The catch-22 is when calling someone out for doing something (subjectively) wrong is already considered insulting.
And this, ladies and gentlemen, I give zero fucks about the rules of this here forum anymore.
This is no longer the forum I helped to create with Scagga and a small group of other people as a counter point to the pure toxicity of Chatsubo. A forum where you could discuss and criticize storylines, roleplay and other things but without descending to personal insults and out of game bickering. For a time this place was just that and it was amazing.
That time has passed.
Now this is the other extreme opposed to chatsubo, nobody is to be criticized so people won't get their feelings hurt, and where even politely saying that someone is doing it wrong is often getting a reprimand in one form or another. That in itself creates another kind of toxicity. Don't get me wrong I bear no ill will towards the moderators. They just enforce the rules, but maybe it's time to change the rules.
Sometimes giving people slap in the face really works. There's been quite a few people who've approached me and with whom I've had polite discussions about how to improve their roleplay experience, guide them to information source or just purely give advice and explain why their course of action is maybe not the best one around - but only after calling them out. However, calling them out nicely or with a vengeance results in the same lame ass whiny bullshit these days.
I will keep breaking the rules with impunity, to the extreme and with purpose until I am banned or until we can reforge the spirit of these forums to what it was when we started them.
Occupy Backstage.
MA is best Pony.
As one of those people who was very active in those discussions in the smoke-filled room Scagga so generously provided us all to shape our ideas into the forum that Silver first suggested and I'd wanted so badly to put up (but lacked wide enough support because I'm an anti-social prick)... I can't disagree with much of what you say, Vince. But you see, here's the thing, as I see it:
We didn't want to build a new forum where the ruling clique, or even perception of a ruling clique, got away with shitposting and everyone else got moderated and banned. We wanted any faction to feel free and welcome to post and discuss topics. We wanted fresh discussion. We wanted more opportunity/availability for cross-factional collaboration. We wanted actual tangible OOC/IC divide across the board (lol). We wanted so bloody much. And most of it, we got. Some of it, we still have. But at the end of the day, there are a lot of whiny, soft-hearted, thin-skinned, emotionally unstable people in this overall community and the introduction of constructive criticism, if not handled carefully (moreso with some than with others), generates problems.
Case in point, there was recently some person whose name I don't feel worth remembering who posted this controversial 'blooder' themed thing which you, Vince, ripped the fuck apart. Early in this person's thread, they were all "Tear it up, I'm ready!
" When they didn't find that replies were going mostly in favor, they edited the OP and deleted their forum account. Now just the posts under greyname remain. (which is why I don't feel it's worth remembering the name)
Yeah, you raised great points as to why that person was DIW. Personally, though, I'd've just left it at "This is contrary to PF on just about all levels and it's a silly trope I'm tired of seeing." IF I posted about it at all.
Yes, you'll get moderated. Yes, you'll get various incremental bans. You might even work your way to a p.ban. Whatever, it's internet spaceships. At the end of the day, I think the prevailing opinion remains that, if we don't keep it as tight/draconian/subjective/whatever as we do on certain things, we're gonne be right back where we were at the start of 2010. With a dead forum largely inhabited by one clique and a bunch of try-hards opposing them until some new forum rises up, old bittervets check it out, post a few times and vanish, it gets a Community Spotlight from CCP and rolls on strong for a couple of years and repeats the cycle.
TL;DR: motherfuckers need to be less emo about receiving fair criticism, then people like Vince won't need to drop the mic and OcCuPpY BaCkStAgE or do anything else e-edgy.
If someone wants to start a serious discussion about revisiting the Rules & FAQ, their original intentions and their application over the last 4 years, Moderation Discussion is the place to start the thread.