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Star Wars Age of Alliances: Hadrix and Cujo
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@Rathenhope said in Star Wars Age of Alliances: Hadrix and Cujo:
Personally I would like proof that accusations on a MU forum have had deleterious affects to any of the accused. And I don’t mean not being able to play a MU any more. Evidence of harm please.
I see where you’re going here, but reputation does matter, and we have seen bad reputation translate into bad reception at places. Particularly with the big offenders, even after rebranding. Personally, I’d love to see more “deleterious effects” and pre-emptive bans.
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Thank you to everyone pushing back against this shit. I’m not up for this argument right now but I don’t gotta make it. I appreciate you guys. It’s so, so nice to see the community trend this way.
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@eddie said in Star Wars Age of Alliances: Hadrix and Cujo:
@Meg Why would I out myself to a group of people who would like to target and victimize me? Well, hold that thought! Thank you for engaging with me, and I think that is a very constructive question, genuinely.
How are we going to target and victimize you? None of us have any power on AOA. Indeed, the people who have posted here that did play on AOA have a distinct lack of power; that is why they posted here.
Truth of the matter is I am the victim of a number of different instances of manipulation and sexual misconduct. Not just on that game, but a number of other venues. Was it by the alleged you named? No. There are other players though who do.
I was mislead into believing that my rp would equate to something of a strong story between one character and my own, for instance, and devoted a lot of time and effort into the development of that narrative. That included in-game currency, assets you have to travel around, find and buy, and modifications to make those assets function more efficiently when they are used.
I invested those things into the person I was playing opposite of only to have them pit me against another player to compete for their attention. Not just the intimate rp, but story we had spent hours developing and writing out. It all got thrown away in an instant, and the assets I invested with walked away with no ROI because I refused to compete, on an OOC level, with another player for something I felt I had earned and put the time into to warrant.
I was manipulated and used, then thrown away like trash from an OOC perspective.
I had another instance where I played with another player that I made clear I do not impart aspects about myself into the intimate rp that they engage in. It is a matter of comfort for me to not allow predators to cling to things like that. Despite my best attempts at keeping this separate, this married man continued to tell me things in OOC about how these scenes and actions were intended for me OOC, and how he hoped I ‘got something from it.’
Unwanted, and unwarranted, and I felt targeted as a victim. I assume in those regards, how would I feel comfortable levying complaints to staff that I had been duped, and manipulated?
Regarding AoA, I think there’s a nuanced community within the community itself that are not all that bad. That’s not dismissing the issues that came up in this topic, but it’s more to the fact that everywhere has issues. Concerning those alleged in this topic, they were not contributors to my own experience. I certainly think there could be a quicker process to out predators much like I experienced, but the question comes in how to negotiate that, or present in a manner much like those presented in this topic. ‘Things can be doctored’, ‘images can be altered’.
So I never outed them because there was no sure way to say, this happened to me. My own experiences aren’t just based out of the aforementioned venue though, I could certainly share more. I think open commentary like this does help in a therapeutic way, airing and such.
So you do understand exactly what were are talking about. Yes, sexual predators/pests etc exist on the games. I am sorry someone tried to force you into OOC intimacy when you had an RP relationship. This is exactly why it’s helpful to be able to share your experiences and find others that had the same.
Because if these people are doing it to one person, they are probably doing it to multiple. And that is a certain kind of evidence in itself.
ETA: Also, my biggest takeaway from your post is that it’s not only Hadrix and Cujo, but also more people being sex pests on that game. Which wouldn’t surprise me, because when you foster that kind of community, it grows, despite the pockets of good players that try to play there and insulate themselves to varying degrees of success.
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@eddie as many have said, there’s no way to do that in a way that won’t get pushback.
People will almost always defend those whom they get something from (whether that’s perceived activity on a game/someone kissing their ass/someone running things they’re too burnt out to/someone who crafts lovely RP with them and who hasn’t shown them that side of themselves) until something happens to open their eyes.
For some people, that’s noticing a pattern of complaints.
For some it’s when they get turned on and experience the stuff other people complained about, once the person has a brand new shiny person they wish to pursue.
For some it’s when the person does significant damage to the game (either by cheating/having a major meltdown that blows up a significant portion of playerbase, ect).Howling about reciepts does jack and shit. In my experience I can say confidently that when I have had receipts I was never believed and was accused of faking them/being too sensitive when the person I was trying to show them to on balance was more disposed/got more out of that person than me. And those who were very capable when it came to keeping a game environment harassment free never demanded them, only asked what the context was, how often it had happened, ect. and already had a system set up to track that sort of thing internally. Sometimes I was asked about stuff that happened in scenes log that had been noticed that I did not even complain about, but as staff was tracking other complaints they were going over stuff and were proactively reaching out.
You will NEVER have an uncomfortable process.
But as others have said someone being asked to leave a game because behavior is questionable (even if it’s not questionable ENOUGH for some) isn’t a life changing event. And alerting people to a pattern of behavior is just that. They’ll take it in and decide for themselves what they will and won’t do.
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@eddie I’ve identified you.
You are here because you’re invested into making sure Cujo and Hadrix don’t fall.
You’re doing this not because you know they are innocent, but because you are complicit in the same activity Hadrix is. I would suggest moreso, and you get away with it because of who you are.
You are protected in the same manner as Hadrix.
You know that if Hadrix goes down, you’re next.
You are attempting to lay out a smokescreen and muddy up the waters to inject doubt into the discussion purely out of self-preservation.
You deserve the grid you’ve created.
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@eddie said in Star Wars Age of Alliances: Hadrix and Cujo:
Why would I out myself to a group of people who would like to target and victimize me?
Why are you asking people who are coming forward here to put themselves into a position you won’t put yourself in? Put your money where your mouth is, or stop demanding people meet a standard you don’t hold yourself to.
You are acting as though no one has reported these incidents to staff. They have. With receipts. Those complaints go to, and die with Cujo.
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You dead-ass actually provided a Merriam-Webster definition of ‘Echo Chamber’ as your lead-in and expect anyone to take you seriously past that point?
Gosh, hearts and minds have surely been changed on this day.
You did it.
Take a victory lap.
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@Meg I appreciate your comment, thank you.
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@mietze I think this is really well written and conveys some of my own experience regarding things in other games. I won’t detract from the point of this discussion to elaborate, but to your point I’ve been where you are, too
Regarding the two named in this discussion however, from my own experience, I’ve not seen this behavior. I think admin have a tendency to come across aloof sometimes, but I also don’t know what bigger picture they’re seeing, either. Or agenda, etc.
I came into the conversation here because no one spoke about what was good about AoA, as it all seemed oriented toward the bad. I agree my approach was was not the best, but who is perfect in our world. I don’t think AoA fosters this environment the others are referencing. I don’t think the staff are intentionally malicious either. That’s just my perspective. I think there are people who certainly abuse the system though, (not just in AoA, but wholly).
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@Das-Auto Name the names and spill the tea (edit: if you so desire), no need to protect an abuser.
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@eddie yeah, I mean, if I ran Game A and people were like ‘Meg is a huge enabler of people being sex pests on her game’, the thread wouldn’t also include, ‘But she’s incredibly funny.’
The focus of the topic isn’t on what’s good. it’s what needs to be done better.
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@Das-Auto You’re under no obligation to actually name names unless that’s a fight you’re interested in getting into. I don’t think anyone here is under any illusions, and I doubt this game will be attracting many new players from this board.
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@helvetica But this is kind of my point. I’m not sure I agree that ‘being banned from a MUSH’ is actual harm.
The rest of this post is not necessarily a direct response, just thoughts that have been brewing this evening.
I don’t think any of this happens in a vacuum. Let’s say that reputational loss is a form of harm. If someone comes to me on a game I’m running and says ‘Hey, X is a sex pest’, the first thing I’ll do is talk to X.
Their response is usually pretty indicative of whether or not there’s substance to the accusations. If it’s “Oh god, I didn’t realise I was coming across like that, I’ll go apologise immediately”, that’s a very different response to “Well I said some things that toed the line but wow they’re so sensitive.” In the former case I’d probably give them the benefit of the doubt, in the latter I’d probably kick them out immediately. I still might keep an eye on them in the former case, and if more people come to me and say “Hey I don’t like X’s vibe, and they did these things too” I may reconsider my original decision.
The problem with the idea that “if you accuse someone they’ll immediately be ostracised from all their communities” is it’s not actually true? Like if someone came forwards and said “Hey Rath is a sex pest and he’s been pressuring me for TS,” I’d expect that my friends and the games I play on would go “hey what’s up with this?” and not knee-jerk kick me out of everything, but if I gave them shitty answers then they’d show me the door. I certainly wouldn’t kick out a long-standing friend over a single accusation on a MU board without talking to them first.
If you’re kicked out of a community from a single accusation on an internet forum? Well, chances are that there were many more accusations you didn’t see, and/or the community already had a vibe about you. Or, maybe the community was just not worth being part of in the first place, because yes, sometimes communities do just suck.
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@helvetica That part. Name names, if you want to*, I should have said. Apologies that it came off otherwise.
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@Meg But on the other side of the coin, it’s not the game that’s the problem. It’s people. Some people take issue with those named, others take issue with other players (like I had), and if everyone was just cast out, no one would rp anywhere! I’m sorry that others have had a negative experience there, I do think there’s an opportunity for growth, and I hope that through meaningful conversation, that happens.
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@eddie I would argue that a problem with staff and the Head of Staff is, in itself, a game problem. It’s a fundamental problem with the game.
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@Meg I think it’s a good point you’re making, but the other side is I can’t provide you proof that this is the case. I’m not implying anything about anyone by asking this, but what if the possibility exists that none of this is true? As an innocent bystander playing in the game under the purview of these people, I can’t make an informed decision without a measure of risk of it being true or false.
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@eddie And that is well within your right to do. Just like anyone reading this thread. They see what’s been said and by who, and they are going to judge it based on their own experiences of either the game or the people.
Hence why we said that testimony is a form of evidence, not a complete form of truth. Personally, I take into the fact that many people who don’t appear to know each other and are saying the same things is a little more weighted in truth than you might, as someone who plays the game and hasn’t been subjected to this.
It doesn’t mean that because you haven’t seen it that it’s not true, by the way. It just means that you haven’t seen it. But we all saw what Hadrix said on channel, in that log. That wasn’t even a denial. That was a ‘I have toed the line and apologized before, so bitches can’t be mad’, right there. So again, I believe what I have read here.
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@eddie said in Star Wars Age of Alliances: Hadrix and Cujo:
But on the other side of the coin, it’s not the game that’s the problem.
It is the head of the game that fosters the environment creating the issue being addressed in this thread. If the leader of that game would actually take steps to protect players this wouldn’t be an issue. This is an issue because instead of addressing the problem, Cujo has promoted Hadrix to staff and empowered that abuse. That is a game problem.
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@Meg That’s totally fair. I acknowledge people are incorporating their own experiences in this. My experience just differs, and I appreciate that there might be a side of it I haven’t witnessed. My own testimony is that it’s not something I’ve seen in the game regarding those named.
