Quote from: rytrasmi on July 13, 2022, 04:05:36 PM

Quote from: Chris24601 on July 13, 2022, 03:49:50 PM
Then my religion calls making that purchase "material cooperation with evil" as you are buying a non-necessity knowing that the profits of the sale are going to be used to fund something against your religious beliefs.

Okay. I get that. But it boils down to "knowing"? That does not sit well with me. The "knowing" requirement seems to reward ignorance. If SJG kept his opinion and donation private is it still material cooperation with evil? I guarantee the vast majority of pro-life gamers don't read the SJG blog and are ignorant of his views. Are they morally in the clear?

This is an open question, not just for you and your beliefs. I personally avoid buying anything made in the non-free world to the extent possible. But, I have to rely on knowing in the form of the "Made In ____." declaration and that is grey and often abused.

Yes, they are morally in the clear. We can only make moral decisions based upon what we know, or at least....based upon what we think we know. If you KNEW that Steve Jackson Games was publicly and self-righteously donating to NAMBLA, would you still support them?

I wouldn't.

This isn't Steve Jackson quietly funding a private organization that we don't even know about. It's not even a case in which we discover that Jackson privately donated to an abortion group. This situation is Steve Jackson Games loudly and self-righteously making a press release that they will be donating money to an abortion fund named after a demon that kills babies. No subtlety there!

I guess the people who called this organization "Lilith" thought that none of the normies would notice any of the religious implications, or just not get the reference. They were wrong.

Quote from: VisionStorm on July 13, 2022, 10:32:49 AM

Quote from: THE_Leopold on July 13, 2022, 09:27:16 AM

Quote from: RPGPundit on July 13, 2022, 06:14:44 AM

Quote from: Mishihari on July 13, 2022, 12:34:08 AM
Well, damn.  Pat's one of the more insightful posters on the site.  Though it's very clear he did break the rules, I'll miss his ideas.

he was often a good poster. The problem is he'd been warned before and kept taking the bait and breaking the rules.

Can Pat request to be unbanned after a time?  A good Virtual Time Out can do people wonders.

Has there been any push back from DTRPG regarding SJG's screed?

I got into a bunch of nasty arguments with Pat a bunch times and certainly didn't get along with him all the time. But he was often better informed than most and contributed far more than Battlemaster ever did. So hoping he can return eventually. Battlemaster was just an idiot, and as much as this forum could use oppositional voices who don't hold the same political views as like 80%+ of the rest of the boards his points were just asinine and wrong, and irrelevant to what was being said like 90% of the time.

Put me down for another one on the unban Pat petition.

Quote from: Stephen Tannhauser on July 13, 2022, 04:41:16 PM
Chris24601's hypothesis that the financial writing is already on the wall for SJG and this is either a Hail Mary pass or a posterior-covering responsibility shift seems plausible, but I have to admit that I generally believe shortsightedness over 3D chess when it comes to explaining people's actions.

Oh, I'm NOT arguing 3D chess by any means. I'm not even convinced that angle is even right, just that its a possibility.

My actual thinking is more along the lines of the "posterior-covering responsibility shift" if anything like that theory is correct.

"Oh Crap! The company's going under. What can I do to not get blamed for it? I know... I'll 'Get Woke' because everyone knows 'Go Broke' follows and then blame it on all the istophobes who hatefully refused to buy the products that already weren't selling enough to pay the bills. If I'm really lucky some Wokist or another might throw a lifeline to their fellow traveler."

Basically, the failure has already happened and this is just a scramble to keep it from being "why did Steve invest all the company's money into [dodgy business venture] and not [20/20 hindsight better business venture]?"

I give that a roughly 30% chance with the other 70% being that he's a libertarian who's baked his brain too long in the Texas heat (and who knows what else) and is no longer able to keep the quiet parts silent in his rants.

Quote from: THE_Leopold on July 13, 2022, 09:27:16 AM

Quote from: RPGPundit on July 13, 2022, 06:14:44 AM

Quote from: Mishihari on July 13, 2022, 12:34:08 AM
Well, damn.  Pat's one of the more insightful posters on the site.  Though it's very clear he did break the rules, I'll miss his ideas.

he was often a good poster. The problem is he'd been warned before and kept taking the bait and breaking the rules.

Can Pat request to be unbanned after a time?  A good Virtual Time Out can do people wonders.

I would need to be seriously convinced that he would be capable of controlling himself in RPG forum threads and not deviating off-topic.

Quote from: RPGPundit on July 13, 2022, 05:26:56 PM

Quote from: THE_Leopold on July 13, 2022, 09:27:16 AM

Quote from: RPGPundit on July 13, 2022, 06:14:44 AM

Quote from: Mishihari on July 13, 2022, 12:34:08 AM
Well, damn.  Pat's one of the more insightful posters on the site.  Though it's very clear he did break the rules, I'll miss his ideas.

he was often a good poster. The problem is he'd been warned before and kept taking the bait and breaking the rules.

Can Pat request to be unbanned after a time?  A good Virtual Time Out can do people wonders.

I would need to be seriously convinced that he would be capable of controlling himself in RPG forum threads and not deviating off-topic.

Well, I don't know how much this counts for, (or if there should be a separate thread for this) but I can point to several instances, some within the same thread, where I and the folks I was arguing with were brought back on track by Pat. I also know he criticized Battlemaster in a kickstarter thread for bringing unrelated politics into play and tried to kill that discussion, separate from me. I also did a search and saw some similar interactions between him and other folks, like one in April where he suggested in a Mongoose Publishing thread that an unrelated topic would be better positioned as another thread in your political subforum. I do think he was working on it, therefore, and cared about your concerns in principle. Plus, while he did admittedly take the bait here, I think it shows that sometimes he actively prevents thread derailment.

Also, much though it pains me to say it, without Battlemaster in play he's probably a little less likely to have bait he's as likely to take.

Most importantly, I'll bet that given how much he seems to care about this site and the integrity of discussions on it, he probably will take serious note of the fact that he was almost permabanned. I know I would. I would therefore totally believe that he's likely to be more careful in that arena.

Dunno how convincing this will be, and I'm not exactly an integral member of this community or completely knowledgeable in this area given how new I am, but I felt I owed it to him and to the site to try. Thank you for being willing to hear arguments, too, since I know you didn't have to.

Some people were talking about throwing out their SJG games.  Don't do that.  You paid for them.  He has some fun games.  Just don't buy any new ones.  If you must get rid of them, sell them on eBay, and donate proceeds to Project Rachel, which counsels women hurt by abortion (that will enrage SJ, seeing his games go to help women), or a charity you support.

I think that this forum is a better, more enjoyable place with Pat as a member than without him. The level of conversation is certainly elevated with him around.

Quote from: jeff37923 on July 13, 2022, 09:24:04 PM
I think that this forum is a better, more enjoyable place with Pat as a member than without him. The level of conversation is certainly elevated with him around.

Agreed. I didn't always agree with him, but I appreciated his contributions to the site.

Quote from: Cathode Ray on July 13, 2022, 08:17:14 PM
Some people were talking about throwing out their SJG games.  Don't do that.  You paid for them.  He has some fun games.  Just don't buy any new ones.  If you must get rid of them, sell them on eBay, and donate proceeds to Project Rachel, which counsels women hurt by abortion (that will enrage SJ, seeing his games go to help women), or a charity you support.

Agreed. SJG retroactively infecting all their stuff with lilith cooties is a really dumb mind perspective. Something good (if you at least liked it at the time) doesn't become bad retroactively based on modern takes.

Thats a lesson we MUST takeaway from twitter.

If Pat is to return he must be required to rename himself "Buttery Pat."  I have spoken.

Anyhow, the thing about your GURPS books is that SJG has no intention of reprinting most of them and only sells them on Amazon.  So, I'm not so sure he really cares about your GURPS dollars.

And I'm afraid Munchkin is in mass market chains and it's a small minority of players and collectors who pay attention to what the company does or says.  I think his retirement revenue is safe.

Quote from: Reckall on July 08, 2022, 07:46:45 AM

Quote from: Battlemaster on July 08, 2022, 07:35:03 AM
Damn! I always had evil Stevie pegged as a solid conservative. Maybe I misjudged him. Gotta check this out. Thanks, cr!

Maybe he is but not on this matter.

Speaking for me, I use to have my opinions on a score of topics. You could say that most of them fall within a certain political spectrum but some extremely don't. I don't like for an external complex of ideologies to dictate how I must think, which is why I never entered politics.

Maybe he's just trying to get his ESG score up.

Quote from: Sacrificial Lamb on July 13, 2022, 04:45:32 PM

Quote from: rytrasmi on July 13, 2022, 04:05:36 PM

Quote from: Chris24601 on July 13, 2022, 03:49:50 PM
Then my religion calls making that purchase "material cooperation with evil" as you are buying a non-necessity knowing that the profits of the sale are going to be used to fund something against your religious beliefs.

Okay. I get that. But it boils down to "knowing"? That does not sit well with me. The "knowing" requirement seems to reward ignorance. If SJG kept his opinion and donation private is it still material cooperation with evil? I guarantee the vast majority of pro-life gamers don't read the SJG blog and are ignorant of his views. Are they morally in the clear?

This is an open question, not just for you and your beliefs. I personally avoid buying anything made in the non-free world to the extent possible. But, I have to rely on knowing in the form of the "Made In ____." declaration and that is grey and often abused.

Yes, they are morally in the clear. We can only make moral decisions based upon what we know, or at least....based upon what we think we know. If you KNEW that Steve Jackson Games was publicly and self-righteously donating to NAMBLA, would you still support them?

I wouldn't.

This isn't Steve Jackson quietly funding a private organization that we don't even know about. It's not even a case in which we discover that Jackson privately donated to an abortion group. This situation is Steve Jackson Games loudly and self-righteously making a press release that they will be donating money to an abortion fund named after a demon that kills babies. No subtlety there!

I guess the people who called this organization "Lilith" thought that none of the normies would notice any of the religious implications, or just not get the reference. They were wrong.

I think the real salient point is that it's not the executives or owners or whatever of a company donating to some cause or another. It's them standing on the digital mountaintop, proclaiming, "This is what our company stands for." I might be remembering incorrectly, but I don't think Chick-fil-A ever said, "Our company policy is to oppose gay marriage," but rather that the owners of the company just donated money to causes they believed in.

The Lilith thing just comes off as cringe new age LARPing to me, like most "witchy" things.

Quote from: Innocent Smith on July 14, 2022, 01:02:54 AM

Quote from: Reckall on July 08, 2022, 07:46:45 AM

Quote from: Battlemaster on July 08, 2022, 07:35:03 AM
Damn! I always had evil Stevie pegged as a solid conservative. Maybe I misjudged him. Gotta check this out. Thanks, cr!

Maybe he is but not on this matter.

Speaking for me, I use to have my opinions on a score of topics. You could say that most of them fall within a certain political spectrum but some extremely don't. I don't like for an external complex of ideologies to dictate how I must think, which is why I never entered politics.

Maybe he's just trying to get his ESG score up.

I never pictured him as a Lyran.

Quote from: HappyDaze on July 14, 2022, 08:29:21 AM

Quote from: Innocent Smith on July 14, 2022, 01:02:54 AM

Quote from: Reckall on July 08, 2022, 07:46:45 AM

Quote from: Battlemaster on July 08, 2022, 07:35:03 AM
Damn! I always had evil Stevie pegged as a solid conservative. Maybe I misjudged him. Gotta check this out. Thanks, cr!

Maybe he is but not on this matter.

Speaking for me, I use to have my opinions on a score of topics. You could say that most of them fall within a certain political spectrum but some extremely don't. I don't like for an external complex of ideologies to dictate how I must think, which is why I never entered politics.

Maybe he's just trying to get his ESG score up.

I never pictured him as a Lyran.

I get that refference!  Although why you'd want an ESG instead of like.. some disruptors, or the very fun to fire Plasma-R torpedoes I will never know.

Quote from: Innocent Smith on July 14, 2022, 01:13:00 AM
I think the real salient point is that it's not the executives or owners or whatever of a company donating to some cause or another. It's them standing on the digital mountaintop, proclaiming, "This is what our company stands for." I might be remembering incorrectly, but I don't think Chick-fil-A ever said, "Our company policy is to oppose gay marriage," but rather that the owners of the company just donated money to causes they believed in.

I think you're remembering incorrectly. Chick-fil-A's CEO has made a number of public statements about gay marriage in the past, such as here:

QuoteAppearing on "The Ken Coleman Show," Cathy spoke of his company's pride in its socially conservative character, but then offered an assessment of same-sex marriage that might lose the popular fast food chain a few customers.

I think we are inviting God's judgment on our nation when we shake our fist at him and say, 'We know better than you as to what constitutes a marriage,'" said Cathy.

"I pray God's mercy on our generation that has such a prideful, arrogant attitude to think that we would have the audacity to try to redefine what marriage is all about," he added.

https://dailycaller.com/2012/07/18/chick-fil-a-president-gay-marriage-is-inviting-gods-judgment-on-our-nation-audio/

That said, I don't think it's wrong for companies to have public opinions. I think it's fine for there to be a Christian restaurant or a Jewish coffeeshop or a Wiccan bookstore or similar. That said, it's also fine to boycott companies whose values one disagrees with enough.