Welp, that makes all the difference. I can't defend or excuse that (nor would would I want to), that was awfully reprehensible and irresponsible.
Mystic removal discussion - The good and the bad
- Thread starter Trolo Bobo
- Start date
Even if I could grant any of this, the precedent of hosting something like this on the srb2.org domain in any private capacity was completely irresponsible and should never have been set.
Time Gear said:
Incorrect, I already gave him a warning for this and asked him to stop.
So let me reiterate:
If what someone is "pointing out that they don't agree with" is them essentially telling victims to shut it and keep it to themselves, then it, in fact, doesn't need to be said. Please, spare us all.
Charybdizs said:
Stepping into here with some shallow "by attacking Mystic you're making yourself just as bad as him!" morality is not well thought out, not helpful, and it is downright disrespectful. Points boiling down to "this thread shouldn't exist! You did it all wrong!" are nothing but white noise.
This thread does exist, and despite all the fretting over poor Mystic's "public reputation" it was a necessary thing to discuss transparently as a community, and the outcome has been healthy. If that's not something you can get on board with, then that's fine! But again, we're not going to turn this thread into constantly contesting the existence of it or telling victims to be quiet.
See, the thing is, if Mystic needed to be defended, up until recently he could have done it himself. He wasn't banned from the community, he was removed from the dev team and just decided to leave afterwards. I know he's banned now (My assumption is that he requested to be or something like that, but I could use some transparency on that), but for the vast majority of this thread's existence he could have came in to try to defend himself. Might not have gone well, but he could have and he didn't. Which tells me that either he can't defend his own actions (I won't go as far as to recognize they're wrong, just that he won't defend them) or he doesn't care enough to try. So why bother defending him if he won't.
We recognize that he's human. Humans make mistakes. That doesn't mean that every mistake someone makes needs to be swept under the rug for the sake of not hurting their feelings. In fact, sweeping it under the rug is counterproductive to the person's growth. There's no reason to learn and grow if you continue to get away with not doing so. If someone punches you in the face, you don't just go "oh, that's okay, you were angry, there's nothing wrong with that, I won't hold it against you at all". That's like, asking them to punch you in the face again. There's no reason to not do it. In fact, now there's even less reason not to do it, because now they know they can get away with it.
Also, while there have been some people who did previously respect the guy who have been swayed, the impression I'm getting is that the vast majority of people here already had issues with the guy. It's not like these thoughts are only just now coming up, public opinion was already largely against the guy, it's just that we just couldn't talk about it. It was always either keep it to private conversations where he can't see, or keep it to yourself. Now that things have changed and people can be honest now, people are letting their opinions out. It's better than keeping it a secret.
We recognize that he's human. Humans make mistakes. That doesn't mean that every mistake someone makes needs to be swept under the rug for the sake of not hurting their feelings. In fact, sweeping it under the rug is counterproductive to the person's growth. There's no reason to learn and grow if you continue to get away with not doing so. If someone punches you in the face, you don't just go "oh, that's okay, you were angry, there's nothing wrong with that, I won't hold it against you at all". That's like, asking them to punch you in the face again. There's no reason to not do it. In fact, now there's even less reason not to do it, because now they know they can get away with it.
Also, while there have been some people who did previously respect the guy who have been swayed, the impression I'm getting is that the vast majority of people here already had issues with the guy. It's not like these thoughts are only just now coming up, public opinion was already largely against the guy, it's just that we just couldn't talk about it. It was always either keep it to private conversations where he can't see, or keep it to yourself. Now that things have changed and people can be honest now, people are letting their opinions out. It's better than keeping it a secret.
time gear
Eternity in an hour
Perhaps you are right. I didn't mean to promote toxic behavior, I was just coming from the viewpoint that different people will have different viewpoints on the matter and that it's only natural for some people to disagree with each other. My timing on delivering that opinion however probably could have waited for better context, as perhaps I was incorrect stating it in regards to Laziness. For that much, I apologize. You are right, nobody should be shutting up and keeping it to themselves. I certainly haven't, and it's great for everyone else to get the chance to speak out about it as well.
K.S.
Formerly Inuyasha, Retired Staff
I temporarily removed my black hole on this place, against my better judgement, upon hearing that people were being argumentative about this. I just want to bring up something real quick.
The behavior of Mystic and the previous administration has left me, as a former admin who had to deal with them firsthand, an anxiety-filled wreck that I am still to this day trying to recover from. I literally cannot enjoy anything related to this game anymore because it sends me into an anxiety attack with a mere thought or sight, and I'm having to repress those feelings just to write this short post.
Those who are defending Mystic as a person who just made a few mistakes likely never had to deal with him.
The behavior of Mystic and the previous administration has left me, as a former admin who had to deal with them firsthand, an anxiety-filled wreck that I am still to this day trying to recover from. I literally cannot enjoy anything related to this game anymore because it sends me into an anxiety attack with a mere thought or sight, and I'm having to repress those feelings just to write this short post.
Those who are defending Mystic as a person who just made a few mistakes likely never had to deal with him.
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xxBeanGirl420xx
Member
hope you're doin better, buddy
Hang in there hon! <3
If there's ever anything I or any of the other staff can do to make you feel comfortable here again (if you have any desire to engage with the community or game, ofc) don't hesitate to let us know, okay?
If there's ever anything I or any of the other staff can do to make you feel comfortable here again (if you have any desire to engage with the community or game, ofc) don't hesitate to let us know, okay?
time gear
Eternity in an hour
While thinking about all this, I happened to remember an old topic I made way back in the day asking about why I had received bans (I guess it was twice after all?). Perhaps because of all this recent drama and the extreme length of time since it happened, I associated it with Mystic in my mind. However, to my surprise after finding and reading through the topic, Mystic isn't even in it. Nonetheless, even now looking back on it, I can't describe the way I was treated back then as anything other than bullying, with people actively making fun of my misspellings and the administration not only doing nothing to prevent it, but actively participating in it. I can't help but wonder how much of this culture was influenced by Mystic at the time.
The real cherry on top is the post locking the topic, which was done by Rob. He explains how the "only excuse" for having such bad spelling and grammar is to be a young child, then proceeds with the incredibly flawed logic of "If you are a young child, you should be learning how to spell, not using the internet". A complete lack of self awareness that this is a forum dedicated to the community of a Sonic fan game made to appeal to children.
It makes me wonder just how many other people were victims of the toxic culture that existed here back then.
The real cherry on top is the post locking the topic, which was done by Rob. He explains how the "only excuse" for having such bad spelling and grammar is to be a young child, then proceeds with the incredibly flawed logic of "If you are a young child, you should be learning how to spell, not using the internet". A complete lack of self awareness that this is a forum dedicated to the community of a Sonic fan game made to appeal to children.
It makes me wonder just how many other people were victims of the toxic culture that existed here back then.
YEP.
The only reason things changed was because people grew up and realized the community had problems in the way people were interacting. I've got to see it live, myself, because -- and it's already been said -- a lot of people who used to really feed into the nastiness are now grown up and much more mature about their interactions. The ones who couldn't adjust and never grew past it, well...
I've done a lot of responding to posts in this, and I'm beginning to think I should put my actual own perspective (because holy hell do I have a lot that hasn't been covered!) as long as people still have the topic on their mind. Maybe I'll type some stuff up over the next few days...
The only reason things changed was because people grew up and realized the community had problems in the way people were interacting. I've got to see it live, myself, because -- and it's already been said -- a lot of people who used to really feed into the nastiness are now grown up and much more mature about their interactions. The ones who couldn't adjust and never grew past it, well...
I've done a lot of responding to posts in this, and I'm beginning to think I should put my actual own perspective (because holy hell do I have a lot that hasn't been covered!) as long as people still have the topic on their mind. Maybe I'll type some stuff up over the next few days...
Super Chris
That one map maker.
Jeez. I genuinely feel sorry that you actually had to go through this. I hope you're doing well.
PencilVoid
Circuit Enthusiast
This. This. This. 300% this. All over the internet I've seen people blindly bashing "bogeymen" as if they find it fun, painting themselves as the good guys and the victim of the dogpiling as the bad guy. By no means am I defending Mystic's actions, but I just ask of you to think a little more critically rather than spewing hate to make yourselves feel better.
The only reason you should be pointing to that post and saying "this" is if you follow it up with "is absolute nonsense that does not apply in this situation whatsoever". There is a difference between a run-of-the-mill tool who's messed up once or twice catching the ire of Online and a staggeringly long pattern of negliglent-at-best-if-you're-being-obtusely-generous abusive use of administrator authority, and it helps absolutely nobody to try and conflate the two just because you are unfamiliar with it. Do not pass go, do not collect $200, this is a bad post that offers the people that have actively been hurt by him or his actions nothing of value whatsoever.
time gear
Eternity in an hour
Perhaps some people are doing this, but it's an oversimplification to regard this entire thread as just that. Mystic did a lot of bad things to a lot of people spanning over the course of decades, and naturally this made people feel negatively towards him. This thread exists as an outlet for people to talk about these experiences, get it off their chest. Naturally, many of these experiences are going to be emotionally charged. Don't forget that the people Mystic did things to are every bit as human as he is. When someone does so many things to so many people, it's a little unrealistic for a thread like this to be filled with sunshine and rainbows.
Look, I get it. The whole thing leaves a bit of a bad taste in my mouth too. However, Mystic had many, many opportunities to change. Many opportunities to apologize. Even until just recently, he still wasn't banned from the forums. He could have showed up here and apologized, or attempted to defend himself. The things said here are largely a result of his own actions, actions that had consequences. Talk like yours makes it out as if the victims of those actions are bad people for using a topic like this to vent out their frustrations built up over actual decades. People like me, for example. This is real life, and things aren't so simple. This isn't a matter of good people and bad people. This is a matter of one man hurting people over the course of decades, and those people having some choice words to say about it now that it's safe to do so.
The fact that Mystic ends up looking like such a "bogeyman" in this topic is largely a testament to just how much harm he did in all that time.
Super Chris
That one map maker.
Hello, guys. I know I posted in this topic earlier, but I have even more light to shed about what Mystic, Rob, and Prime 2.0 (A.K.A. Pv2) did to me back during the 2.0 era of SRB2.
This is a long one.
This is a long one.
Back in August of 2010, I was once again banned from #srb2fun just for posting a link to an old Flash game called "Portable Curse Device". As such, Mystic and the other admins found it very "immature" that the Flash itself was nothing but a profanity-laced gadget to help relieve stress.
Thinking it was a good idea, Mystic decided to lay the banhammer on me. My original SRB2 Wiki account, Superchris, had its talk page locked because of MascaraSnake (who, at the time, was known as SpiritCrusher) requesting K.S. (formerly Inuyasha) to lock the talk page, which he actually went through with.
I created another account, Super Player, to address how Mystic was being rude to me. Again, I know I did stupid stuff in this community before, but that's a story for another day.
Back on point, when MascaraSnake opened up my talk page with a comment asking me why I wasn't using my old account, I responded with something stupid that led to this debacle of a drama that ended with Rob telling me to "grow the fuck up", which did NOT sit with me at all.
TL;DR: It was basically a long list of people attacking me for how I foolishly reacted to everything that everyone wrote. All of this basically boils down to them telling me: "You are nothing but a very negative influence on this community and you should do us a favor and get out". It also didn't help with the fact that they kept egging me on. (Do bear in mind that I was 14 years old at the time.)
Here are a few things that stuck out to me like a sore thumb:
Looking at it now, I had every right to feel iffy about the responses posted here. Thankfully, when my 3-month ban ended, I felt like my edits actually did something to help the wiki. It wasn't until 2019 when I got back into editing for 2.2.
To wrap it up, my bullheaded behavior led to people disparaging nasty comments on my talk page, which hurt them more than it hurt me. I do, however, hold responsibility for my actions here.
Thinking it was a good idea, Mystic decided to lay the banhammer on me. My original SRB2 Wiki account, Superchris, had its talk page locked because of MascaraSnake (who, at the time, was known as SpiritCrusher) requesting K.S. (formerly Inuyasha) to lock the talk page, which he actually went through with.
I created another account, Super Player, to address how Mystic was being rude to me. Again, I know I did stupid stuff in this community before, but that's a story for another day.
Back on point, when MascaraSnake opened up my talk page with a comment asking me why I wasn't using my old account, I responded with something stupid that led to this debacle of a drama that ended with Rob telling me to "grow the fuck up", which did NOT sit with me at all.
TL;DR: It was basically a long list of people attacking me for how I foolishly reacted to everything that everyone wrote. All of this basically boils down to them telling me: "You are nothing but a very negative influence on this community and you should do us a favor and get out". It also didn't help with the fact that they kept egging me on. (Do bear in mind that I was 14 years old at the time.)
Here are a few things that stuck out to me like a sore thumb:
- Me overreacting, which, now that I think about, has me shaking my head thinking; "I used to be like this?"
- MascaraSnake calling me "Retarded" just because I "wasn't mature". It also didn't help with the fact he cracked down on me for censoring out the word "fuck", yet he found my ignorant responses "amusing". In fairness, as someone who has ADHD, MascaraSnake calling me a “retard” really hurt me. (I forgot to mention that someone calling me "retarded" is actually one of my major triggers.)
- BlazingPhoenix called me an "asshole", saying that what I did would make me look worse. When I told him to stop swearing at me, he proceeded to use even more vulgar language. (Note: Swearing at someone, even if you're just joking, is very disrespectful.)
- Mystic telling me to "Grow up" when my previous talk page was locked due to it being done via request.
- The excessive amount of peanut gallerying on this page.
Looking at it now, I had every right to feel iffy about the responses posted here. Thankfully, when my 3-month ban ended, I felt like my edits actually did something to help the wiki. It wasn't until 2019 when I got back into editing for 2.2.
To wrap it up, my bullheaded behavior led to people disparaging nasty comments on my talk page, which hurt them more than it hurt me. I do, however, hold responsibility for my actions here.
This is a bit of a short one.
One time on the thread for the November/December 2011 OLDC, I posted very lackluster reviews to every level that was part of the contest's Circuit division. Rob, however, told me that he felt like deleting my post just because I didn't give further insight on why I gave some of the levels low ratings. Get this: On other OLDC threads, people have done the same thing and neither Mystic nor Rob have cracked down on them.
Not only did this come off as somewhat hypocritical, it was also unnecessary.
This other time, Mystic once gave me an infraction in response to a very nasty post left on one of my SRB2 Riders levels.
As for the Super SRB2 Kart Z thread, Mystic was railing at D00D64 because he refused to make changes to Cloud Cradle. I made a post saying that I agreed with him. Of course, this is what he posted in response. Agreeing with someone is one thing, but outright accusing them of "sucking up to you" is another.
One time on the thread for the November/December 2011 OLDC, I posted very lackluster reviews to every level that was part of the contest's Circuit division. Rob, however, told me that he felt like deleting my post just because I didn't give further insight on why I gave some of the levels low ratings. Get this: On other OLDC threads, people have done the same thing and neither Mystic nor Rob have cracked down on them.
Not only did this come off as somewhat hypocritical, it was also unnecessary.
This other time, Mystic once gave me an infraction in response to a very nasty post left on one of my SRB2 Riders levels.
As for the Super SRB2 Kart Z thread, Mystic was railing at D00D64 because he refused to make changes to Cloud Cradle. I made a post saying that I agreed with him. Of course, this is what he posted in response. Agreeing with someone is one thing, but outright accusing them of "sucking up to you" is another.
I originally created Zeostar Realm as a way of learning how to make a level pack for SRB2 one at a time. Before this, I have created numerous levels for SRB2 before, but they've never been released to the general public.
When I shared it on #srb2fun in the hopes of getting better at level designing, people in there gave me very vague criticism, saying things such as: "Your mod needs work. A lot of work." I asked them, but they didn't give me any advice, so I was forced to go to the SRB2 Wiki to look up how to design levels better. Though on a positive note, I did get some feedback about it and made the levels a little better. To add to this, I once posted on the help section asking how to fix a Zoom Tube I had trouble with. Hilarity ensues.
To keep it short:
However, this was just the beginning. When I was about to release the mod on the SRB2MB in the form of an early beta, Prime 2.0 gave me some constructive criticism that I improved on, but by the time I got ready to upload the newest revision, I received a PM from Prime 2.0 that my submission had been rejected.
Once I uploaded a fully functional Zeostar Realm demo and submitted it to the Submissions forum, it was immediately rejected. MascaraSnake told me that I had "plagiarized" some of the scenery from other level packs. These being:
Because of these alleged accusations, I got an infraction from Prime 2.0 as well as him telling other admins and mods who looked at the release thread there was "nothing to see."
Skipping ahead, I went back to work on Zeostar Realm and uploaded it to an offshoot SRB2 forum. It got positive reception there, but when the people in #srb2fun found out about it, they bombarded Zeostar Realm with negative ratings, as well as telling me to stop working on the mod altogether just because they didn't like it.
On that note, this old SRB2 player named "H" (Yes, that's his name.) told me that Zeostar Realm "rips off" other levels. When I told him to elaborate, he told me to "get over it". As you can tell, this did absolutely nothing to help me understand where the flaws in my level pack were. A similar scenario happened with this other player I met on the SRB2 Master Server named StarToad who outright insulted my pack, even going as far as comparing it to Sonic Unleashed, a game that they hate playing. While we were playing on Windblown Harbor Zone Act 3, StarToad scolded me for spawning players over a death pit just after the water rose. The host, A Hedgehog, told StarToad to lay off because the comments they were making about my level pack got out of hand and they delved into personal attacks toward my ability as a level designer.
It wasn't until 2015 that I started to develop hate for Zeostar Realm. I even thought it was one of the worst level packs that I created due to Mystic, Rob, and the others picking the mod apart and offering me absolutely no pieces of constructive criticism on how to improve. As I mentioned above, people even called it a "Mystic Realm rip-off" due to the word "Realm" being in the name.
Looking over this, I now realized something:
If it wasn't for Zeostar Realm and all the constructive criticism I received, I wouldn't have made all of my levels look a lot better to this day.
When I shared it on #srb2fun in the hopes of getting better at level designing, people in there gave me very vague criticism, saying things such as: "Your mod needs work. A lot of work." I asked them, but they didn't give me any advice, so I was forced to go to the SRB2 Wiki to look up how to design levels better. Though on a positive note, I did get some feedback about it and made the levels a little better. To add to this, I once posted on the help section asking how to fix a Zoom Tube I had trouble with. Hilarity ensues.
To keep it short:
- Most of MascaraSnake's posts sum up here as: "We have the SRB2 Wiki! Use it!" Some of his other messages are basically derailing the topic, such as him comparing Zeostar Realm's name to Mystic Realm because of the word "Realm" in the title, even going as far as calling it a "poor ripoff." At the time (and nowadays), I learned that just because a mod or level has the word "Realm" in it doesn't make it a "Mystic Realm rip-off."
- Teravolt (formerly known as Metal-Rawr) did the same thing as MascaraSnake, although his comments contributed nothing to the thread. Namely this comment:
"If only Mystic had a dollar for every time people made a mod with "Realm" in its name... =P" - ThunderNova, just like Teravolt, jumped onto the thread to berate me about making a level pack instead of working on one level at a time and submitting them to the OLDC. He even told me that Zeostar Realm lacked "originality", which did absolutely nothing to help me understand what my flaws were as a level designer.
However, this was just the beginning. When I was about to release the mod on the SRB2MB in the form of an early beta, Prime 2.0 gave me some constructive criticism that I improved on, but by the time I got ready to upload the newest revision, I received a PM from Prime 2.0 that my submission had been rejected.
Once I uploaded a fully functional Zeostar Realm demo and submitted it to the Submissions forum, it was immediately rejected. MascaraSnake told me that I had "plagiarized" some of the scenery from other level packs. These being:
- Sea Temple Zone: The tall structure in the middle of the giant water room in the old Deep Sea Zone Act 1.
- Silent Woods Zone: The starting point of Verdant Forest Zone Act 2.
- Pristine Palisade Zone: The beach umbrellas seen in the Tortured Planet Zone Sunshine Atoll.
- Windblown Harbor Zone: Can't remember.
- Sky Grassland Zone: Alleged claims I made a copypasta of Aerial Garden Zone, which was, at the time, the most popular zone in Mystic Realm.
- Poison Valley Zone: The toxic water and factory-like areas from Act 1 of Techno Hill Zone.
- Vacant Castle Zone: The stronghold from Castle Eggman Zone Act 1 that players enter at the end of the stage.
Because of these alleged accusations, I got an infraction from Prime 2.0 as well as him telling other admins and mods who looked at the release thread there was "nothing to see."
Skipping ahead, I went back to work on Zeostar Realm and uploaded it to an offshoot SRB2 forum. It got positive reception there, but when the people in #srb2fun found out about it, they bombarded Zeostar Realm with negative ratings, as well as telling me to stop working on the mod altogether just because they didn't like it.
On that note, this old SRB2 player named "H" (Yes, that's his name.) told me that Zeostar Realm "rips off" other levels. When I told him to elaborate, he told me to "get over it". As you can tell, this did absolutely nothing to help me understand where the flaws in my level pack were. A similar scenario happened with this other player I met on the SRB2 Master Server named StarToad who outright insulted my pack, even going as far as comparing it to Sonic Unleashed, a game that they hate playing. While we were playing on Windblown Harbor Zone Act 3, StarToad scolded me for spawning players over a death pit just after the water rose. The host, A Hedgehog, told StarToad to lay off because the comments they were making about my level pack got out of hand and they delved into personal attacks toward my ability as a level designer.
It wasn't until 2015 that I started to develop hate for Zeostar Realm. I even thought it was one of the worst level packs that I created due to Mystic, Rob, and the others picking the mod apart and offering me absolutely no pieces of constructive criticism on how to improve. As I mentioned above, people even called it a "Mystic Realm rip-off" due to the word "Realm" being in the name.
Looking over this, I now realized something:
I hated Zeostar Realm for all the wrong reasons.
If it wasn't for Zeostar Realm and all the constructive criticism I received, I wouldn't have made all of my levels look a lot better to this day.
While Mystic was one of the head admins for the then-current IRC channel #srb2fun, I would log on there and try to keep up with the current chat. However, when I did so, I'd post something nonsensical, and the things I posted would often lead me to being unfairly bombarded with negative comments from the other people, as well as them attempting to run me out of there, which I did because my feelings were hurt and nobody in the chat showed any remorse for their actions.
The second time this happened was back in August of 2010. As I pointed out in my first post, the mods of #srb2fun were picking on me for no good reason, and when MascaraSnake saw what I tried to do on the SRB2 Wiki to avoid being harassed, that's when he asked Inuyasha to lock my talk page, which he did. Other people in that channel went as far as calling me names like "Chris Thorndyke" and threatening to send fictional characters my way to kill me.
The final time this happened was back in February of 2012, where I joined in under the name "MegaMallix" to see how things were going. Unfortunately, Mystic logged on that same night declaring all of my SRB2MB posts, as well as anything I made in general, stupid. When everyone found out what my true identity was, they, once again, bombarded me with comments telling me to "grow up", "get a life", and other stupid crap. Scizor300, one of the IRC members, came up with the idea of posting the chat logs publicly.
His reason? He wanted to show the internet "how stupid I was."
This also alludes to the time I had the original SRB2 logo as my avatar, with Sonic sticking his tongue out and his eyes moved to different places (referencing the infamous "Down Syndrome Sonic" from an early beta of Sonic 3D Blast). Mystic said that my avatar "perfectly summed up how stupid I was".
There was also this one time I found an IRC log where MascaraSnake and a few others insulted me while I wasn't around, calling me names such as "big idiot" and other stupid crap. He even asked if I was a bigger idiot than Touhou character Cirno, and someone said "Yes." However, this one person named DigalySoftware defended me because I was helping him out for an SRB2 variant he was making for Game Maker.
One last note, Mystic once set an autokick for me in the IRC channel. Pv2 and several others tried to help me back in, but after five tries, I got banned for three months.
Because of all these, I stopped joining #srb2fun for the better of my health, and when the SRB2 Discord opened up years later, I was welcome there. Thankfully, nothing disparaging happened, other than the old admin team dropping comments about the stupid things I did without my knowledge.
Oh, and did I forget to mention that there was a bot named Kikyo in the IRC chatroom that would kick people out if they responded too quickly? That happened to me once, and when I rejoined, the admins actually praised Kikyo for kicking me out of the server. It also didn't help with the fact that the admins encouraged peanut gallery-like behavior, which made me way more uncomfortable than it should have.
One last note: Whenever I tried to report someone on #srb2fun, I was accused of "having a gigantic ego" and acted like a "snitch."
Given the stories you've read, I've originally considered leaving the SRB2 community for the sake of my mental health, but after seeing things slowly change for the better, I decided to stick around.
The second time this happened was back in August of 2010. As I pointed out in my first post, the mods of #srb2fun were picking on me for no good reason, and when MascaraSnake saw what I tried to do on the SRB2 Wiki to avoid being harassed, that's when he asked Inuyasha to lock my talk page, which he did. Other people in that channel went as far as calling me names like "Chris Thorndyke" and threatening to send fictional characters my way to kill me.
The final time this happened was back in February of 2012, where I joined in under the name "MegaMallix" to see how things were going. Unfortunately, Mystic logged on that same night declaring all of my SRB2MB posts, as well as anything I made in general, stupid. When everyone found out what my true identity was, they, once again, bombarded me with comments telling me to "grow up", "get a life", and other stupid crap. Scizor300, one of the IRC members, came up with the idea of posting the chat logs publicly.
His reason? He wanted to show the internet "how stupid I was."
This also alludes to the time I had the original SRB2 logo as my avatar, with Sonic sticking his tongue out and his eyes moved to different places (referencing the infamous "Down Syndrome Sonic" from an early beta of Sonic 3D Blast). Mystic said that my avatar "perfectly summed up how stupid I was".
There was also this one time I found an IRC log where MascaraSnake and a few others insulted me while I wasn't around, calling me names such as "big idiot" and other stupid crap. He even asked if I was a bigger idiot than Touhou character Cirno, and someone said "Yes." However, this one person named DigalySoftware defended me because I was helping him out for an SRB2 variant he was making for Game Maker.
One last note, Mystic once set an autokick for me in the IRC channel. Pv2 and several others tried to help me back in, but after five tries, I got banned for three months.
Because of all these, I stopped joining #srb2fun for the better of my health, and when the SRB2 Discord opened up years later, I was welcome there. Thankfully, nothing disparaging happened, other than the old admin team dropping comments about the stupid things I did without my knowledge.
Oh, and did I forget to mention that there was a bot named Kikyo in the IRC chatroom that would kick people out if they responded too quickly? That happened to me once, and when I rejoined, the admins actually praised Kikyo for kicking me out of the server. It also didn't help with the fact that the admins encouraged peanut gallery-like behavior, which made me way more uncomfortable than it should have.
One last note: Whenever I tried to report someone on #srb2fun, I was accused of "having a gigantic ego" and acted like a "snitch."
- Primary reason: I wasn't "mature" enough to be part of the conversation and was allowed to return when I "grew up."
- I once said "IT'S OVER 9000!", then was promptly accused of "ruining" internet memes.
Given the stories you've read, I've originally considered leaving the SRB2 community for the sake of my mental health, but after seeing things slowly change for the better, I decided to stick around.
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Jesus, dude, I think I remember you from your old name. That's pretty fucked up. I know you probably won't be taking another look at this just to see the responses, but I hope you're doing better these days.
I don't know, I'm not the kind of person who can see someone as less than a person. I just think there's a baseline level of respect that everyone deserves to be treated with. That's not an attempt to describe anything Mystic did as anything less than really fucking shitty, or an attempt to say anyone here hasn't been treating him with at least that baseline "human" respect. I just hope the dude finally got enough of a wake up call to fucking learn a thing or two. Probably not, but one can hope.
I'm not sure many people see Mystic as less than human, but their resentment of him is something he brought on himself. He didn't just make a mistake, his entire attitude and how he treated people for decades is how this all came to be. It's not really a hate bandwagon as much as it is just airing grievances.
Massive amounts of grievances.
Anyone who gets the impression this is a witchhunt should probably take some time to read the whole thread. It's not in our interest to hunt down Mystic's life and make a callout to every community he's in. Since he was removed from this community for being as asshole, it stands to reason that the same attitute would continue to have him removed from other communities and relationships on their own. Hopefully he learns to better himself, but that's no longer our business.
If I have anything positive to say about him, it's that I still really like his levels. As much as they aged...differently from SRB2's current direction, Mystic Realm is still really nostalgic, and Aerial Garden and Prismatic Angel are very fun platforming challenges for me. I don't know what the state of Mystic Realm will be now that both he and Prime are gone, but I'll always regard it fondly.
Massive amounts of grievances.
Anyone who gets the impression this is a witchhunt should probably take some time to read the whole thread. It's not in our interest to hunt down Mystic's life and make a callout to every community he's in. Since he was removed from this community for being as asshole, it stands to reason that the same attitute would continue to have him removed from other communities and relationships on their own. Hopefully he learns to better himself, but that's no longer our business.
If I have anything positive to say about him, it's that I still really like his levels. As much as they aged...differently from SRB2's current direction, Mystic Realm is still really nostalgic, and Aerial Garden and Prismatic Angel are very fun platforming challenges for me. I don't know what the state of Mystic Realm will be now that both he and Prime are gone, but I'll always regard it fondly.
Sunderland
Member
I agree with you guys that cancel culture is disgusting and causes more problems than it ever solves and that it does dehumanize people for saying something or doing something that upsets somebody, which we all do. Nobody deserves to be labeled something damaging and have their lives destroyed just because they made a passing joke or said something on the internet.
But I think it's extremely unfair to imply that the people in this thread are awful for making it and discussing it. I don't know how anyone could read the entire thread and take that away from it. We're talking about someone that's had 20 years to change their behavior, yet it only got worse. We're talking about a guy that advertised his fetish for porn of young girls IN PUBLIC AND PRIVATE TO MINORS. We're talking about children who were bullied and abused and weren't able to identify their trauma for a long time. So no, it's not an example of cancel culture. It's an example of people whose confidence was beaten down during the most formative years of their lives and how they were manipulated into participating in that behavior themselves talking about their experiences with the person and people who did it.
Having a place like this where they can be understood is an important tool in their recovery and trying to take it away from them only justifies the abuse in my opinion.
(Also, not to get personal, but why would someone archive a thread that makes them that disgusted? I don't get it.)
But I think it's extremely unfair to imply that the people in this thread are awful for making it and discussing it. I don't know how anyone could read the entire thread and take that away from it. We're talking about someone that's had 20 years to change their behavior, yet it only got worse. We're talking about a guy that advertised his fetish for porn of young girls IN PUBLIC AND PRIVATE TO MINORS. We're talking about children who were bullied and abused and weren't able to identify their trauma for a long time. So no, it's not an example of cancel culture. It's an example of people whose confidence was beaten down during the most formative years of their lives and how they were manipulated into participating in that behavior themselves talking about their experiences with the person and people who did it.
Having a place like this where they can be understood is an important tool in their recovery and trying to take it away from them only justifies the abuse in my opinion.
(Also, not to get personal, but why would someone archive a thread that makes them that disgusted? I don't get it.)
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Icarus
Phantasy Savior
This guy's a lolicon!? Seriously?? If it's true then nothing else matter, nothing needs to be added, I shall rest on my case.
zevirik
doom 2 is actually an srb2 mod
(pedophilia tw)
he seemed to have a fascination with lolis, and im pretty sure he admitted in a screenshot to having a secret nsfw channel for sharing loli stuff.... ? so yeah, honestly, calling him a 'lolicon' seems right. ironic considering he accused someone else of pedophilia, but..... life, right?!