Kain Darkwind's page

What makes rooming with a trans woman a "dangerous situation"?

If she had a loaded gun. A real katana she liked swinging around in the dark. A recent trip to some of the local taco places I've heard about from con tales. If she was sick with an easily communicable disease. If her significant other was an angry jealous person prone to violence. If she was a runaway princess from Jupiter that even as we speak, lethal bounty hunters are scouring the system for any trace of to bring her back to her evil uncle, that he might legitimize his claim to the throne.

The theme of the above would seem to be 'nothing inherent to being trans' in my mind? But I'm not a bean counter. I don't have a lot of empathy for a theoretical position predicated on the idea that a trans woman rooming with a cis woman is anything other than two women rooming together. Because the silent part that keeps running through my mind is that they are thinking "We don't want to room a man with a woman." As long as the situation is just trans women can't room with cis women, that's the reason I'm assuming, and that's blatant transphobia. In fact, the only version of the scenario that makes sense to me that wouldn't be transphobic would be if the decision came about due to something particular to Crystal herself, rather than her gender. Which seems it might still be a problem, just a different one. And as I've said, we don't have enough information to support that.

At worst, Paizo had a deliberately transphobic policy. At best, Paizo's decision made Crystal feel she was the target of a transphobic policy. All the other scenarios fit in between those, whether their decision was a bad call based on a poor understanding of legal ramifications or whether it was a personal attack on Crystal, or whether it was a transphobic choice on the part of a manager and not Paizo at large.

Unless someone is on a different page than 'trans women are women, trans men are men', I don't see how the particulars of the case matter overmuch to the community at large. No matter what degree of transphobia was involved, I don't think anyone here thinks it was ok for Crystal to feel discriminated against for her gender identity? Now, I am of the opinion that legally, we won't be seeing an apology or acknowledgement of that unless Paizo loses a courtcase about it, because such an admission opens them up to being sued. That's not going to sit well with a lot of people, but I think that is the reality. Which is why I wanted to see that there would be a policy that prevented such discrimination from occurring in the future.

Kain Darkwind wrote:

I mean, the discussion now seems to be whether or not a real law was broken, but I don't see the relevance of that. Actions taken because someone thought the law (or rule, in the case of an unlikely company policy on the matter) was such and such don't necessarily have to have an actual law that justifies them.

This right here. If I'm understanding this right, some people are arguing that Paizo is either absolved of or innocent of these allegations of transphobia on the grounds that they THOUGHT they were covering themselves legally.

If Paizo made the call to discriminate against someone based on her gender because they thought they knew the rules and they were wrong, they were still wrong. Malice isn't required, you can just not know enough about trans people, which unfortunately is a problem a significant part of the population has.

Right. If you follow a law that doesn't exist, there isn't automatically a problem, other than you wasting your time. But if you break a law that you didn't know exists, you still broke the law.

And in either instance, I don't think we'll be privy to the details, unless Crystal gets more specific and/or whoever the manager was that made the call comes forward to explain.

And as I've said previously, I don't think they actually matter. A trans person shouldn't have to wonder if they were being separated from a group due to their identity.

As for the lawyers, it seems to me that the beancounters in HR would be just as adverse to a lawsuit from allegations of systemic transphobic actions as they would from a lawsuit that they placed a cis woman in a dangerous situation by having her room with a trans woman.

Realistically, if you had reason to suspect ANY person, regardless of their gender or orientation, of being a sexual predator or even just a creep, then they should have been on a no-con list to begin with, until you could remove them from the company entirely.

I'm no longer certain of what the conversation is about. Given what we know, any of the following scenarios could have happened. (I want to be clear they are all hypothetical possibilities and not based on any real knowledge. I'm not presuming anyone's actual motivations here.)

1. Crystal's situation made her manager uncomfortable due to the fact the manager disliked trans people or considered them to not match their gender identity, and the manager chose to forbid the rooming.

2. Crystal's situation made her manager uncomfortable because it was the first time a trans and cis woman were provided the opportunity to room together, and the manager made a call without considering all of the implications. Or made the call out of fear of legal repercussions that may or may not have actually existed.

3. Amanda secretly was uncomfortable with rooming with Crystal (for any reason, trans or not) and mentioned it to the manager who chose to run interference by taking responsibility for making the call.

4. Crystal was disliked by her manager for reasons unrelated to being trans, and the rooming was forbidden in order to keep Crystal from going to the convention, not to keep her separate from cis women.

I mean, the discussion now seems to be whether or not a real law was broken, but I don't see the relevance of that. Actions taken because someone thought the law (or rule, in the case of an unlikely company policy on the matter) was such and such don't necessarily have to have an actual law that justifies them. Say for instance, an 18 year old breaks up with her 17 year old boyfriend because she thinks that legally she's no longer allowed to date him, when the law of her state actually allows an age gap of two years. You can point to the fact that the law doesn't exist, but the perceived law still motivated her decision. (and in the case that the law and her actions were reversed, she would still suffer legal consequences for breaking the law.)

Unclear or possibly just bad rules.

Generally lax rules and broad guidelines really are best, while strict rules just piss everybody off. "No personal items" might get prevent some problematic things, but it also sweeps away harmless character and personality. You only have to go there when people are abusing the privilege and management can't or isn't willing to deal fairly with the problems. "Don't be a dick" isn't a clear rule, but done in good faith it covers most problems.
Until someone isn't dealing in good faith and tries to rules lawyer around it.

Heh, I think the preference for lax vs strict rules is one of the few actual characteristics that differentiate between chaotic and lawful alignments, is it not?

As someone who struggles to notice, much less care about, others' personal styles, decorations, clothing, etc, I agree that I prefer less to more, when it comes to dress codes, people telling me what I'm allowed to have in my workspace, etc.

But, from a company perspective, say I have two employees that work hard, know what they are doing, and get things done. Employee 1 is a Christian, super uptight, and easily offended by what they perceive as sinful actions. Employee 2 doesn't have any religion, is fairly relaxed, but recently had an annoying personal exchange with Employee 1, so they decided to bring in Satanist counterparts to the Christian decorations in Employee 1's workspace, just to annoy them without actively doing anything wrong.

Now, as an employer, I have a potentially explosive situation on my hands, all due to the fact that these two good employees are basically picking at each other. And yeah, Employee 3, who has stayed out of this, but is a Wiccan/Christian/Satanist/Etsy enthusiast, is probably about to end up screwed by a policy designed to keep Employee 1 and 2 from escalating their sniping.

And human nature being what it is, the employer is often going to be drawn into the more obvious nature of the religious back and forth, than the fact that the religion is being used as a proxy for the two's personal issues. And now, it isn't just Employee 1, but all Christianity, and not Employee 2 but all Satanism. When in reality, this all boils down to someone who is uptight and someone who is doing something they know (but no one can prove) bothers that uptight person.

This is the sort of scenario that leads someone to declare workspaces to be barren of any personal items. Well before they get to the point of having back the blue and pride flags flying in their office.

In my opinion, the clearest policies tell you what you can/should/are allowed to do, not what you aren't allowed to do.

Kain Darkwind wrote:

Clear policies are good, Paizo should have a clear policy. Even if it's not made available to the customers, the employees should know how things are working. Customers knowing that there is a clear policy will alleviate some of their concern about unfair treatment of people they care about.

Clear policies aren't always clear. My current office has tried to create clearer more inclusive policies; but people keep being alienated in different ways. To help prevent any issues we now have pages of policies that no one really understands to the full extent. One of the things that happened right before the pandemic is that no one can have personal items at their desks. Instead you can only have company approved items for decorations that they have preselected. If you have any decorations on your desk someone will come and talk to you.

Just because you have "clearer" policies doesn't mean they are clear in every way possible and sometimes can create unintended side effects.

It would seem you are talking about unclear policies, not clear ones? I mean, in regards to the desk items question, the clearest policy of all is 'no non-work items allowed on the desk.' This might not be the most desirable policy, but if I can't trust my employees not to get into some sort of religious one upsmanship contest with holiday decorations, or someone to use their allowance of pictures to cover their desk in cultish fawning over a politician (or mockery of a politician) or LonelyFrans screenshots, then no decorations might be the best answer.

Freedom, even as simple as 'I can place personal items in my public workspace' comes with responsibility. Otherwise it doesn't work. And suddenly you end up with people fighting to band public Nativity scenes during December, or trying to jump down their Jewish cashier's throat for wishing them happy holidays.

In teaching, we call it rules and procedures. You have a few rules, which are nonnegotiable and apply regardless of situation, like 'treat people with respect' And you have many procedures (aka policies), for just about everything. How to get a pencil. How to ask permission to leave the room. Where to put your bag.

'Trans people get basic human respect' (how is this considered political or even bold?) would fall under the rule category, most likely without the first word included, while 'how rooming assignments will work when we go to GenCon' would be a procedure.

Kain Darkwind wrote:

Mergy wrote:

People are upset because solving the hotel room issue in this way is very similar to "don't ask, don't tell".

That's an interesting analogy. In my lifetime, I've seen DADT go from the progressive and inclusive option to the posterchild for discriminatory ruling.

I'm too young (born 1990) and don't have the experience in the military but I got the impression that DADT was a compromise rather than *the* progressive and inclusive option.

I'm also struggling to reasonably map your elaborations (which are interesting and I appreciate you sharing your experience) back onto the hotel situation, as I don't think Paizo has a murdering trans people problem, or something similar that trans people need to be shielded from. The context for DADT being a compromise isn't a good mapping for the context of Paizo today. Although I can sorta see what you're saying with the reality of trans discrimination or prejudice still being present, I think we're supposed to be at a place now culturally where that should be unacceptable rather than compromised around.

While I generally agree that autonomy over room choices is good policy, the context for the switch to that policy is othering for sure. (For example: I like single stall bathrooms, I don't like single stall bathrooms being pitched as the solution to cis people realizing trans people pee like everyone else.)

Ah, my comment flowed naturally from the conversation, but a massive chunk of that is now gone and moderated away (including oddly enough a defense of inclusivity), and it doesn't fit quite as seamlessly now. There's also the bit where there are multiple threads at this point, so the flow of my thoughts as they develop isn't neatly in order on a single thread.

To summarize my thoughts on the Crystal situation.

1. Whether the situation was or wasn't transphobic misses the point. It made a woman feel discriminated against for being trans.
2. There was no policy in place to prevent transphobic discrimination.
3. A clear policy helps everyone understand the process that produces a given outcome, whether that's for being fired, rooming with someone at a convention, or getting a raise.
4. Clear policies are good, Paizo should have a clear policy. Even if it's not made available to the customers, the employees should know how things are working. Customers knowing that there is a clear policy will alleviate some of their concern about unfair treatment of people they care about.

And while I haven't thought about it, a clear policy that prevents trans discrimination probably doesn't have to specifically be about trans discrimination. Saying things like "Our company will never discriminate on the basis of gender identity" sounds nice, but it's not actually a clear policy.

Non single stall bathroom policies are almost always going to be bad examples of clear non-discriminatory policy because the very concept of a Men's/Women's room is discriminatory to begin with. Bathrooms also have the exciting distinction of having a rich history of discrimination.

Quite frankly, there exist multiple scenarios where Crystal's situation could have occurred and not for transphobic reasons. All would require more information than anyone not directly affected by the situation has at the moment.

But let's take a step back. Say it -was- a decision that wasn't made for transphobic reasons.

There's still a woman who was left feeling that she was being discriminated against for being trans coming out of the scenario. And there's no company policy in place that she can look at to see how or why that wasn't the case. Do we see why that's a problem?

I might have a really good reason to pay this male employee more than a female employee in a similar position. Or this black employee more than her Asian counterpart, or whatever. God I hope there's a clear salary policy/set of guidelines to work off of. Because even if I have a good reason, I don't want my female employee thinking it was because she was a female and that's just the way things go. You can see that, right? Even if she accepted that discrimination without going to legal, that's still an undesirable outcome?

A lack of policy led Crystal to the conclusion that she was discriminated against for being trans. There's no way that's a good thing, even if she wasn't. Even if she just sucked it up as one more nasty experience on the list.

A clear policy isn't just CYA for the company in case a disgruntled employee turns on them. It fosters understanding within the organization of how they can expect things to work.

I get that all the details on Crystal's situation won't ever be known to me. But employees today should know that they aren't being shafted over whatever sort of reason, and certainly not because they belong to a minority group that lacks the political capital necessary to avenge their mistreatment.

People are upset because solving the hotel room issue in this way is very similar to "don't ask, don't tell".

That's an interesting analogy. In my lifetime, I've seen DADT go from the progressive and inclusive option to the posterchild for discriminatory ruling.

DADT only changed one thing about gays serving in the military, the asking part. Previously, we all were asked, and thus if someone was later found out, it became a crime of falsifying a federal document. It was still illegal to be gay and serving in the military.

A (probably) gay soldier was brutally killed at my duty station of Fort Campbell, literally the first year I was in the Army. And not because of DADT, but due to gay panic. Because of that killing, the policy became that if you said you were gay, no (or very few) questions asked, you got chaptered out of the military in 72 hours. A lot of straight guys who regretted signing up used it to get out. Most of the gay people I knew in the service were not telling (or only telling trusted people). Most of us really didn't care about our fellow soldiers' sexuality. As one eloquent Marine once stated, 'the average military guy does gayer stuff on a regular basis out in the open than actual homosexuals do in their homes.' He was not using the term in the generic 'insult' sense either, although I suspect being more specific might violate the community terms of service.

Now, you might consider the commanders that threw gay (professed) soldiers out of the army in three days to be horrifically biased or homophobic today, but they were also trying to protect those same gay soldiers from potentially murderous reprisals. There weren't actual good answers, definitely not easy ones. Even if you prosecute and convict gay killing soldiers, you still have dead gay soldiers. It's not something that changed overnight, and it's not something that just one person, even a president, had the power to fix alone.

To bring it back to the Paizo hotel room issue, giving everyone their own room and letting them be the one to decide who they room/bunk/sleep with is probably the better and safer solution regardless, even preferable than to my previously stated 'let people consent to their roommate' idea. It removes hard feelings from company's sphere of influence. It's easy to look at it as letting people chicken out rather than have to vocalize that they have a problem sleeping in the same room as a trans person, or gay person, or any other kind of person, but it also keeps you from having to room with someone who is of the unwashed poor hygiene RPG player stereotype. Or just the person that tells horribly boring stories until 4am. Giving individuals autonomy is a good thing.

The room issue and liability doesn't need a bold stance on trans rights to avoid being discriminatory, regardless of whether the state in question acknowledges trans folk's rights or not. Since everyone is an adult, cohabitation can (and should) be determined entirely based on consent, which can be given or not given without an explanation. If someone is uncomfortable rooming with a person that they know is trans, cis, white, male, stinky, stays up too late, eats meat, doesn't like their favorite cartoon, whatever, they can withhold consent. If you don't have consent from both (or all, in the case of more than two) individuals, you don't cohabitate.

It really doesn't matter if a man stays with a woman on a business trip, if they both consented. Just like it should not have mattered that two women consented to cohabitate. This isn't the 1950s.

I think most binary approaches end up failing because life exists across a spectrum. Whichever side of the binary ends up coming off as (not necessarily actually being) the most inflexible tends to lose. Every once and awhile you'll get two equally inflexible sides and establish some sort of equilibrium.

So despite most people having nuanced views on this matter, regardless of where they fall, all the views are being placed in one of the two following categories.

1. Paizo is bad/Paizo did bad things, aka 'Paizo must change.'

2. Paizo is good/Paizo did not do bad things, aka 'Paizo should stay the same.'

So sure, some people are saying 'I support position 2, this entire affair makes me more supportive of Paizo because I dislike position 1 so much.' And some people are saying, 'I not only support position 1, but I know specifically of these two/ten/four score changes that must be made.'

But that's the binary. I've heard all of the following views.

A. I don't know enough about this situation, so I support X until shown otherwise.

B. People who support X are annoying/stupid/phobic/other negative, ergo I support Y.

C. Other people's reactions are unacceptable.

D. I think Paizo will change, and I support 2.

E. I support 1 but I'm not entirely sure how much Paizo must change.

F. Paizo should support what I think is morally right over what the law says.

G. Paizo should support the law over what others think is morally right.

H. F&G aren't mutually exclusive, are they?

I. I don't trust the people making allegations, so 2.

J. I trust people making the allegations, so 1.

K. I trust some (not all) of the allegations, so X.

L. I only trust evidence, which makes me support X.

M. There is no way to get evidence, which makes me support X.

I probably could go through the entire alphabet without even getting into the sidetrack discussions that have cropped up, but I will say I'm wary of absolutes past the most basic of verified facts. (Sara was fired and made a post. It says X. Jeff responded to the situation and it says Y. He responded again and it says Z.') I don't like presuming I know someone's unstated motivations, and I don't like unsupported predictions of the future. And I don't like getting rid of neutral positions, assigning them to a side, or suggesting that the neutral position is inherently superior to the others.

At the end of the day, I want to see that Paizo has clear policies that do not discriminate against their employees for things they shouldn't be discriminated against, and I want to see Sara Marie land on her feet and go on to be successful. I guess that puts me on the 'side' of position 1, even though I don't think Paizo is bad, and I don't believe there's evidence for many of the accusations and I don't find all of the accusations to be actual problems regardless of their veracity.

Things are usually more complex than a binary.

If that had been the statement we got initially, I would have spent a lot less time crying.

I only see the cry statement. Where is the new one?

@Arkon63

It's a bit hypocritical to paint all of us LGBTQ folks with a brush and turn around and then say that all of Paizo deserves the benefit of the doubt and not to judge it based on the actions of a few, isn't it? Even if you had a valid point or frustration in there, you've voiced it in a way that's almost certainly going to be moderated away, and then what?

I think it's fair to want to know if Paizo really does have directly discriminatory policies for its employees based on their gender expression or orientation or anything else. If Crystal had been a black woman and told she couldn't go because she wasn't allowed to room with a white woman who had no problem rooming with her, this would be a real cut and dry situation.

And I think, if the above situation had occurred in the 1960s, people would be receptive to the idea that even though the company had been trying to do the right thing, this situation caught them off guard and they made a call which turned out to be a bad one. And they might be receptive to the idea that the particular situation couldn't be discussed due to legal reasons.

I'd *still* want to know that they had a specific policy that would address future situations of that nature.

Isolated offenses aren't why things become large problems. It's the continued nature of them, and it starts to look like 'it was just an accident/one-time/bad call/very specific' is just an excuse to keep the bad behavior going.

To use an example from back in the day, when I was a manager at Deb's, we got an anonymous complaint that I was looking into changing rooms while up on a ladder. I had no idea anyone was even in the rooms, someone must have seen me up there while I was changing a lightbulb and figured if they could see me, I could see them. (And I probably could have, if I'd been looking.) Since I wasn't known for that type of behavior, I didn't get written up or anything when I denied it. But we STILL came up with a policy that I (and anyone else) would only fix lightbulbs on that ladder before open or after closing.

Good policies aren't just to make a specific group of people happy. They're intended to make sure that things flow smoothly.

I am also sorry for if it seemed like I snapped at you. It's been a rough week.

No, when I said thank you, I meant it. I did appreciate the correction. My linguistic reasoning went with 'misgendered rhymes with cisgendered the opposite of transgendered'. But that's not the case. In a similar vein, I hope if we met in person and I had something in my teeth, you'd let me know that too, so that you're the last person that day I have to look like an idiot in front of.

I feel like a drunken time traveler, but on the flip side, I'm glad trans rights have come so far. My memory still has gay marriage bans being signed into a bunch of state laws. I've missed two whole presidents.

Sorry for the hyper focus on Crystal's issues. I know Sara Marie's sudden firing deserves attention too.

If I have confused anyone, let me try to be clear.

Crystal is a woman. When I found out from Cori that she was a trans woman, that did not change anything in my understanding. She's still a woman.

If Paizo had some problem with trans women rooming with cis women, even cis women who had no problem with her rooming with them, the implication to me is that they would not have a problem with a trans woman rooming with cis guys.

It is not ok to lump trans women in with cis guys, because they're women. I'm always going to take the word of the individual over anyone else's on that matter...one is the foremost expert on oneself.

Clearly, Paizo didn't have any policy, well thought out or otherwise. At a minimum, I would hope that has changed to something less disappointing.

Kain Darkwind wrote:

Does that mean Crystal could have roomed with a cis dude without an issue?

Hey, there's some of that othering I was talking about!

Like, do you understand why what you're asking is incredibly offensive?

No, I don't. If Paizo had a policy of making (or letting) trans people room with the opposite gender but not their own, that would be massive evidence of some screwed up policies.

It's clear by your tones that I'm getting some of the lingo wrong. I'm not intending to. I don't have many memories between 2005 and May of this year thanks to Covid. Back then, the acceptable term was transsexual. I understand that isn't the case anymore. I'm not trying to 'other' anyone, and if you feel othered by me, I'm sorry. Despite my lack of memory, I still have trans friends, and I hope that even if I didn't, I would have a desire for people's basic humanity to be respected. Regardless of whether I'm getting the terminology right.

It was my understanding that Paizo was a company that shared that desire of basic humanity, and I wanted to be clear that they weren't before taking actions. Based on Cori's explanation, I have a clearer picture now than I did before, and I appreciate that.

Kain Darkwind wrote:

I read that. Is Crystal talking about herself there? Is she 'transgender employees'? I ask, because it seems like the stuff about employee being fired while out with a broken ankle sounds personal.

And if Crystal is 'Paizo's transgendered employees', it seems that mistreatment of her doesn't automatically make these things policies intended to harm transgendered people. Even the reason for the firing has to be conjecture, there's no way someone was fired and told that they were making way for a straight cisgendered friend.

I don't want to downplay anything, but reading the tweets and having no other information to go off of, it sounds more like whoever Crystal's manager was didn't like her and used the position to crap on her. And now that manager is 'Paizo' and Crystal is 'transgendered employees'. I once had a job as a woman's clothing store (Deb) manager, but I don't think it would be entirely accurate to call my treatment by employees and bosses there as the company's policy for bisexual male Army veterans. Of which I was the company's only on all three accounts. Again, that's just from the limited tweet information; anyone with better insight into the stuff is welcome to broaden my understanding.

Not letting Crystal go and bunk with another female is different than not letting her go because she's transgender, or not letting transgendered individuals ever go.

A. Crystal is transgender, and at the time was one of Paizo's transgender employees (transgendered is not correct terminology, transgender is an adjective, not a noun).

B. Crystal was told that the reason they would not send her to cons is that their budget required cohabitation, and they would not allow her to cohabitate with a cisgender woman, even when that cisgender woman said that it was what they also wanted.
C. Whether that was the work of a single manager or corporate policy, it was still something that was enacted and prevented Crystal from having the same opportunities as her peers, just because of her gender identity.

A. Thanks. Grammatically, I think you mean 'adjective, not a *verb*'. Adding 'ed' to something implies a state of being originated in the past ('screw to screwed', 'close to closed' etc.)

B. Ok, and I want to be clear on this. They wouldn't allow her to cohabitate with the cis woman in question who had no issues with it BECAUSE she was trans? Not because they were a couple, or because they weren't allowing any cohabitation, or any other reasons, but Crystal and Employee X weren't allowed to cohabitate because Crystal was transgender. Does that mean Crystal could have roomed with a cis dude without an issue? This is sort of why I was curious about an actual stated policy on Paizo's part about cohabitation. If they allowed any cohabitation, and if they allowed any male/female cohabitation and if they allowed any couple cohabitation.

C. I want to be clear, this sounds like something rotten that happened regardless of these specifics, but there is still a difference to me if it was the act of a single nasty individual given power, and if it was the act of the company itself, or if the company condoned nasty acts by this individual to the point of being a de facto policy.

Kain Darkwind wrote:

I read that. Is Crystal talking about herself there? Is she 'transgender employees'? I ask, because it seems like the stuff about employee being fired while out with a broken ankle sounds personal.

And if Crystal is 'Paizo's transgendered employees', it seems that mistreatment of her doesn't automatically make these things policies intended to harm transgendered people. Even the reason for the firing has to be conjecture, there's no way someone was fired and told that they were making way for a straight cisgendered friend.

I don't want to downplay anything, but reading the tweets and having no other information to go off of, it sounds more like whoever Crystal's manager was didn't like her and used the position to crap on her. And now that manager is 'Paizo' and Crystal is 'transgendered employees'. I once had a job as a woman's clothing store (Deb) manager, but I don't think it would be entirely accurate to call my treatment by employees and bosses there as the company's policy for bisexual male Army veterans. Of which I was the company's only on all three accounts....

Which is why Paizo should address it. Thus far they’ve addressed the ridiculous, the truly salacious and the charges that can easily be batted away by saying “no we didn’t.”

The one that has perhaps the most potential to tarnish their image is an inclusive company is the one they are shying away from the most.

Well, I agree there. If they do in fact, have a policy of harming transfolk or limiting their experiences in ways that cisfolk don't have to deal with, I'll have to drastically reorient my outlook on their company. That's grotesque and uncalled for.

However, sadly, I don't think there is much of an upside to them commenting. Anything they say can be used to make a legal nightmare for them, and the court of internet opinion doesn't seem to care too much for things they didn't want to hear. For instance, the immediate response to gay employees responding that they've never seen any sort of homophobic actions on Jeff's part were met with suggestions that the employees were intimidated or forced to make their statements. It's probably more beneficial to Paizo to stay quiet about it.

Kain Darkwind wrote:

keftiu wrote:

thaX wrote:

As for the hotel room accommodations, keep in mind that the likely reason for co-habit concerns in the first place is that the room space is limited during convention events that they are likely needed for, so the need to room with others is not just about not getting single rooms, but the availability of rooms for the situation.

The allegation was that a trans employee was not allowed to co-habitate with a cis coworker.

This seems too short to evaluate. Were there other factors to consider?

1. What was the actual co-habitation policy?
2. Was there an issue of consent involved?
3. Was this a constant issue, or a one-off?

Crystal Frasier

And it's not just "weren't allowed to room together", but weren't sent to conventions because of it.

I read that. Is Crystal talking about herself there? Is she 'transgender employees'? I ask, because it seems like the stuff about employee being fired while out with a broken ankle sounds personal.

And if Crystal is 'Paizo's transgendered employees', it seems that mistreatment of her doesn't automatically make these things policies intended to harm transgendered people. Even the reason for the firing has to be conjecture, there's no way someone was fired and told that they were making way for a straight cisgendered friend.

I don't want to downplay anything, but reading the tweets and having no other information to go off of, it sounds more like whoever Crystal's manager was didn't like her and used the position to crap on her. And now that manager is 'Paizo' and Crystal is 'transgendered employees'. I once had a job as a woman's clothing store (Deb) manager, but I don't think it would be entirely accurate to call my treatment by employees and bosses there as the company's policy for bisexual male Army veterans. Of which I was the company's only on all three accounts. Again, that's just from the limited tweet information; anyone with better insight into the stuff is welcome to broaden my understanding.

Not letting Crystal go and bunk with another female is different than not letting her go because she's transgender, or not letting transgendered individuals ever go.

thaX wrote:

As for the hotel room accommodations, keep in mind that the likely reason for co-habit concerns in the first place is that the room space is limited during convention events that they are likely needed for, so the need to room with others is not just about not getting single rooms, but the availability of rooms for the situation.

The allegation was that a trans employee was not allowed to co-habitate with a cis coworker.

This seems too short to evaluate. Were there other factors to consider?

1. What was the actual co-habitation policy?
2. Was there an issue of consent involved?
3. Was this a constant issue, or a one-off?

Well, it's been a long time since I was a Paizo customer. I still log in every once and awhile to download my pdfs to a new computer or something.

I don't have all the information here, and honestly, I'm not going to. Long covid makes every action physically draining, even just social media interaction. And related, I've lost most of my memories over the past ten-fifteen years.

I do know that Jessica Price jumped down my throat for not agreeing with her about Susan of Narnia, and screamed at Sean K Reynolds that he was 'enabling' me, by not assuming my opinion was full of the personal malice she saw in it. Jessica and Sean presumably have an actual relationship and know each other in real life, whereas I only know both of them via the internet. I don't know what either of our opinions on Susan were, I only have this 'memory' from reading a conversation with one of my friends where I brought it up. I don't think I would trust Jessica Price on anything, even situations where she was a direct witness, based on that.

I also know that Sara Marie was a very reasonable and earnest person, whose interactions with me were always both professional and warm. Again, this is from rereading, not actual memories. If she was fired unjustly, that seems to be something that should be made right. One thing I was unable to glean from reading through this entire thread, all 279 posts, was why she was fired. Either actually, or suspected, or reasons given. I don't know why she would want to come back to a job she was fired from wrongfully though.

It also seems that speaking the truth is unpopular within the community. Of course a company has to listen to its paying customers over people who aren't. Anyone who has a subscription should be listened to more than me, for instance, given that I haven't been a real customer since the early days of PF2. That isn't some horrifically insulting thing to say, unless you are looking for a reason to be offended.

I will say this, I hope Sara Marie lands on her feet. Of all the people and names I've seen come up throughout this thread, she was the nicest. She deserves good things. (Also, given there has been some mention of transgender issues, I don't know if Sara Marie is trans, and I apologize if I've messed up her pronouns. Not intentional.)

It seems too bad. I don't remember why I stopped buying Pathfinder books, but I never wanted bad things for Paizo as a company. I hope all of these things get sorted out, if not ideally, then at least satisfactorily to the directly involved parties.

150 is going to be the last AP for me. It's been a good long run. Thanks for everything.

I'd like to cancel all of my subscriptions except the PF Adventure Path please. Thank you.

Hey guys, this order is listed as 'pending', which might mean it hasn't shipped yet?

If possible, can the destination on this order be changed to my Winter Haven address (the current default for shipping)? I got back home yesterday.

If it can't be changed, or if it requires something stupidly difficult like going through dozens of piles of Pathfinder books, please do not worry about it. The destination it is being sent to in Ohio is my mom-in-law's house where I spent most of the summer. I will get the books, and they won't be lost. Just, if it can't be changed, it would save a minor delay.

I sent this via email as well, but since I use a different email than the one associated with the account, I figured I'd better post too.

I would like Starfinder Adventure Path and Starfinder Roleplaying game cancelled. I'd like to keep my current Pathfinder subscriptions.

Couldn't you just tell your players that you don't like the idea of them playing melee specialists if they use races that make ok melee specialists? Let them know that you expect them to play against type, and that they need to make sure they aren't trying to gain benefits for their choices.

I would like to cut my current subscriptions down to only the PF Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game and Starfinder Adventure Path. Thank you.

Mark, the elohim look like spaghetti monsters.

Was this an intentional art nod to the Flying Spaghetti Monster?

That explains why I can't find them anywhere! Thanks, Diego!

Obviously anecdotal, but I'm fine in sitting crowds until they get loud. Clapping is okay for short periods, but if a lot of people are yelling around me it makes me very anxious.

Sure, I have issues too, going back to the Army and the spectrum and the fact that I'm half deaf. I don't like loud crowds.

The answer to that however, is to leave, when the crowd gets loud, not to tell the crowd to be quiet. There are certain places where quiet is expected of a crowd (like a movie theater), and certain places where it is not (like a ball game). If we're in the latter, it is on us, the uncomfortable, to remove ourselves from the situation, which we knew going into, was going to be uncomfortable.

This idea that the entire world should rearrange for the most offended person needs to go away. It's preventing reasonable accommodations from being seen as anything other than a political talk point.

I need to drop the campaign setting and modules from my subscription list.

I would like to add the Starfinder adventure path to my subscription list.

If there is a Starfinder core line subscription, I would like to add that to my subscription list.

It is a shame that the Qlippoth Lords are not full on demi-gods.

Stated for years now that they were less powerful, that some powerful qlippoths turned stag and became demon lords, etc. They've drawn a fairly clear distinction between the obyrith work for 3.5 (where the oby lords mixed freely, were originally more powerful than the demons, etc) and qlippoth (which follows closer to the Green Ronin version, in that the qlippoth were horrific, terrible, and all but wiped out by the demons) for PF.

It's fairly cool, since they're the original authors of all three, that they've made them distinct in that manner. But qlippoth lords being quasipowers and no current demilevel qlippoth has been the running narrative for quite some time now. If anything, undermining that canon without explanation would be the real shame.

Kain Darkwind wrote:

Is there an intention of a new printing of this, made available here or through the Kobold store? And if so, is there a way to be notified when such a printing happens?

It is currently on backorder. We'll have more in October, which the kobolds will ship first (and Paizo not long after that).

That's great news! Just in time for my birthday!

Is there an intention of a new printing of this, made available here or through the Kobold store? And if so, is there a way to be notified when such a printing happens?

Wow. End of an era. Pathfinder fiction gone, and now Liz Lilith Courts. A lot of changes to things, and mostly in the loss sense. Things really don't feel the same anymore. Haven't for awhile, but these recent ones are really driving home the point.

Dragon78 wrote:

Can someone remind me who/what are the 8 arch devils again?

In order, they are: Barbatos, Dispater, Mammon, Belial, Geryon, Moloch, Baalzebul, and Mephistopheles.

Six are definitely devils, albeit of wildly varying forms. Jury's out on Geryon and Barbatos, but I'm guessing they'll have the subtype. ^_^

Jury shouldn't be out. (Pathfinder) Geryon was originally an asura rana. I suspect that you are correct that they will all have the devil subtype though.

Wow, like others have said, this really is the end of an era. I loved the fiction, no matter how varying in quality it has been. There was this one story, I'm pretty sure it's in Rise of the Runelords, but it could have been CotCT, where Eando meets these orcs, and something happens to make the orcs laugh and call out this word. Eando asks his guide what the word means, and it's basically apocalypse. And Eando just has this moment where he realizes that A) the orcs think the world is ending and B) they're laughing about it.

It was just such a tiny bit, but it's stuck with me for a decade now. Pathfinder will have to work overtime to keep me into the AP line. There's no way I'll ever be able to play all of the adventures, and some of the paths just haven't been as evocative as of late...the fiction and the bestiary were the two sections that I flipped to first. (Unless there was a demon prince/archdevil/SKR-god writeup.) And now that's half gone. It does feel a bit like a friend is moving far away.

1d20 ⇒ 20 Ponderings on New Herkule

1d20 + 5 ⇒ (11) + 5 = 16 Stealth of the Alpha Wolf

1d20 + 3 ⇒ (12) + 3 = 15 Charisma of the Alpha Wolf
1d20 + 3 ⇒ (3) + 3 = 6 Possible advantageous Charisma of the Alpha Wolf.

1d20 + 1 ⇒ (14) + 1 = 15 Super Charisma
1d20 + 1 ⇒ (5) + 1 = 6 Super Charisma disadvantage

1d20 ⇒ 19 History

1d20 + 2 ⇒ (4) + 2 = 6 (Nature)
1d20 + 4 ⇒ (17) + 4 = 21 (Stealth)

1d20 ⇒ 3 Influence envoys

1d20 + 7 ⇒ (17) + 7 = 24 tracking

2d20 ⇒ (9, 4) = 13(history advantage one)
2d20 ⇒ (3, 10) = 13(history advantage two)
1d20 + 3 ⇒ (16) + 3 = 19(insight)

Hit points

1d10 ⇒ 3

2d20

1d20 + 5 ⇒ (10) + 5 = 15

Tracking follow up.

2d20 ⇒ (12, 20) = 32

Notice, however, that in all those situations, if you simply sit back and stick to your 'job', the experience becomes demonstrably worse for you.

I'm curious, are there any plans to release a second (or third/fourth/fifth) compilation of these mythic pdfs?

Athaleon wrote:

I don't know about you, but my odds of getting buff and learning to effectively use a sword (whatever those odds may be) are way higher than my odds of learning how to cast spells.

In Golarion they aren't.

Because you're all commoners?

Are there any plans to expand the information on the different demigod level entities (daimyo, immortals, rana, etc) at any point in the near (say 1-3 years) future? Far future? Just the names are fairly evocative, and no doubt intended to leave customers hungry for more...just wanted to say, I'm starvin'!