I was talking to BNW and co, to be clear. I'm not trying to dismiss the pain and burnout of dealing with the forums of late.
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I think a challenge is massive misunderstandings. Many interpret things on a forum as if they exist in their personal context, but all personal contexts are (even) more different than in real-life.
The most obvious (and admittedly my own gripe) is US-based (and even then there big differences) vs. non-US based. But also background, education level, affluency etc are bound to differ massively.
And our own experiences and circumstances differ, which makes us different in understanding which issues are (still) a problem.
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A big part of the problem, I think, is that some people came out swinging against Erik Mona with some pretty unkind insinuations--about him, about the freelancer, and about everyone who supported the change. And if someone comes in telling us that we're stupid, fragile, SJWs, snowflakes, or any of the other phrases that we hear so often from a certain other crowd, we're really not going to be inclined to assume good faith.
Some posters assumed the worst of the freelancer, Owen, and Erik Mona. It led us to assume the worst of those posters. A lot of us did make an effort to extend good faith to those who were extending it to us. I may disagree on some issues with Oppsylum and Nerve Eater, but I had no issue talking to them respectfully about these issues, because they did some due diligence in being respectful to us.
But someone who comes out the gate insulting me and implying I'm an idiot who doesn't understand that obviously Paizo isn't literally advocating the return of slavery, without first asking us what we're actually concerned about to make sure he has it right? And then refuses to back down? Who shows zero empathy towards the freelancers' discomfort?
Yeah, I'm kind of going to assume he's a racist troll. Or just a normal troll who's really obsessed with this slavery issue for some reason.
And I might spam him with "sheep shalm" a lot, but it's only because "sheep shalm" is the best joke I've ever told literally ever and I would rather focus on my swan song than someone who thinks he can sue Paizo for child neglect or whatever's going on over there.
I will admit I do not know what 'sheep shalm' means. :I
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I think the forums will get better again. Things got better with the permanent suspension ban hammer, but Erik Mona's public statement brought a whole new set of angry posters at a time when many Paizo Staffers go on very well deserved holiday breaks.
DISCLAIMER: This is not about the over-worked frontline CS people like Heather F, who was my enormous respect and sympathy for the situation they are in.
They don't seem to have banned almost anyone. Loads of the worst transphobic agitators disappeared, and I would have agreed with you then, except they clearly just got temporary suspensions again and are back. Agitating the racism threads.
There is a user on this board who was deliberately, toxically misgendering. They got suspended. They came back, derailed even more while bragging about having misgendered people and gotten away with it. They didn't actually get banned though.
They were back quietly within a few weeks, and are already creeping their little bigot heads into the main boards again.
If you don't ban people that bad, and a good few people not as obvious but still as bad as that we never get off the bigot-go-round.
Someone in charge of the team at some level decided to alleviate or not follow through on lots of bans. I doubt that was any of the workers in the CS department, it smacks of management "oversight", and until that person wises up or gets replaced the forums won't get better.
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A big part of the problem, I think, is that some people came out swinging against Erik Mona with some pretty unkind insinuations--about him, about the freelancer, and about everyone who supported the change. And if someone comes in telling us that we're stupid, fragile, SJWs, snowflakes, or any of the other phrases that we hear so often from a certain other crowd, we're really not going to be inclined to assume good faith.
Some posters assumed the worst of the freelancer, Owen, and Erik Mona. It led us to assume the worst of those posters. A lot of us did make an effort to extend good faith to those who were extending it to us. I may disagree on some issues with Oppsylum and Nerve Eater, but I had no issue talking to them respectfully about these issues, because they did some due diligence in being respectful to us.
But someone who comes out the gate insulting me and implying I'm an idiot who doesn't understand that obviously Paizo isn't literally advocating the return of slavery, without first asking us what we're actually concerned about to make sure he has it right? And then refuses to back down? Who shows zero empathy towards the freelancers' discomfort?
Yeah, I'm kind of going to assume he's a racist troll. Or just a normal troll who's really obsessed with this slavery issue for some reason.
And I might spam him with "sheep shalm" a lot, but it's only because "sheep shalm" is the best joke I've ever told literally ever and I would rather focus on my swan song than someone who thinks he can sue Paizo for child neglect or whatever's going on over there.
It goes both ways, people have assigned me some heinous point of views based on the worst possible, and then some, interpretation of my words. I admit that sometimes my reaction has been "somewhat" inflammatory.
Humbly,
Yawar
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Likewise, light, frivolous, or outright false accusations of those are also offensive, and arguably harmful, as they diminish real cases.
Humbly,
Yawar
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Likewise, light, frivolous, or outright false accusations of those are also offensive, and arguably harmful, as they diminish real cases.
Humbly,
Yawar
The problem is that there are never "real" cases with some people.
If somebody goes "Are you saying George Washington was bad??!!?" they go "See, we need to stop looking at past through the lens of today's morality!"
If somebody goes "Slavery had some people live a better life than they do today" they go "See, it's a valid commentary on today's social inequalities!"
If somebody goes "My grand-grand-grand-uncle treated his slaves very well and they all kept in touch with him until he died" they go "Look at this heart-warming tale, not all slavery was evil"
If somebody goes "Slavery was everywhere, why are you singling United States out?" they go "Of course, let's ponder court-mandated slavery in VII century France!"
It would pretty much take somebody to walk in with a black woman on a leash and say that she's his slave and nobody ain't gonna tell him that's illegal or bad for them to admit that it's slavery, and even then they would at first assume that it's just some LARPing or really kinky BDSM.
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Removing any all difference of opinion just makes it a boring section of the forums where non one is going to really discuss anything imo. Everyone and anyone agreeing on a topic is not a discussion it’s just a group of people echoing the same perspective on the topic.
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I may disagree with many hear yet if someone came here and make A personal transphobic attack say on KC or Rysky I would tell them they are out of line and go elsewhere.
Instead many her did nothing and still have done nothing. Not that I’m surprised really in that regard.
As for the continued attacks on my character I’m not engaging simply flagging and ignoring what was written.
If someone doesn't believe in the validity of the identities themselves, even if they restrain themselves from insulting someone personally, the damage is done-- that's because the insult itself isn't what's doing the harm, its the pressure and lack of acceptance behind the insult, its knowing and feeling vulnerable because the people around you don't accept who you are or think that its important for you to feel safe.
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To expound on what the metric system said (and yes, agreeing with themetricsystem is making my head hurt)
There is a bundle of ideas that include basic human rights.
There are also some less than stellar ideas in there.
But you aren't allowed to disagree with those ideas, because you are then denying the bundle, and if the bundle can be wrong, then the idea of basic rights can be wrong, and that denies people basic human rights.
I really don't know what to call it besides overly connected? Sympathetic? (like a magnetic field not feeling for someone)
It doesn't follow. Just because someone doesn't reach a conclusion the same way doesn't mean they disagree with every conclusion. The required secondary powers of the bundle are expansive enough to include... pretty near everything and leaving no room for real disagreement.
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Removing any all difference of opinion just makes it a boring section of the forums where non one is going to really discuss anything imo. Everyone and anyone agreeing on a topic is not a discussion it’s just a group of people echoing the same perspective on the topic.
You are welcome to many different opinions. We have whole threads made just for sharing critical opinions about Pathfinder.
Recognizing other people's inherent humanity is not up for debate. You can have opinions about the facts of another's identity, but it is not polite to share those in any public forum.
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Edit: I originally said a lot of things, but in retrospect I'm not sure what I said added anything constructive to the conversation apart from requesting we keep Hmm's guidelines in mind, from her "How can we disagree without being disagreeable?" thread. So I'm just going to leave this post with that. Love this community, and hope we can work through our differences constructively. There's good reason for this tension, though, and I don't want to short sell that and preach how we all need to get along when people are hurting and need for things to be talked about, much as I want peace. Conversations like this are needed right now, I guess.
So I'm going to bow out for a bit and think about things. Wish you all well.
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We've disagreed with lots of people who weren't being racist, homophobic (homophonic is a bit of a homophone, by the way :P) or transphobic, and we didn't call for them to be banned. Usually it's because they didn't immediately try to signal their contempt for "the woke mob".
Some of y'all really aren't as sneaky as you think you are, and the half-faked outrage at being caught is always weird to watch.