Wall of text incoming, don't bother reading it if you don't care for a wishy-washy feelings based post. That is, unless you're looking for ammunition to hurl at me. If so, by all means, read away.
I used to look at these threads and think it was kind of silly to make a whole post for it, but I kind of see it - in my old age, I suppose - that it must be bittersweet to leave for those who keep this community so close to heart.
We're a bunch of 'spergs that beat on each other, insult each other, and literally want to kill each other (in-game) to the point of waging war over Strat.
No other game I've ever played has the community this invested in each other. And at the end of the day, we're all a bunch of bro-sco's playing a game together. All our invested and evoked emotion contributes to the nebula that is our little brotherhood.
Sure there are those funny sounding people across the water, but at the end of the day, we're all playing together. We're all joined by our mutual desire for fun and a good old time. We get drunk in TS together, we get mad at each other together.
"The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference. The opposite of beauty is not ugliness, it's indifference. The opposite of faith is not heresy, it's indifference. And the opposite of life is not death, but indifference between life and death."
~ Elie Wiesel
I think that says something about our community. We - at times - hate each other. But that doesn't matter, because the "feeling's mutual, bruh." A bunch of asshats on CS:GO will never get to me no matter what they say, but some of what you guys say impacts me irl'z.
I think our community is best defined as being that we are all the same person, just in different instances of being. We love, hate, appreciate and despise each other as a reflection of ourselves. I've made friends here that I'd bail out of jail any fucking day of the week, and I wouldn't even do that for people I've known in person for longer.
You guys are top lads (and ladies). And I'm always sorry to see part of our collective soul leave, especially when we know they're serious. Missed opportunities to get to know a bit more of our community has been, and will always be, a melancholy event for me.