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Author Topic: RPG.net user points out irony of mods "not wanting to ban people", gets banned  (Read 19148 times)

Trinculoisdead

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I couldn't find somewhere to post this in an existing thread, sorry!

I was considering posting a LFG ad on RPG.net for this Wolves of God game I'm running, and thought I'd peruse the infractions thread for some entertainment. Lo and behold, came across this delight:

https://forum.rpg.net/index.php?threads/dispatches-from-the-front-a-moderators-thoughts-on-moderating.870863/post-23540807

Quote from: rpg.net mod
Impression #4: We Really Don't Want to Ban You
The thing that surprised me the most after becoming a mod is how much work goes into not banning people.
...
But seriously folks, we don't want to ban you. If all we had to do to keep things on an even heading was ban the occasional spammer and and fix a missing tag or two, that would be just fine.

Quote from: Leoshowers
I don't know if this segment of your post is represents a startling lack of self-awareness, or just habitual, reflexive dishonesty.

Mods of forums that "really don't want to ban you" tend to be rules light, with those said rules being very clearly defined to prevent possible misruling from the mods.

They don't contain page after page of bans for 'able-ism', 'sex-ism' (defined about as loosely as you could possibly define it) and what, for all intents and purposes, simply amount to bans for not conforming to a SJW worldview or alternatively expressing any sort of skepticism around progressive narratives.

I don't think I have ever seen a mod team so utterly overbearing and ham-fisted in enforcing their worldview across a site as the ones on rpg.net. You honestly do the users here a disservice by not warning them in advance that you have essentially banned any form of dissent from SJW orthodoxy on this site, especially regarding the ever evolving and utterly inconsistent 'speech codes' that the entire site must now labor under.

Some of the bans given out here truly defy any sort of logic. This three day ban of CanoeMan is especially egregious, and makes me, frankly, question the sanity of the mods when a statement as innocuous as:

   
Quote
CanoeMan said:
    No, seriously. I'm no rap aficionado, but from my understanding, you need two things to make a good rap song:

    1) Words put together well
    2) A beat

    These are both things that can be put together very cheaply, without any instruments, if you only have the skill for it. And in the middle ages, most people presumably did not have a lot of extra cash to spend on a lyre, and the time to learn how to play it. So it seems to me, that rap music would be ideal form of entertainment for the average 15th century french farmer. So why wasn't it a thing? Or was it, and I just don't know about it?

Produces a reply as unhinged as:

 
Quote
  CrazyIvan said:
    The premise of this thread is...no. Just no. Either you are asking why spoken poetry didn't exist, which it did, or you are asking why French peasants didn't invent a historically Black music style. At which point our only reply is read the room.

Seemingly implying that even the hypothetical idea that French people could produce an artistic style that is similar to that of African-Americans is somehow an offensive concept??? Even the supposed reason given for the ban 'treating race as a hypothetical thought exercise' is quite amazing, as the thread in question makes no reference to race, either in the original post, or the resulting thread (I also have no idea what is meant by 'read the room' other than perhaps as a sort of reflexive statement of justification for non-justified moderation).

Since I have no confidence at all that reasoning with the mods to take a more relaxed attitude to moderation will produce any sort of change in behavior, can I at least make an appeal for honestly among the moderation team,

Rather than erroneously claiming that this is a forum for the discussion of RPG's, open to any RPG fan who will contribute in good faith and with decorum, the moderators should honestly state what they wish this forum to be: namely a forum for SJW aligned RPG fans, that is utterly unwelcoming of non-SJW's.

A statement along the lines of:

   
Quote from: Moderators
    Although the title of this website might lead you to believe that this is primarily a roleplaying game forum, it is not. This forum/site is, in practice, a safe-space for supporters of "social justice" causes, that also happen to practice the hobby of tabletop gaming. We have no desire to be inclusive to any person (irregardless of race or religion) who does not unreservedly support our political ideology, and what this specifies is not concrete, and may change at any time, at our whim.

    Anyone who participates on this site should understand that those who's primary desire is to discuss RPGs in a politically neutral fashion would be better served participating on just about any other RPG related forum than this one. Anyone who disagrees strongly with "Social Justice" (however we choose to define that on any given day) will be banned, if not immediately, then swiftly as evidence of dissent emerges offhandedly through their posting.
Would represent, if nothing else, a fair assessment of the reality of this site. I suggest that the sites name be similarly changed to reflect it's newfound focus on SJW politics, rather than tabletop gaming (I leave the specifics of this to the mods).

Ghostmaker

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Burner account (that was his only post, and he had registered recently); no idea if the guy has a 'normal' account.

There was no way the mods were going to let that kind of challenge slip by. Of course, they're not going to frame it as such. Tanka (the mod in question) simply dismisses the argument as 'alt right bullshit'.

Look, I'm not going to mince words; as rough as it gets here, at least you're not going to eat a ban for commenting on the similarities between flyting and rapping. Or questioning the wisdom of changing an established property just to try and lure in a marginal, very small group of possible consumers.

Sadly, RPGnet's mods are wholly devoted to the idpol fallacy, and my only regret is that newbies to the roleplaying game hobby will find them as a first contact :(


Brad

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"Although the title of this website might lead you to believe that this is primarily a roleplaying game forum, it is not. This forum/site is, in practice, a safe-space for supporters of "social justice" causes, that also happen to practice the hobby of tabletop gaming."

It takes considerable knowledge just to realize the extent of your own ignorance.

Armchair Gamer

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Elsewhere in that thread, they mentioned that they had been pleasantly surprised at the response to their "no support for Trump" policy. I wonder if it ever crossed their mind that one possible reason for that was that they'd already, by direct action, indirect action, or reputation, driven off almost everyone who would protest that decision.

Arkansan

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Burner account (that was his only post, and he had registered recently); no idea if the guy has a 'normal' account.

There was no way the mods were going to let that kind of challenge slip by. Of course, they're not going to frame it as such. Tanka (the mod in question) simply dismisses the argument as 'alt right bullshit'.

Look, I'm not going to mince words; as rough as it gets here, at least you're not going to eat a ban for commenting on the similarities between flyting and rapping. Or questioning the wisdom of changing an established property just to try and lure in a marginal, very small group of possible consumers.

Sadly, RPGnet's mods are wholly devoted to the idpol fallacy, and my only regret is that newbies to the roleplaying game hobby will find them as a first contact :(

Interestingly enough I had a conversation about RPGnet with a friend the other evening. He mentioned that he had looked the site up for the first time in probably a decade and was baffled by what it had become. I told him some stories about the drama that had occurred there over the years and his reaction was essentially "maybe the internet was a mistake".

mightybrain

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Elsewhere in that thread, they mentioned that they had been pleasantly surprised at the response to their "no support for Trump" policy. I wonder if it ever crossed their mind that one possible reason for that was that they'd already, by direct action, indirect action, or reputation, driven off almost everyone who would protest that decision.

Which was presumably about 50% of their audience before they went down the purity spiral plughole.

Ghostmaker

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Elsewhere in that thread, they mentioned that they had been pleasantly surprised at the response to their "no support for Trump" policy. I wonder if it ever crossed their mind that one possible reason for that was that they'd already, by direct action, indirect action, or reputation, driven off almost everyone who would protest that decision.
Doubt it. It's like that meme of Mr. Skinner. 'Could it be me that's wrong? No, no, it's the posters who are wrong.'

I have to admit, the idea of them saying 'This worked out so well!' after two years of banning anyone who posted the slightest support for the current President... it's got a kind of dark humor to it.

tenbones

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I read through a few pages of that thread...

It was like a discussion group between prison-staff and Stockholm syndrome survivors asking about the lone prisoners who finally cracked, and the staff tsk-tsking about those "rare" cases - and how they had to travail themselves in coming up with new rules to undermine the expression of the surviving inmates.

Woe's them.

The mods can't even see what a bunch of self-obsessed narcissistic authoritarian assholes they are, lording over the shitheap of their kingdom.

RPG.net is its own online rpg.

ShieldWife

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The moderator said the following:
Quote from: Tanka
You signed up just to spew alt-right bullshit at us. As we don't welcome alt-right bullshit on our forums, you're simply not welcome here.

Bye.

It pisses me off when anything that leftists don't like gets called "alt-right"

It would be one thing if "alt-right" meant anybody who disagrees with the far left, but they want alt-right to carry maximum stigma, to mean a literal Nazi, but also they use alt-right with the broadest brush possible to basically include anybody who dissents against their extreme ideology.

Of course, that particular poster expected to be banned, but everything he said was right.

I read through a few pages of that thread...

It was like a discussion group between prison-staff and Stockholm syndrome survivors asking about the lone prisoners who finally cracked, and the staff tsk-tsking about those "rare" cases - and how they had to travail themselves in coming up with new rules to undermine the expression of the surviving inmates.

Woe's them.

The mods can't even see what a bunch of self-obsessed narcissistic authoritarian assholes they are, lording over the shitheap of their kingdom.

RPG.net is its own online rpg.

Yes, it's really pretty sickening. They're a bunch of bullies and their sniveling toadies.

tenbones

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Oh they totally are.

It's kinda baffling to me that they are so aborbed with their experiment that they can't take a breath for air in the real world and see how they roll around in the excrement of their own hypocrisy on a post-by-post basis. Their rationalizations mark them as immoral and unethical assholes who have created a cult on their forum.

At no point do they have the internal capacity to ask whether they're wrong. And the only time they will admit they're wrong is when the inevitable slip occurs when challenged for their own purity - as you see when one of them gets called out with a passive-aggressive litany

"Am I just wrong or did I read this as sexist?" - Invocation of Purity Test 1.01 engaged. Seeking Ratification
"Oh good it wasn't just me! Yes it is a bit problematic." - Ratification protocol engaged. Negative attribution code accepted.

"Well if it's offensive in your personal dystopia I can see how you might be offended." - Passive-Aggressive Apology REJECTED.
"The joke was in poor taste. I apologize." - Contrition and Knee-Bent Posture affirmed. EXECUTE OFFENDER <OVER-RIDE> Target Class: MODERATOR <IMMUNITY PROTOCOL ENGAGED>.

Shasarak

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RPG.net is the gift that just keeps on giving.
Who da Drow?  U da drow! - hedgehobbit

There will be poor always,
pathetically struggling,
look at the good things you've got! -  Jesus

Aglondir

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Strange Visitor just got banned. I remember him from the old days. Maybe even 2005.


Abraxus

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What is even more ironic that the so called SJWs of the forum are conspicuously silent on the issue.

We are true Fascists for mocking Evil Hats latest rpg for including a Woke and SJW manifesto yet somehow the forums that behaves in a truly spectacularly Fascist is given a free pass on bad behavior. When faces with true repression and regression because it goes against their carefully constructed personal narratives lack the stones to actual do anything.

As I said before: Rolling rolling keep them Narratives rolling RAWHIDE!

lordmalachdrim

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Anyone else love the response/reason from the mods for the ban?

Quote
LeoShowers said:
*snip alt-right bullshit*
Moderator Text:
You signed up just to spew alt-right bullshit at us. As we don't welcome alt-right bullshit on our forums, you're simply not welcome here.

Bye.

Mishihari

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And that's why I left.  At one time it used to be a good place to talk about RPGs but that was long, long, ago.