The Apology

[Crystal Shards]

Except that the things I don't like are against the rules...!

If you think insulting someone's religion doesn't breach the Forum Attitudes rules #1, 3 and/or 4... well, lol.

With how vague those things are, telling someone to "go somewhere else" could easily fall into those. Besides, I'm pretty sure the staff is working on fixing that problem.

[lolDeath]

Debates are one thing, but to really bash Christians because of such debates is another, as well as the fact that I ended up reporting a post where a picture of Jesus on the cross was used as part of a joke (and as a result, Fox's thread on report abuse).

I already stay out of religious debates. I don't need to see people mock Christians just to show off how cool or funny they are.

If you are too small of a boy to accept that not everyone cares about your religion enough to show it any respect you have absolutely zero fucking business reading debates on the subject. Did I cry when the little dead God lovers started insulting people saying they were without morals, evil, blah blah load of shit? No. Grow a pair, a huge, huge pair.

[Crystal Shards]

If you are too small of a boy to accept that not everyone cares about your religion enough to show it any respect you have absolutely zero fucking business reading debates on the subject. Did I cry when the little dead God lovers started insulting people saying they were without morals, evil, blah blah load of shit? No. Grow a pair, a huge, huge pair.

How "Blackenesque" of you.

[lolDeath]

Don't even start that shit again.

[TheEnd]

How "Blackenesque" of you.

I don't remember Blacken insulting Christianity.

No, seriously.

[Crystal Shards]

I don't remember Blacken insulting Christianity.

No, seriously.

I meant the overall attitude that people attach to Blacken. "If you're offended get the hell out of here or grow a pair."

Edited July 9, 2009 by Crystal Shards

[TheEnd]

I meant the overall attitude that people seem to attach to Blacken. "If you're offended get the hell out of here or grow a pair."

And even with that attitude of his, he wouldn't go and insult people for their religious beliefs.

That says something, if you ask me.

[Wolf]

I still wish I had a clue what was going on, but good choice Jyosua.

[lolDeath]

I meant the overall attitude that people attach to Blacken. "If you're offended get the hell out of here or grow a pair."

He says get the hell out period from what I remember, I say get the hell out of discussions of that nature. Potato, pota- wait that doesn't work online.

[Rodykitty]

If you are too small of a boy to accept that not everyone cares about your religion enough to show it any respect you have absolutely zero fucking business reading debates on the subject. Did I cry when the little dead God lovers started insulting people saying they were without morals, evil, blah blah load of shit? No. Grow a pair, a huge, huge pair.

Nevermind that I clearly say I am not even reading debates. The problems I had happened outside of debates where it was pretty much pure trolling.

And even with that attitude of his, he wouldn't go and insult people for their religious beliefs.

That says something, if you ask me.

I'm pretty sure the post I reported was in a thread Blacken took a huge part in.

[lolDeath]

Nevermind that I clearly say I am not even reading debates. The problems I had happened outside of debates where it was pretty much pure trolling.

I have never, ever, ever seen anyone here just bring up Christianity out of the blue in any kind of attack. Granted I was gone for like 2 months, but still, give me a fucking break.

[Crystal Shards]

And even with that attitude of his, he wouldn't go and insult people for their religious beliefs.

That says something, if you ask me.

I dunno if he's done it here, because I didn't read that whole thread, but I am pretty sure I've heard him discuss it before and it's not pretty. If you've been spared, consider yourself lucky.

He says get the hell out period from what I remember, I say get the hell out of discussions of that nature. Potato, pota- wait that doesn't work online.

You remember incorrectly, and the overall attitude is the same. Kettle, meet pot.

[TheEnd]

I dunno if he's done it here, because I didn't read that whole thread, but I am pretty sure I've heard him discuss it before and it's not pretty. If you've been spared, consider yourself lucky.

My point of reference.

I don't discuss with Blacken, by the way.

[lolDeath]

When did I ever say that he was a bad guy in the first place?

I'm just saying. The always growing list of people who compare me to Blacken is made almost entirely of people I don't know. It's kind of weird.

[Rodykitty]

I have never, ever, ever seen anyone here just bring up Christianity out of the blue in any kind of attack. Granted I was gone for like 2 months, but still, give me a fucking break.

There was the Religion thread in FftF (which you posted in), and I can't find the other thread I'm thinking of (which is a good thing).

[lolDeath]

There was the Religion thread in FftF (which you posted in), and I can't find the other thread I'm thinking of (which is a good thing).

A religion thread had posts about religion? Go fucking figure, no way!

[Superbus]

What, Bus? Really, what?

Really... you don't post here. You don't keep tabs on their behaviour on Serenes. Your opinion is clearly based only on the way they act outside here, or in FESS. That's why you can call Steve and Black Knight good members. (I'll leave Fox aside here because really, he was tamer than the others and didn't deserve more than a demotion really, I guess.)

Tell me, Bus. Have your standards changed so much that a "good member" is one that joins a community to insult, flame, troll and mock the members there, contributing minimally? For months? Supposedly to prove a point that the rules weren't being enforced, while they become some of the greatest issues themselves?

I've said it before; I had a difficult time accepting the fact that the atrocious God-hating troll I saw here was the same Sword Saint I respected at FESS. He was a good member there, for as long as I had known him (and that means early FESS2); however, here, he's a blister.

Black Knight even admitted what he was doing, so no need to talk about him.

You're comparing things that are completely different, Bus, and missing the mark by far. It's almost embarassing.

Someone who on multiple occasions accused me of making administrative decisions based on who I wanted to have sex with has NO FUCKING RIGHT accusing me of missing any mark, whatsoever, ever. How DARE you. Who do you think you are!?

In the case of BK and Fox (and this will address Jyo as well), I KNOW they were good members. Fox was a mod, and not really even one I recommended; he was promoted on his own. And with BK, did I miss something, or should my memory of our three lost months go away just because the actual data did? I remember BK being a great contributor to the Serious Discussion board (one of the few I'm active in, but hear me out). Oh, but right, he had a bad few days. FUCK HIM!! THE TROLL!!!!! CRUCIFY HIM! CRUCIFY HIM!!! (cookie for whoever gets THAT reference).

As for Sword Saint, I'm told by multiple people that he's an absolutely unruly dick here and that I don't know what I'm talking about. I'd need data on this, and most of that is now gone, but I do admit his general attitude is disappointingly different. Does that make him a "troll"? Not really. Is it disappointing? To me, a bit. Is it ban-worthy? Fuck no. By the way, I put Sword Saint in the same category that I put Eaichu and whatever Laylea is calling herself here; I'm disappointed in their actions, and their idiotic spam, but they shouldn't be banned, like someone was calling for in a ticket.

That's what bothers me about this: everyone wants their own personal utopia, where bans are handed out and STRINGENTLY ENFORCED!!!, no matter what, full stop. If ANYONE knows how silly that policy is, I would think it'd be your root administrator. As for the whole FESS thing (HOW did we get into this "FESS vs. SF shit again? This wasn't my intention...), it's not really FESS so much as a fandom-wide thing. See, here's the thing: everyone has bad days. Some people even have bad weeks! I don't view them as grounds for permanent discipline, nor should anyone else. If someone has a HISTORY of problems, they should be viewed with a crooked eye until they prove they can get alone. If someone was a great member at another place - be it FESS, FEFF, FEP, FEO, whatever - I feel that they should be at least a little more respected at other places. That's what we built this on, and for a long time, it worked very well. Everyone borrowed resources from everyone else; I borrowed ideas from FEP and FEFF, gave advice to them, and it kept our respective members happy. I'm still seeing the xenophobia here that I saw when FESS shut down, and I understand it even less than I did then. It's like some of you are just going to hold your breath until you get everything you want, no exceptions.

That includes you, Fox. Congrats; you took what should have been a great occasion, which is a real step forward, and ruined it by constantly pushing back, completely ignoring good peoples' advice about it, and you've successfully ruined this topic all over one member, again. I wouldn't blame Jyo at this point for massaging his temples and going "wow, I should have just left them banned". Why? Because you've got Blacken in your ear on IRC the whole time, and if you don't fight, you're letting him down? I've heard that shit before. His history with the memberbase is deplorable (and since I'm big about someone's past history, remember I fired him for it at FESS, after more warnings than I should have given him), and while no, I think his banning this time was a convenience, considering the fact that it likely should have happened before for something else, I can't defend it, and you pushing so aggressively for this is making yourself - and by extension, your brother and Steve - look really, really bad. As for where Josh goes for advice on what goes wrong with his site without the security blanket there for him? I went through this when I fired him from FESS: If Josh is smart, he'll start learning more about his servers, and his software. I am NOT a code monkey - by trade, I'm a network engineer, and most of the hardcore coding over the years at FESS was handled by either Eai, Togieduo or Blacken himself - but if it meant I could get rid of Blacken so I didn't have a staff member embarrassing us at every turn and turning my forum into "Pro Blacken" and "Anti Blacken" camps, then yes, I started to learn what I had to do in case a bug hit, or in case one of the custom modifications went plonkers. I had to make myself, in a short time, much more competent in the gears of my website and forums (it should also be noted, this is one of the reasons I made the final decision to take us down, as day to day dealings were exhausting me, forget about having to relearn our code base without having the understanding of PHP to really know it). And yes, that's why I gave Josh the advice I did when he first took over, to not let Ed get involved; once he's in, to him, his strengths (expertise and intelligence) are justification for his weaknesses (he thinks the members are useless and treats them like they are, and even some other staff members), and when you call him on it, it becomes a personal affront (again: I'm going to be giddy getting yelled at later).

If you take an objective look back on this in your own time, away from the computer, I hope you'll realise that right now, you're coming off as just someone's follower, which is highly disappointing.

(I will defend him on the religion front, Crystal. Blacken doesn't flame anyone for their beliefs, but he does hammer someone for going above and beyond what society would consider normal, and really hates Theocracies).

Edited July 9, 2009 by Superbus

[Crystal Shards]

(I will defend him on the religion front, Crystal. Blacken doesn't flame anyone for their beliefs, but he does hammer someone for going above and beyond what society would consider normal, and really hates Theocracies).

Ah, that does make sense. Perhaps I'm thinking of someone else, or the context was different (like a debate on FESS or something). Maybe he was annoyed at someone for cynically calling America a theocracy or something. Anyway it doesn't matter.

Edited July 9, 2009 by Crystal Shards

[TheEnd]

Someone who on multiple occasions accused me of making administrative decisions based on who I wanted to have sex with has NO FUCKING RIGHT accusing me of missing any mark, whatsoever, ever. How DARE you. Who do you think you are!?

You can do better than ad hominem and authority arguments, Bus.

Out of respect, I'll just stop there.

In the case of BK and Fox (and this will address Jyo as well), I KNOW they were good members. Fox was a mod, and not really even one I recommended; he was promoted on his own. And with BK, did I miss something, or should my memory of our three lost months go away just because the actual data did? I remember BK being a great contributor to the Serious Discussion board (one of the few I'm active in, but hear me out). Oh, but right, he had a bad few days. FUCK HIM!! THE TROLL!!!!! CRUCIFY HIM! CRUCIFY HIM!!! (cookie for whoever gets THAT reference).

Fox aside, and I'm obviously not talking about the Serious Discussion board (as you should know well, I've never been a fan of those).

As for Sword Saint, I'm told by multiple people that he's an absolutely unruly dick here and that I don't know what I'm talking about. I'd need data on this, and most of that is now gone, but I do admit his general attitude is disappointingly different. Does that make him a "troll"? Not really. Is it disappointing? To me, a bit. Is it ban-worthy? Fuck no. By the way, I put Sword Saint in the same category that I put Eaichu and whatever Laylea is calling herself here; I'm disappointed in their actions, and their idiotic spam, but they shouldn't be banned, like someone was calling for in a ticket.

He clearly antagonizes people to get a reaction/"lulz".

That's the troll definition I'm going by.

Eaichu's and Laylea's behavior is far, far from stellar indeed, but at least they aren't flaming anyone.

That's what bothers me about this: everyone wants their own personal utopia, where bans are handed out and STRINGENTLY ENFORCED!!!, no matter what, full stop. If ANYONE knows how silly that policy is, I would think it'd be your root administrator. As for the whole FESS thing (HOW did we get into this "FESS vs. SF shit again? This wasn't my intention...), it's not really FESS so much as a fandom-wide thing. See, here's the thing: everyone has bad days. Some people even have bad weeks! I don't view them as grounds for permanent discipline, nor should anyone else. If someone has a HISTORY of problems, they should be viewed with a crooked eye until they prove they can get alone. If someone was a great member at another place - be it FESS, FEFF, FEP, FEO, whatever - I feel that they should be at least a little more respected at other places. That's what we built this on, and for a long time, it worked very well. Everyone borrowed resources from everyone else; I borrowed ideas from FEP and FEFF, gave advice to them, and it kept our respective members happy. I'm still seeing the xenophobia here that I saw when FESS shut down, and I understand it even less than I did then. It's like some of you are just going to hold your breath until you get everything you want, no exceptions.

The fact someone is an excellent member somewhere shouldn't mean an automatic free-out-of-jail card if they decide to be dicks - and just dicks - elsewhere.

Things are a bit sad when they get to the point where people wonder "what the hell is he doing here?", really.

[Agro]

FUCK HIM!! THE TROLL!!!!! CRUCIFY HIM! CRUCIFY HIM!!!

omg did i get it right

Edited July 9, 2009 by Angelix

[Superbus]

Angelix gets the cookie! Tagalong?

I'll respond to one thing Tibs said, because I really hate getting blown off:

The fact someone is an excellent member somewhere shouldn't mean an automatic free-out-of-jail card if they decide to be dicks - and just dicks - elsewhere.

I'm not sure about Sword Saint at this point, but I KNOW that's not the case with Fox or BK. That wasn't even the case with Blacken, who would contribute well to topics before going Katie Kaboom.

[Colonel M]

I'm trying to get to the point of this topic. After reading 10 pages of the stuff I have a small headache, but otherwise I can see why the unbannings were undone. I know no one knows I slipped into FESS for a short time (remember the horrible Niime vs. Yodel debate? Oh yeah, that was me) as well as other forums not related to Fire Emblem. This being beside the point, I think looking further into this the unbanings that were done were just.

I know I'm not the best to decide these sort of silly things, but it's the opinion I derived from reading everything that was said. I'm not sure about Blacken's case though since I think I was gone before that happened.

[Rehab]

It's generally a good sign when a topic called The Apology is best summed up by "good feelings at first, followed quickly by a sharp spike of vitriol."

I realise we have a sacred cow of needed to correlate every ban with an equally compelling action that prompted it, but to be honest, this is an internet forum. It is generally made for fun and lols. Lets keep this in perspective when we are trying to accommodate the majority of people's personal space versus the right of anyone to call everyone selections from the untoward word variables of our collective profane dictionaries.

tc;dr: This topic could be improved by everyone holding hands, and forgiving each other. Or being doused in gasoline and lit on fire so we don't have to go through this whole friggin' shebang for 10 pages of everyone just making each other feel worse. Really.

I tend to expect the latter will be used, but then again, try optimism, settle for pessimism.

Edit: The middle of my post seems to have nothing to do with anything else in it... >_>;

I forgot to say I like the cut of this post's jib and think it deserves to not be buried because this is getting into circular shit again. I am not against people expressing their feelings towards each other at all but everybody here is smart enough to do it better and more constructively than they are now.

[Zkirsche]

I KNOW that's not the case with BK.

BK himself admitted to all this stuff, idk why he would admit to doing it if he didn't even do it in the first place. See, he did it, stop letting your past, whatever it was, affect your judgement of what people are now.

[Fox]

BK himself admitted to all this stuff, idk why he would admit to doing it if he didn't even do it in the first place. See, he did it, stop letting your past, whatever it was, affect your judgement of what people are now.

You need to catch up on your reading, son.

As for this "boo hoo Steve said means things about my religion" garbage. Grow up.