A caveat to the self-important carebears.

For discussion of video games, and their theory and practice, as well as the social impact of such.
Post Reply
User avatar
Audley Strange
"I blame the victim"
Posts: 7485
Joined: Wed Jun 08, 2011 5:00 pm
Contact:

A caveat to the self-important carebears.

Post by Audley Strange » Thu Nov 14, 2013 11:50 am

The following is an account from an Eve Online gamesmaster. Eve is traditionally considered a free for all for sociopaths and so as you can imagine there is a lot of butthurt in that community. I think it is a good article with respect to all online trolling. The whole article states the obvious really, but it is worth considering that the cynics and suspicious folks are better suited to this domain than the credulous optimisitic who thinks everything is just peachy then gets trolled to an online version of a prolapse.
CasualPlayer3284 didn't HAVE to tell RandomStranger3746923 that they live in Milwaukee and volunteer as an EMT. InnocentMind42 didn't have to say in an open forum that they suffer from depression and social anxiety, George4th didn't have to proudly announce that she's a woman in RL, and Happy2Live wasn't forced to tell IWillHurtYou that they're gay.

These are all things that I have seen turned around and used against the unsuspecting poster. The question that gets asked most by support teams when complaints about the retaliation come through is, "Why did you feel the need to tell people that?"

Why DID you feel the need to tell people that?
Really, why indeed?
"What started as a legitimate effort by the townspeople of Salem to identify, capture and kill those who did Satan's bidding quickly deteriorated into a witch hunt" Army Man

PsychoSerenity
"I" Self-Perceive Recursively
Posts: 7824
Joined: Tue Feb 23, 2010 1:57 am
Contact:

Re: A caveat to the self-important carebears.

Post by PsychoSerenity » Thu Nov 14, 2013 12:39 pm

Because the majority of us are human. :dunno:
[Disclaimer - if this is comes across like I think I know what I'm talking about, I want to make it clear that I don't. I'm just trying to get my thoughts down]

User avatar
Audley Strange
"I blame the victim"
Posts: 7485
Joined: Wed Jun 08, 2011 5:00 pm
Contact:

Re: A caveat to the self-important carebears.

Post by Audley Strange » Thu Nov 14, 2013 1:02 pm

I don't buy that as an argument, unless you and most people are in the habit of sharing your personal details publicly with complete strangers out on the street too? I think not and I think not because you are aware of the problems that doing such could cause.

It's an internet phenomenon. I don't know whether people have cognitive difficulties when it comes to recognising that even though one is communicating from a private place, they are doing so in a public sphere. I doubt many young men and women would happily confetti the streets with nude pics of themselves from their bedroom window, yet somehow they think it acceptable to do so on the internet, often with ugly and tragic ramifications.

The article is interesting in so far as it mentions that since the internet is anonymous some people want to give a little of themselves tomake themselves seem more personable. However as the article points out, your personal problems arising from such are your responsibility until they go over a certain legal line in both RL and cyberspace. Why do we understand that about the street but not the net?
"What started as a legitimate effort by the townspeople of Salem to identify, capture and kill those who did Satan's bidding quickly deteriorated into a witch hunt" Army Man

User avatar
Mysturji
Clint Eastwood
Posts: 5005
Joined: Thu Feb 26, 2009 4:08 pm
About me: Downloading an app to my necktop
Location: http://tinyurl.com/c9o35ny
Contact:

Re: A caveat to the self-important carebears.

Post by Mysturji » Thu Nov 14, 2013 1:15 pm

Why should I tell you? :what:








But seriously, because life is a learning process. I must presume that they made such an elementary mistake because they were in a new and unfamiliar environment, unaware of its dangers. Hopefully, their respective experiences will have taught them something.
(e.g. the internet is full of arseholes and you could be one of them so I don't want you to know who I am or where I live.)
Sir Figg Newton wrote:If I have seen further than others, it is only because I am surrounded by midgets.
Cormac wrote:Doom predictors have been with humans right through our history. They are like the proverbial stopped clock - right twice a day, but not due to the efficacy of their prescience.
IDMD2
I am a twit.

PsychoSerenity
"I" Self-Perceive Recursively
Posts: 7824
Joined: Tue Feb 23, 2010 1:57 am
Contact:

Re: A caveat to the self-important carebears.

Post by PsychoSerenity » Thu Nov 14, 2013 1:27 pm

Audley Strange wrote:I don't buy that as an argument, unless you and most people are in the habit of sharing your personal details publicly with complete strangers out on the street too? I think not and I think not because you are aware of the problems that doing such could cause.

It's an internet phenomenon. I don't know whether people have cognitive difficulties when it comes to recognising that even though one is communicating from a private place, they are doing so in a public sphere. I doubt many young men and women would happily confetti the streets with nude pics of themselves from their bedroom window, yet somehow they think it acceptable to do so on the internet, often with ugly and tragic ramifications.

The article is interesting in so far as it mentions that since the internet is anonymous some people want to give a little of themselves tomake themselves seem more personable. However as the article points out, your personal problems arising from such are your responsibility until they go over a certain legal line in both RL and cyberspace. Why do we understand that about the street but not the net?
But most of the sharing online is not with complete strangers but with friends, just like in RL. The internet phenomenon is that a small minority who overhear conversations between friends can then use anonymity and a megaphone for endless harassment.

We make online spaces for the purpose of getting to know each other, - for a large number of online games the social side of it is central, with teams and guilds. And there's no reason we shouldn't make these spaces with the tools to limit harassment just as we have limitations in RL.

You equate someone 'confetti the streets with nude pics of themselves' with simply acknowledging their gender in a public space. Any game that uses voice chat you'd have to go out of your way to hide your gender. Yet we wouldn't take constant harassment of women as acceptable simply for showing their face in public.
[Disclaimer - if this is comes across like I think I know what I'm talking about, I want to make it clear that I don't. I'm just trying to get my thoughts down]

User avatar
Audley Strange
"I blame the victim"
Posts: 7485
Joined: Wed Jun 08, 2011 5:00 pm
Contact:

Re: A caveat to the self-important carebears.

Post by Audley Strange » Thu Nov 14, 2013 6:32 pm

PsychoSerenity wrote: But most of the sharing online is not with complete strangers but with friends, just like in RL. The internet phenomenon is that a small minority who overhear conversations between friends can then use anonymity and a megaphone for endless harassment.
I can't say that's true in my experience online, many people seem desperate to bombard you unbidden with the trivia and minutiae of their existence, not just children either. I have many friends I play with online, but we do so privately. Guilds are a different matter in my experience, I go to play games not listen to someone tell me about their day, most of the guilds I've been in have not been particularly social, small talk bullshit and epic adventures. If you have any experience on MMO's or large scale games and I'm sure you have, you can't help but have noticed people announcing all sorts of stupid shit publicly, phone numbers, e-mail addresses, when they are leaving for holiday and where they live.
[/quote]
PsychoSerenity wrote: We make online spaces for the purpose of getting to know each other, - for a large number of online games the social side of it is central, with teams and guilds. And there's no reason we shouldn't make these spaces with the tools to limit harassment just as we have limitations in RL.
Well if you read the article you'd see that GM's do take harrassment seriously. However what some aggrieved player considers harrassment is often nothing of the kind. I agree though that games companies are starting to realise arseholes are limiting the experiences, but I do think there is, on the net, this idea amongst some people that they should be able to say and do what they want without ramification and then when there are, they look around for others to blame or start demanding unreasonable restrictions on others rights to the net.
PsychoSerenity wrote: You equate someone 'confetti the streets with nude pics of themselves' with simply acknowledging their gender in a public space.
No I did fucking not! Not in any way, shape or form.

I was making the point that they would not drop nude pics of themselves out on the street, yet they often do on internet and then end up being exploited and occasionally topping themselves.

PsychoSerenity wrote: Any game that uses voice chat you'd have to go out of your way to hide your gender. Yet we wouldn't take constant harassment of women as acceptable simply for showing their face in public.
Well we don't, but a while ago when I pointed out in the gaming community people were becoming concerned about "constant harrassment of women" in gaming I was told it wasn't really an issue. All of which is still irrelevant to disclosing private information publicly and whining about it when it bites you in the arse, that's not a gender issue. We had a young man in Scotland kill himself recently because of his behaviour and others exploiting it. Men women and children are duped mocked and hounded every day, mostly because they provide their attackers ammo. Suggesting people might be a bit more cautious about that is not a particularly unreasonable suggestion is it?
"What started as a legitimate effort by the townspeople of Salem to identify, capture and kill those who did Satan's bidding quickly deteriorated into a witch hunt" Army Man

PsychoSerenity
"I" Self-Perceive Recursively
Posts: 7824
Joined: Tue Feb 23, 2010 1:57 am
Contact:

Re: A caveat to the self-important carebears.

Post by PsychoSerenity » Thu Nov 14, 2013 7:54 pm

Certainly it's not unreasonable to suggest people be cautions, and especially not share things they would worry about being blackmailed with, but several of the examples given in the article are of things that are just basic or fundamental parts of their lives. And why shouldn't they share some of that with their friends?

People aren't (for the most part) getting harassed because they provide ammo, but because the attackers can get away with it. Out in public you can very easily find out information about peoples' lives, easily find people to target. But just you try following someone out of a gay club, then following them around town wherever they go while shouting "Faggot" and "Butt-fucker", - you'd pretty quickly find yourself in real trouble.

There is an issue with women, and various other groups of people, being harassed in games, - but the issue is a small minority of arseholes who take advantage of the anonymity to be bigger arseholes than they've got the balls for in RL. There's no reason why a gaming environment must tolerate them at the expense and enjoyment of all the other players.

I think I already posted this in the last thread you made, but these guys pretty much sum it up:

[Disclaimer - if this is comes across like I think I know what I'm talking about, I want to make it clear that I don't. I'm just trying to get my thoughts down]

Post Reply

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 9 guests