Mystic removal discussion - The good and the bad

Boy oh boy, if I ever wind up getting tired of modern internet communication again, romanticizing good ol' forum culture, this thread will serve as a reminder to take off the rose-tinted glasses.

Good on you all for getting rid of old baggage. I'm happy in retrospect to have merely been a very occassional, casual visitor.
 
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Hearing staff is eavesdropping on PMs is really disappointing. This is absolutely wrong!
If a user composes a PM it should be obvious that the contents are only to be read by the recipients. The occurence of grooming in the past, as sad as it is, does not excuse this.


I advise to stop this immediately. This is a tool that undermines the trust of the users and could be abused. However there probably aren't important matters after all in these PMs.


A "report this PM to staff" button would be much more sensible.
 
Tyrannic said:
...romanticizing good ol' forum culture, this thread will serve as a reminder to take off the rose-tinted glasses.

Good on you all for getting rid of old baggage. I'm happy in retrospect to have merely been a very occassional, casual visitor.
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Who are you referring to, specifically? No one has romanticized anything as far as I can recall (if anything I'm seeing here, is people that had leave the community a long time ago, coming back because of the situation, and others just talking about their experiences); or more exactly, what are you talking about? it seems very out of place or impertinent.
 
XleederTH said:
Who are you referring to, specifically? No one has romanticized anything as far as I can recall (if anything I'm seeing here, is people that had leave the community a long time ago, coming back because of the situation, and others just talking about their experiences); or more exactly, what are you talking about? it seems very out of place or impertinent.
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i think they're saying that if they ever go back to IRC & webforums vs discord & social media or whatever, this thread is a good reminder that "the way of the past" is not necessarily as pristine as we might remember it to have been
 
Silver Sonic said:
Hearing staff is eavesdropping on PMs is really disappointing. This is absolutely wrong!
If a user composes a PM it should be obvious that the contents are only to be read by the recipients. The occurence of grooming in the past, as sad as it is, does not excuse this.


I advise to stop this immediately. This is a tool that undermines the trust of the users and could be abused. However there probably aren't important matters after all in these PMs.


A "report this PM to staff" button would be much more sensible.
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There are cases in which individuals are not mature enough to recognize something 'report-able', even if they meet the minimum age required (if it's 13 or younger, maybe verifiable or modded PM are the best way of making sure nothing "weird" happens).

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ash said:
i think they're saying that if they ever go back to IRC & webforums vs discord & social media or whatever, this thread is a good reminder that "the way of the past" is not necessarily as pristine as we might remember it to have been
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Oh well, looks more logical to me now. I thought it meant "We were romanticizing the other banned members" or something really out of place. Good thing I didn't answered to that, a really bad interpretation I had.
 
ash said:
i think they're saying that if they ever go back to IRC & webforums vs discord & social media or whatever, this thread is a good reminder that "the way of the past" is not necessarily as pristine as we might remember it to have been
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Yes. English as a second language, sorry.
 
Tyrannic said:
Yes. English as a second language, sorry.
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Nah. I understood what you meant. I, too, prefer this forum type structure. Although I've come to accept Discord for what it is, and even run a server of my own, it just doesn't feel the same or as personal as a forum. Of course, forums can be good or bad, depending on the community in them. The official SEGA forums were rather venomous towards the end of its life. I went from being an active member to being a lurker who posted a few times a year.
 
Slightly related, because the Discord probably won't allow discussion on it, but an announcement about Prime being banned was made there, and looking at the logs in imgur, it was for good reason, as he had intended to make his own SRB2 Discord server and forcibly replace the current Discord with it, to the point that a text replacement filter would be set up here to prevent the current Discord couldn't be linked to, and it just makes me wonder if, aside from SSNTails, most, if not all of the STJr. veterans haven't grown out of the "bully or be bullied" mentality that has been discussed at length in this thread. The imgur album is horrifying to read that someone would go to such lengths to destroy a Discord server.
 
details on Prime's... lunacy? were discussed elsewhere, and it has me confused how people put up with it (as well as mystic and rob's antics) for over a whole-ass decade. this isn't even like "oh they were just harsh" kind of behavior... it's some of the most nasty, vulgar moderation i've ever seen. doubly confusing considering he didn't contribute much to the actual game from what i understand?

has me feeling even better about the future of this game, honestly. better off without someone who seeks praise for simply not abusing their power even though they could've, or whatever.

(the logs that were posted in the discord announcement: https://imgur.com/a/CN4tfp8)
 
He wasn't going to make a new srb2 discord server- he was going to revert it back to the old official server, which was abandoned for the current one because Mystic had a fit about Spazzo being an active member there. (Not abandoned, per say. It has new owners and has been a tight knit community there for the past few years)

This isn't defending Prime's actions, however. It is still an action in bad faith. Just more elaboration (Dear god imagine if there were three "official" srb2 discord servers. Eugh.)
 
cookiefonster said:
I think a good lesson to take away from this thread is that you shouldn't look up to someone as wiser and more sensible than you just because of their age, especially in a place as chaotic and focused on anonymity as the Internet.
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This might the best moral lesson out of many to make on this moment. I wholeheartedly agree.
 
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I think a mental health PSA is sorely needed in this thread. I wrote this as part of other comments I was going to make, but I'm not fully moved to share my personal opinions. That said, this PSA should not wait.

While this thread has benefits in providing cathartic release, it is nowhere near sufficient for aiding your mental health by itself. You are ultimately responsible for building your own victories. You can work towards your own victory with the proper help.

If you're in a position to seek help, then you should consider doing so. EmuEmi, a prolific Sonic content creator, vouches for mental health support in her YouTube video. In it, she supports BetterHelp online counseling.

No solution is perfect, as BetterHelp has its fair criticisms. But if physical access is an issue for you, then a licensed solution such as BetterHelp is better than an improvised one like this thread.

(EDIT: I realize the links I shared for BetterHelp are not flattering. I encourage you to look around and make an informed decision. They are not the only provider in online therapy.)

If physical access is not a problem but financial access is, then consider Open Path Psychotherapy Collective for substantial discounts on in-person therapy. Or, your local city/county might offer such services to you for free. To find such services, you may Google "[your city/county] community mental health" or dial 411 in the US to ask for assistance. (EDIT: Dial 211 to ask for government services specifically.)

Finally, consider asking your national suicide hotline for assistance; they're not just for last resort. Review this international list and FAQs for suicide hotlines. Or, you can use the Crisis Text Line by texting HOME to 741741.

Anyway, that's a lot of resources and not all of them may apply to you personally. But they're there if you need them, and you should absolutely use them. Once more, no solution is perfect, but a licensed solution can provide many more benefits to you than an improvised one.
 
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Silver Sonic said:
Hearing staff is eavesdropping on PMs is really disappointing. This is absolutely wrong!
If a user composes a PM it should be obvious that the contents are only to be read by the recipients. The occurrence of grooming in the past, as sad as it is, does not excuse this.
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Truly private communication isn't a thing, as long as you use a platform (like the internet) you can still have your message to be seen.


Furthermore if people have nothing bad to hide what is the problem if the staff can see the PM?


I'd rather have problems be solved before something bad happen.
 
Icarus said:
Truly private communication isn't a thing, as long as you use a platform (like the internet) you can still have your message to be seen.


Furthermore if people have nothing bad to hide what is the problem if the staff can see the PM?


I'd rather have problems be solved before something bad happen.
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It is indeed possible using end to end encryption using for example PGP.

But this isn‘t the topic here.
Privacy is a human right. If it is undermined without a warrant it needs to be made clearly transparent! Especially if the feature is called a private message.

The possibilities for abuse are endless, which is why there are regulations as the EU GDPR which try to end this. I guess you‘d feel uncomfortable too if the police rummaged through your house or if you realized someone has been listening to your every phone call even if you did nothing wrong. There still might be emberassing things or a general feel of unease as humans act differently when they know they are being watched.


The provider of the MB could possibly be made liable in accordance to GDPR by EU citizens if it isn‘t made transparent how and by whom their data is being processed in the terms of the plattform.
 
Digiku said:
I think a mental health PSA is sorely needed in this thread. I wrote this as part of other comments I was going to make, but I'm not fully moved to share my personal opinions. That said, this PSA should not wait.

While this thread has benefits in providing cathartic release, it is nowhere near sufficient for aiding your mental health by itself. You are ultimately responsible for building your own victories. You can work towards your own victory with the proper help.

If you're in a position to seek help, then you should consider doing so. EmuEmi, a prolific Sonic content creator, vouches for mental health support in her YouTube video. In it, she supports BetterHelp online counseling.

No solution is perfect, as BetterHelp has its fair criticisms. But if physical access is an issue for you, then a licensed solution such as BetterHelp is better than an improvised one like this thread.

If physical access is not a problem but financial access is, then consider Open Path Psychotherapy Collective for substantial discounts on in-person therapy. Or, your local city/county might offer such services to you for free. To find such services, you may Google "[your city/county] community mental health" or dial 411 in the US to ask for assistance.

Finally, consider asking your national suicide hotline for assistance; they're not just for last resort. Review this international list and FAQs for suicide hotlines. Or, you can use the Crisis Text Line by texting HOME to 741741.

Anyway, that's a lot of resources and not all of them may apply to you personally. But they're there if you need them, and you should absolutely use them. Once more, no solution is perfect, but a licensed solution can provide many more benefits to you than an improvised one.
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IMO this should be its own thread, and stickied. The community in general could stand to have more practical humanistic resources and topics and places to help each other.

If this thread shows anything, if you ask me, it's that the entire Mod staff is somewhat complicit and the whole system should be revised. I again recommend not having "Forever" be the tenure for Moderators and instead adopt a simple voting system.

Having a way to Like posts or post Reactions would help in overall communication. Not going overboard with the amount of Reactions, the mb doesn't need to be Discord, but just the basic set, would go a long way.
 
BlueSmoke said:
I have literally no idea what happened. Can someone fill me in?
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i really do think you should actually read the thread, but tldr, some (now ex-) mods revealed themselves to be Not Good People and got kicked out.
really its hard to describe. just read the thread.
 
Tyrannic said:
Yes. English as a second language, sorry.
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My bad, I was interpreting your post with other intentions, which I pointed the less aggressive ones and then stopped writing because I might not be answering to your actual message.

---------- Post added at 08:05 PM ---------- Previous post was at 07:38 PM ----------

Icarus said:
Truly private communication isn't a thing, as long as you use a platform (like the internet) you can still have your message to be seen.


Furthermore if people have nothing bad to hide what is the problem if the staff can see the PM?


I'd rather have problems be solved before something bad happen.
Click to expand...


The thing is, we don't wanna be that platform which people could share their phone number or get asked to do so for god knows what reasons...
Because there actually are, messaging applications with encryption.
 
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