involved, such as stalking, or sending illicit pictures without permission: Provide detailed evidence/explanations as to what happened. Make effort to hide victims who did not report, but at the same time, don't highlight the harassment of those who did not report.

I have seen so many cases IRL where someone was accused of harassment. I looked into it, and the 'harassment' was just 'having black skin while near a racist'. I have seen claims of harassment raised as a sword pointed against the necks of minorities enough, that my first instinct when I hear such a claim is doubt.

I have ALSO been a 'victim' of a 'harassment campaign' in a different game. I did not feel harassed. I felt the actions of the alleged harasser were reasonable and fine. The administrators disagreed, and acted like I raised a complaint. I did not. I believed that the actions deemed to be 'harassing me' were not harassment towards me, and in fact made the political intrigue within the game better.

[Snake]

Sounds like how Geladyne justice works right now, yikes.

Also there's no middle line on what a ban means. Some take it in stride and then notice that they needed this timeout for whatever they did, others take it as unfair punishments for something they think they didn't do wrong, even if it broke rules openly.

In the end, the value of a ban is solely tied to who receives it.

If they're a good person, they'll try to improve from their mistakes. If they're not, the timeout is the toll they'll have to cope with until it's up.

Or they'll be hounded forever by the community and put in the corner of infame for the rest of their stays in SL2, and be dryly remembered for being the ones who broke X Y Z rules forever.

You feeling lucky?

[Miller]

I don't really have that much of a strong stance on the matter so I generally refrained from commenting but as someone who has witnessed a fair amount of harassment and a bunch of the stuff behind the scenes during my long time on this game; it's really hard for me to advocate for complete transparency on the matter. I've often seen people speak up about it to someone and slowly get ostracized from portions of the community, the same sort of thing you see in high school cliques and the like.

On the other, I completely understand how people could interpret it as a GM targeting a specific player and/or group, it's a murky grey area that comes with a policy like this and favors trust in the GMs judgment. I'm mostly in favor of the evidence being hidden, but I'm also generally not on bad terms with anyone that I know of so I may be biased in that regard.

That said, I do feel like if this policy were to be reversed in favor of presenting evidence/logs of such, the punishment incurred by this kind of behavior is probably going to get much much worse instead of the recent alleged examples only getting a week. Because as someone who has seen many bans happen in the past years ago, there were a lot of cases of legitimate harassment that only got a slap on the wrist over and over without anything truly noticeably done about it, so it festered and subsisted until they either quit the game in most cases or got perma-banned rarely.

Pre-GR/Early SL2 and SL1 were a doozy in regards to this sort of thing.