Predators and Roleplaying Communities

[L. B. Heuschkel]

@Gashlycrumb Thank you. All of this is something I am only in the process of learning about now – at the age of 52, finally getting assessed for ADHD and autism. Turns out I very likely have both.

All those years of being told I’m just depressed or stupid. Sigh.

[Cobalt]

@Arkandel I appreciate the support but there is no need to be sorry. Very few people in the community knew the details of what was going on. You get conditioned to keep things quiet.

I have other thoughts about stuff re: trans women, male, and neurodivergent victims but my brain is a touch mush right now.

[Rucket]

@Cobalt said in Predators and Roleplaying Communities:

@Arkandel I appreciate the support but there is no need to be sorry. Very few people in the community knew the details of what was going on. You get conditioned to keep things quiet.

I have other thoughts about stuff re: trans women, male, and neurodivergent victims but my brain is a touch mush right now.

Yeah, abusers get off on things like control, and gaslighting people into keeping quiet is a big part of that. I am sorry you went through everything. My mom has been talking more about her experiences dealing with my dad and I think not only is it helpful for her to be doing so but I believe she has found some peace in trying to warn younger people about signs to keep watch for.

[MisterBoring]

Predatory behavior in RP communities is terrible. I hate that it happens, and I try to be there to support the victims where it’s appropriate. I’m lucky in that I haven’t had to deal with it, but I super hate that all this shit happened to all of you, and wish nothing but horrible things on your predators.

[Artemis]

Yo @Cobalt , just wanted to appreciate you for expressing this here. I feel like, had things gone just a little differently for me, I could’ve ended up in a similar situation with one of the online people I played and flirted with. I really relate to your bit about not having much of a social life in your teens and leaning on rp as a surrogate. Also got labeled slut/whore/whatever as a 14yo, though I did typically keep my age private. Anyway, though I’m no longer much a part of it, I do commend this community for how quickly and thoroughly they act on allegations of this nature, and you for your post.

[Gashlycrumb]

@L-B-Heuschkel I hope you get joy of it. Figuring out that I’m autistic and connecting with autistic community has been very good for me.

I don’t want to derail or dismiss the sexual abuse aspect of this thread, but it might be good to talk about this kind of thing in non-sexual friendships. That can be very damaging too. Also, the patterns of behavior tend to include manipulating entire friend-groups to turn on and isolate victims, and not getting lassoed into participating is probably one of the best things a person can do to prevent abuse of others.

[L. B. Heuschkel]

@Gashlycrumb said in Predators and Roleplaying Communities:

I don’t want to derail or dismiss the sexual abuse aspect of this thread, but it might be good to talk about this kind of thing in non-sexual friendships. That can be very damaging too.

There are many kinds of emotional abuse and manipulation. I have been fortunate enough to only experience sexual abuse offline (‘fortunate’…) but I have walked blind into co-dependent online close friendships no less than three times and gotten very badly burned all three times. Anything that helps us spot abusers, whatever kind, whether they’re self-aware or not, is good advice.

[Pavel]

@Gashlycrumb said in Predators and Roleplaying Communities:

it might be good to talk about this kind of thing in non-sexual friendships.

I agree. And, again, not to derail or diminish the impact of sexual abuse.

Many of you are aware of my past association with someone of such ill repute that they’re essentially persona non grata, with that association in part leading to me making rather immoral decisions in a position of authority.

It’s been a long time since then, but I’m fairly sure that counts as a predatory relationship. Like abuse of a sexual nature, it’s often so difficult to tell when you’re being preyed upon or manipulated that you don’t really know if you should, or indeed can, turn to anyone.

[Rinel]

@Pavel said in Predators and Roleplaying Communities:

someone of such ill repute that they’re essentially persona non grata

This ranges from “Rinel in some places” to “SpiderVA” and you’re gonna need to be way more specific

[Coin]

@Rinel said in Predators and Roleplaying Communities:

@Pavel said in Predators and Roleplaying Communities:

someone of such ill repute that they’re essentially persona non grata

This ranges from “Rinel in some places” to “SpiderVA” and you’re gonna need to be way more specific

He means VASpider.

[Pavel]

@Rinel said in Predators and Roleplaying Communities:

@Pavel said in Predators and Roleplaying Communities:

someone of such ill repute that they’re essentially persona non grata

This ranges from “Rinel in some places” to “SpiderVA” and you’re gonna need to be way more specific

I absolutely do not.

[Rinel]

@Pavel
I just wanted to know if we were friends

[Pavel]

@Rinel said in Predators and Roleplaying Communities:

@Pavel
I just wanted to know if we were friends

I don’t see any of you as friends.
I see you all as future clients.

[Cobalt]

@Pavel Don’t lie, bb. you know you crave my friendship

[Rinel]

@Pavel said in Predators and Roleplaying Communities:

@Rinel said in Predators and Roleplaying Communities:

@Pavel
I just wanted to know if we were friends

I don’t see any of you as friends.
I see you all as future clients.

Wait what do you do

[GF]

@Gashlycrumb said in Predators and Roleplaying Communities:

I don’t want to derail or dismiss the sexual abuse aspect of this thread, but it might be good to talk about this kind of thing in non-sexual friendships.

I had a friend in high school. She was very good at isolating me from others, with a combination of speaking to my interests and complaining about how everyone else was too dumb and pedestrian to be worthy of our attention. After a few years, I noticed I was lonely and miserable because she was all I had after having been convinced to abandon everyone else out of a cultivated sense of elitism.

I do not believe she was doing it deliberately. I think it was a defense mechanism; an unpopular person convincing herself she’s only unpopular because everyone was secretly jealous of her. Regardless of intent, though, it trained very bad habits in me that I still catch myself falling into even today.

This isn’t a MU story. I don’t feel like telling the MU story, even though it’s pretty much just like this except instead of high school, it was a MUD. I think the reason I’m telling the high school story instead of the MUD story is I worry the MUD “friend” might still be out there somewhere, looking for someone like me to isolate again.

[Pavel]

@Rinel said in Predators and Roleplaying Communities:

@Pavel said in Predators and Roleplaying Communities:

@Rinel said in Predators and Roleplaying Communities:

@Pavel
I just wanted to know if we were friends

I don’t see any of you as friends.
I see you all as future clients.

Wait what do you do

I’m a grief counsellor in training to be a big boy psychologist.

[Pavel]

@GF said in Predators and Roleplaying Communities:

I think it was a defense mechanism

One of my biggest personal battles is overcoming toxic behaviours that were originally sensible defence mechanisms from abusive relationships. It’s a hard road, because every fibre of your being is telling you that you need to do a thing or behave a way because it keeps you safe.

[somasatori]

@Pavel said in Predators and Roleplaying Communities:

@GF said in Predators and Roleplaying Communities:

I think it was a defense mechanism

One of my biggest personal battles is overcoming toxic behaviours that were originally sensible defence mechanisms from abusive relationships. It’s a hard road, because every fibre of your being is telling you that you need to do a thing or behave a way because it keeps you safe.

I am 99% sure you’ve heard this from a supervisor (as the idea comes from one of my own supervisors), but in the small chance you haven’t: an important part in overcoming your pathogenic defenses is acknowledging their importance in your life. As you said, every fiber of your being was telling you that your behavior was appropriate to keep you safe. An insidious part of trauma is how often we are changed – including in a biological way in terms of hippocampal volume, amygdala function, prefrontal cingulate reactivity, etc. – by the nature of what we endured. So, two things: your brain responds to a biological change as a result of abuse suffered over time, and your behavior becomes habit due to its necessity in keeping you safe. Not easy stuff to overcome, so good on you for working towards a healthier holistic state of mind.

As a side note, my therapeutic tendency is more towards psychodynamic (TLDP) and internal family systems work, but I was also taught cognitive processing therapy and prolonged exposure in my training rotation at Veterans Affairs here in the States. The way I usually phrased it to that population is that we have two obligations to our defense mechanisms: one is to honor the work they did for us in keeping us safe, and the other is to gently put them to rest by recognizing our negative (pathogenic) defenses as cognitive distortions. We needed them once, we don’t need them now, but we can learn a lesson from why they developed and be aware of situations that may cause that to happen again.

[Pavel]

@somasatori Absolutely. I’ve worked with my trauma therapist for many a year. The only reason I say that it is still a battle is because I think it always will be, at least somewhat. There’s always going to be that temptation into reaction, I just get better and better at refusing it.