Long, stupid post ahead.
Beware formatting.
1-A. I asked you to look at the logs (even gave you a specific time frame on when it happened) in the ban request thread involving a guy who was flagrantly TK'ing me, not to scour nearly a weeks worth of logs, completely unrelated to the actual case, for every shred of evidence you could possibly use against me. You know that. So don't try to act otherwise. I’m not impressed.
Slander, and untrue at that.
After multiple people mentioned their problems with you and asked to have it looked into, I decided I'd look at the logs of this day in question to get a better picture of just what exactly happened. It was through human error that I started looking through logs on the
siege server, instead of battle, where the exchange/TK/report came from. This is not scouring through weeks of logs, this is literally
one day of what you said on siege, condensed from 1135 lines I searched through because I was looking for one particular incident which I'd inevitably never find because of my mistake. So don't act so smug, because you don't know that.
1-B. Yet you still chose to do so; through the better part of a week's worth of logs, days apart from the actual incident.
That's not a fluke. That is not a coincidence. Somebody apparently wanted to go through those logs pretty badly. You can't really say you don't want to do something when you do it anyway, in your spare time (as you put it), without any reasonable explanation.
Saying "we looked through the better part of a week's logs because you asked us to check up on this particular incident doesn't hold up to objective scrutiny. Saying one thing and doing another doesn't exactly give you a whole lot of credibility on this issue.
One goddamn day. It was even on the same day as the other incident, just the wrong server. You're half right, though, you asking to check the logs for the incident isn't entirely why I did it. It was because of the slew of requests to look into your behavior.
2. Implying that the community would be allowed to harass me to their hearts content while leaving me unable to respond in kind is a blatant double standard. The kinds of which I have been pointing out in the admins own behavior for a while now.
Implying that you'd react to their trashtalking with your own rulebreaking because you can't control yourself and have to respond in some way to any negative statements people make towards you. You presented a theoretical situation and I said that it's what's already been going on but with the parties switched. The difference is that not everyone has a problem adhering to the rules when warned about them, so, yes, "holding your record above your head".
3. This is a strawman argument. You are directly accusing me of "willfully" and intentionally trying to alienate entire servers. This is entirely false.
And you're directly accusing us of only enforcing certain rules against you, which is also entirely false. I mean, hey, let's agree to disagree. I don't know if you
meant to make as many people uncomfortable and alienated as you did, but I guess you still did it. We don't
mean to let people abusing chat continue to get away with it unabated, but we can't be everywhere at once and your case was mentioned more than once by people who had a problem. Most of the time these things go unreported, and we may not even know they happened.
Furthermore, the server has gray areas because you haven't boiled things down to the point where they would eliminate behaviors of obvious double-standards. This mod has been around 3+ years. It isn't really an "ongoing process" if no work is actually being done on it. Sadly, it takes a situation like this to make you realize/admit these gray areas lead to nothing but double-standards in rulings and abuse at the discretion of the personal feelings of the moderator staff. That is the nature of corruption at the very core of its concept.
I'm glad you're at least semi-acknowledging this in your post.
We’ve gone from:
http://forum.meleegaming.com/na-%28official%29/unban-spookpalace-38515/msg595222/#msg595222
"The server guidelines for behavior contain several grey areas that require human judgment and common sense. We won't be making them black and white and robo-responses simply because Spook has made a spectacle of himself."
To:
Canary: “The rules have gray areas because we're still discovering and establishing the boundaries for them, it is an ongoing process. You, actually, are helping.”
Not sure if you actually legitimately mean what you’re saying here. Not sure if you're actually going to do anything about it or just leave things as they are to make things more convenient for yourselves. But it is an improvement over what another admin previously said (to give credit where it is possibly due).
However, two months from now, if we see nothing has been done to narrow down the rules despite this whole “spectacle,” we will ABSOLUTELY know if you are flat-out lying to everyone right now or not.
I guess I was lying, under your criteria. What I meant was our 'subjective double-standard guidelines'. Simple game admins, particularly we NA admins, have literally no sway over the rules. We're only in charge of upholding them. By saying we're discovering and establishing the boundaries I meant that because there are so few hard and fast rules we've got to determine for ourselves how to enforce them. That you'd blame this problem on me or another specific admin is, what's that word you keep using? Strawman.
4. Here’s the part of Canary’s post that gets really interesting.
Canary, here, literally uses the arguments of people who have been put up on the ban request forum, by me personally, for intentionally TW/TK’ing me after throwing a tantrum. These same people were guilty of the same infraction of rules (trash talking) that they accused me of and that you’re basing the meat of your argument off of. The difference is that I didn’t throw a tantrum and TK/TW anybody.
'Cause we look into both sides of a story when they're available. Half or more of the rulebreaking that goes on is prompted by the actions of another player, and oftentimes those actions are also in breach of the rules. I'd rather see both parties punished, and so listen to both sides, than have only one side pay for the mistake.
Canary, if you’re going to use the excuses (not even actual arguments) of guilty hypocrites, who are about to be hanged in their own ban threads for intentional tk’ing, I’d say your position and argument is in some serious fucking trouble.
You are blaming me for not taking sides. You are saying that I
should not look into the entirety of the issue when both people have a problem? And you continue to complain about the double-standards...
Also, it is kind of convenient that you willfully chose not to actually link where the arguments were coming from, like you did initially, so people couldn’t put two and two together.
Huh? The quotes are links.
5. You can believe in expression of freedom and still care about someone’s feeling. Believing in the freedom to express yourself doesn’t mean you are an outright sociopath if that is what you’re attempting to imply.
Mincing my words, taking them out of context, and extrapolating what I meant by them. You're kind of proving my point about their feelings when you entirely dismiss the complaints of those "guilty hypocrites" who teamkilled you.
6. This section is great because it is one fallacy followed by another (the second in the form of another strawman argument). First off, trash talk doesn’t give you the right to TK somebody. Repeated trash talk doesn’t give you the right to TK somebody. Do I ever TK anyone intentionally for trash talking me? No. Do I ever TK anyone intentionally for repeatedly trash talking me? No; hence, the painfully obvious logical fallacy here.
I'm not trying to justify the actions they'd taken, I'm pointing out the reasons behind them. I'd agree with you if the incidents were more isolated and if you hadn't gone above and beyond the point where you're deserving of punishment. You are the point from which a lot of problems stem. The majority of these people seem to have reported your misuse of game chat as the motivation behind their outbreak. It turns out you're doing something I'd consider a breach of the rules, too, and
not on an isolated scale. The troublemaker whose trouble is causing even more trouble gets more punishment for causing it.
As for the strawman argument?
“You are a negative impact on this community and you've made it clear that you intend to continue to be so.”
I am also a positive impact on this community. However, I’m pretty sure I made it abundantly clear that I want the rules to be reformed to eliminate subjective rulebook abuse by the admins and to keep them from being protected by their obvious mistakes and practices of double standards. I’m pretty sure I’ve mentioned that I would be happy to turn in any trash talkers if you made it completely illegal. I am eager to form a solution. That doesn’t translate to what you’re trying to insinuate. The impression that I’m getting is that you don’t want to tackle this subject. If that is the case, why are you an admin? Do you not want to make the rules fairer for EVERYONE? Do you not want to eliminate possible abuse by your fellow admins and yourself? Do you not want to eliminate the corruption that goes on?
What is really curious in this segment is that you said I “push the limits” and not “break the limits.” That appears to me to be a Freudian slip. Seems to me it runs contrary to everything you’re trying to specifically state and prove; not exactly a great way to build an argument.
http://www.fallacyfiles.org/strawman.html
You refused to change your behavior under the current rules simply because they're either being enforced lackadaisically or aren't 100% implicit. You've been warned, you've been muted, you've been banned, and yet you still behaved this way and blame the
rules for what went wrong? You blame the admins when they've been making it clear, I should have thought, to you, what is not okay? Is the only message you'd understand a plain-as-day, black-and-white list of rules that specify every single thing that would be a cause for a ban? Because that won't happen. You'll just have to deal with it. There shouldn't have to be a complete rewrite of the code of conduct because one person is having an issue with being punished for not following it.
If anything we should be the ones complaining because of how much time we end up spending on this kind of garbage. I'm not required to explain myself one whit to you, did you know that? I choose to do it. I choose to try and help establish a consistent way to enforce the rules along with the other admins. You got punished for something that even in the "subjective rulebook" is pretty clearly not okay and post paragraph upon paragraph of arguments that are kind of misplaced this late in the game. If we've presented an inconsistent front I can only apologize. If we've not given punishment everywhere it's deserved, I can only say we'll try to do better.
We, as mere admins, can't change the rules. We can only change how we handle them. If we've started enforcing them better, then I guess that's why it has become your problem. Continuing to attack me doesn't make yourself any less guilty.
7. This last final list is so laughably desperate I can’t even believe you’re trying it. However, if you want me to specifically address each one of these bullet points, it’s just going to continue to prove how laughably absurd your entire argument has become when actually challenged.
I'm glad you found it funny, because I meant it facetiously...
Hell, let’s give an example on the first one just for fun:
- “Fighting or challenging someone to fight in a public place”
The ENTIRE point of CRPG is to fight (either to kill or to claim an objective). Did you honestly even think before putting this list together? Honestly? You are definitely not helping your case with this type of nonsense.
Canary, I’m not intentionally trying to embarrass you here, but if this is the best you’re going to scrape together against me, you really have nobody to blame but yourself.
I can tell your heart isn’t in this argument. Frankly, I think everybody knows I’ve basically wrapped up the win for philosophical debate here (especially if this is the best initial response you can bring against me). It just really depends on if the admins will listen to reason or just abuse their positions of power to get their way and re-secure their own pride. They’d be proving my entire point by doing so.
...but I guess you missed that.
If you can't see any further into that analogy, though, then I say it's your heart that isn't in it.
Reason does not equate to repeated attacks, trivial arguing, nitpicking responses and indictments against the system when under scrutiny. Nobody's here to fix things just because you got screwed over by something you did. And then you state bold-faced how you "won a debate" here despite having told
multiple untruths in the very same post.
We all know the unban essay forum is nothing more than a venue to publically humiliate someone.
In effect, true. But there's more to it.
You’d be perfectly happy eating a lie from me that you know is a lie just so you could feel a little bit bigger about yourselves; various individuals in the community included.
False. We're here to understand whether or not you understood why you were banned and that you would not continue to break the rules. If it had turned out you'd lied about it and continued to break them, it would result in a permanent ban, and
there's nothing aggrandizing about having to keep someone from playing the game.
You aren’t dealing with a kid here. I have your job in the real world. I’m highly trained for it. I have years of experience in it. Frankly, I could do your job better than you. Put me to the test if you don’t believe me.
I’m not going to write some bullshit essay degrading myself, my family, where I come from, my values, etc.. like I’ve seen others do just so you can feel a little bit bigger and just so the community can feel like they are getting their satisfaction. If you have a hole in your self esteem, I suggest you go exercise and lift weights. If you have a grudge and want to have it out with me, I suggest you save it for playing against me in the game. Don’t abuse your position. Don’t abuse the system. If you want to solve this issue, I’d be more than happy to work with you, but I’m not going to shit on myself to make you feel better about whom you are.
Respect has to be earned, and you certainly aren’t earning it with anybody who can think for themselves and can see what you mods are doing; which dozens of people here can already.
That's a lot of irrelevant stuff initiated with a "come at me bro". Believe it or not, but there's no grudge here. You just require a lot of attention. We have had trouble trying to deal with you in the past, and that's because you can be so belligerent. I'm not abusing my position by
upholding the rules against a repeat offender and looking into requests made in the ban section of the forums. From past experience, you have not proven to be someone we can work with. You've only brought up the option now after having been banned.
As for respect:
19730: 19:39:51 - *DEAD* [SpookPalace] bundle of stickss wont listenIf you want use the poll method of deciding what essay is good or not, we should use that method for deciding who stays as admin. Only we set the standard a little higher considering that with their power, they should be held to a higher standard. Then we make the poll system completely open to everyone so we can all see who votes. Then we filter the voting system so that no admin can vote for another admin and that no clan member can vote for another clan member or for someone in an allied clan. We remove the penchant for corruption that is already there.
If we played by those rules, how many of you admins would be thrown out on your ass? Definitely a vast number of you.
So if you want to live by the sword of lynchmob polling, you better be prepared and willing to die by it. However, I think that is the last thing the current admins genuinely want. You do not want to be held accountable, but you want to be freely entitled to hold everyone else accountable by subjective criteria you write yourselves. That’s called hypocrisy and corruption. I used to live in Illinois, and we know all about that game.
There are certainly a lot of vague allegations coming from you about the corruption and double-standards of the admins. People are free to write about it in the admin feedback part of the forums. A lot of admins even
do have self-appointed polls in their threads, but, no, they don't amount to anything. The poll for an unban essay doesn't amount to much, either.
Most of your issues don't seem to stem from us directly, but rather the rules, the way they're written and definitely the way they're interpreted, which you evidently do quite differently than the admin team. A lot of discussions were never had, and so a lot of problems went unchecked, which exacerbated this situation beyond being a matter of words (which is coincidental because of the reason you got banned...!).
I, too, live in Illinois. This, however, is a game of leisure, and the only thing at stake right now is your personal enjoyment. (and, I suppose, that of the people who both cheer for you and deplore you)
Finally, the cherry on top of this post.
I present everyone in the community and in this topic with yet another example of the exercise in routine double standards; only this time it was performed even with a clear black and white rule that allowed for no subjectivity.
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Some petty, small-minded admin rewarded me last week with a 50% warning because I broke the double-posting rules in my own unban thread.
Notice the cutesy little immature message left to me that embodies the “well… so there!” attitude that runs amok when you let non-trained children enter a position of power usually because their other friends invite them aboard. Now notice that the first two replies in this topic, we’re currently in, broke literally the same rule and has no warning level. There were multiple people in this thread who broke that same black and white rule, yet I was the only one punished by it.
So I just want to thank that particular admin, who probably doesn’t have the balls to step forward and defend himself, for proving me exactly right yet again.
I literally could not have asked for a better example handed to me.
Thank you.
It was me, of course. Stop acting as though you're the victim of some kind of bitterness or conspiracy. As Tears mentioned, the other posts weren't warned because your two threads (with the same subject, which is also against the forum rules) were merged. I only gave you a 45% warning, not 50%, which is the threshold for a mute, so that you would be allowed to respond sooner, since this was an ongoing thread. You were also
quintuple posting.
So, I stepped forward (which I can only assume you were attempting to goad whoever it was into) and you were proven exactly wrong, also again.
You're welcome.My final question in this reply to admins is this:
If you can’t even avoid blatant double standards and abuse, with clearly-written black and white rules such as brought up above, why should the community allow you vaguer, more subjective rules to employ your abuse with? Why should we give you the leverage and insurance to be as corrupt as you want to be when clearly you haven’t even gotten a handle on the most simplistic of rules that you created?
Because it's a game, and there's only a problem when someone (read: rulebreakers) create one.
Seriously, though, the people who developed cRPG are the ones who made the rules, stop blaming the admins as a single generic entity. They had something in mind for how people are supposed to conduct themselves on this free mod they host and continue to update. You can continue to contest us and our decisions, but it's a little late to start arguing the rules when they have almost never changed, and not in any major way.
And to answer your question with my own question:
If you really feel like you're the victim of corruption, why do you keep bothering to argue the rules at all? It is evident that you broke them, even under the loose definitions they hold.
Why should we give you the leverage and platform to speak as freely as you want when you are a player who was banned for
chat abuse in the first place?
If there’s a problem with CRPG, it doesn’t lie within the community. I think I just proved that pretty clearly.
You've proved once again that you're here doing this for the audience of said community, sure. Pretty apt that you emote using a microphone.
There, that was dumb.
I'll give a final answer sometime later today.
Poll