This sounds like an argument that's been made before. Can you please clarify a little so that we can understand your take on this a bit better?
1. Do you think the ongoing harm done by societal sexism is comparable to the slight ego discomfort of a few men being told to listen more?
2. Is the community more fragmented by sexism or by othering sexist views? Note that the MGSA has a responsibility (as do all South Africans) to tackle sexism and other forms of marginalisation.
3. You mention real, observed results. I refer you to the studies mentioned by @dammit, we have someone way more knowledgeable about this available in the local scene and for some reason, their factual input is continuously a thing that we're told to ignore. Why do you think that is?
4. How is the current advocated acceptance of sexist content not an echo chamber of its own?
1. I think the newly accepted discrimination against men voicing their opinions rather than empowering women to voice their own will have a stifling effect on communication in general. Making this a "them vs us" issue is wilfully creating an outgroup, which is something we are ostensibly trying to eradicate by promoting inclusivity. Thus I cannot support such measures.
2. Agreed, eradicating marginalisation is a laudable goal. However, I have no data on which to base an opinion of which is more damaging to this community. My read on the situation based on the community nights I attend is that participants of all sexes feel extremely welcome.
3. If you are referring to @dammit's input as the factual input, I have no idea. However, being a human, @dammit is indeed fallible, so to point out such perceived flaws is not sacrilegious. I will read the mentioned studies for perspective, thank you. However, there is a huge volume, so directing me to the relevant texts would be helpful.
4. "Sexist content" is a complicated subject. However, the lazy use of the term is not helpful. The gender terms "male" and "female" are they themselves "sexist", by definition, as they promote discrimination between individuals by sex. Unfair discrimination by gender and/or sex is the real concern. The creation of certain content to the exclusion of all others, would indeed be an echo chamber, however I do not see that manifest on these forums. Topics are currently diverse and interesting.
If the intent is to attract more of a certain type of user that is currently not participating, expelling existing members is certainly one way to proceed, however it will damage the existing community. Promoting the types of content that are attractive to these potential members while still catering to existing members is the ideal to strive for.
The approach that one can stamp out an existing mindset by force is laughable. One cannot. The individuals simply leave, taking their mindset with them, to exist elsewhere. However, this being the internet and not the wild west, being an outlaw just means you go to where people think exactly the same way as you do already, or are at least tolerant of you - instead of perishing in the wilds. There is no penalty for being expelled from an online community since the internet allows communities to form instantaneously.
Taking a hard tack on this matter is extremely ill advised.
So, to conclude from the last couple of posts (and I went back to my orginal posts in pierre's thread where tone and context can easily be seen): I never asked for pierre to be banned. I did ask to start a discussion of why we would want someone like him around. I did ask for punishment to be implemented, as pierre had at this point not conceded to points made to him and was refusing to change his (sexist) character.
And to go back a little further, I have shared the link to some studies on how to change the group norms. And how group norms that create a certain environment can be harmful etc. Can we return to that discussion on how to improve our forum/community?
We want somebody like @Pierre around because he is a good person, with good intentions, trying to create a game that he feels proud of, to enrich the community of game developers around him with knowledge, and to enrich the community of gamers with new and fascinating experiences. This is why we want him around. Perhaps some of his methods are misguided, I cannot say, however, this is a community of learning, and personal growth. Expulsion accomplishes neither.
These are the same reasons we want you around. You have enriched us with new experiences and knowledge.
As an aside, punishment is immaterial here, there is nothing at stake and so punishment will have no appreciable effect on the individual being punished. The effect of a punitive regime, however, will have a pronounced effect on how the community is perceived, its vibrancy, and its composition.
My reaction to the mansplaination discussion here.
The definitive/ textbook definition as exampled by the spiderman discussion in @garethf's post is maybe not what's happening.
But what I see happening, repeatedly, is that @dammit's posts are being pulled out of context, invariable creating a straw dammit to replace and dismiss what she's saying.
@garethf IS being condescending. @garethf IS substituting @dammit's message with his own version. In what seems to be an effort to dismiss her as a whole; Or outright ignoring the information she's bringing to the table.
This is mansplaining, particularly that endpoint. Just because the word's "Well actually..." are not being used, or the poster is not actually being interrupted, doesn't make it untrue.
Actually, because it's happening on this thread, I feel like I don't want to participate here. And that's thing we're trying to not have happen, right? We're trying for better, right? My trying for better is this post.
@garethf IS being condescending. @garethf IS substituting @dammit's message with his own version. In what seems to be an effort to dismiss her as a whole; Or outright ignoring the information she's bringing to the table.
This is mansplaining, particularly that endpoint. Just because the word's "Well actually..." are not being used, or the poster is not actually being interrupted, doesn't make it untrue.
I'm not ignoring the information she's bringing. I'm saying the evidence contradicts what she's saying.
The community wasn't "too nice" to Pierre, the comments directed toward his project were overwhelmingly criticizing the sexualization of the avatar, as I showed. Males spoke out to tell him it wasn't ok, as the studies she mentioned indicate that we should do, speak out on what is wrong with a fellow man's attitudes.
Her prior posts contradict her claim that she wasn't calling for him to be banned. She's tried to sidestep that claim with some semantic dancing, but sorry, no.
I am not ignoring her, but neither am I agreeing with her claims about men being too nice or her claims that she wasn't calling for him to be banned.
That's disagreement. And it's certainly challenging, perhaps even rudely so. But it's not ignoring.
Nor is it mansplaining. That word is not a magical shield to be invoked as protection from criticism, disagreement or challenge.
The community wasn't "too nice" to Pierre, the comments directed toward his project were overwhelmingly criticizing the sexualization of the avatar, as I showed. Males spoke out to tell him it wasn't ok, as the studies she mentioned indicate that we should do, speak out on what is wrong with a fellow man's attitudes.
I'm going to address this particular point. Yes, a lot of the replies to that thread were saying, pierre, that's not a cool design. In fact we don't like it. And then, when pierre said, basically, no, i'm not going to change it, the community gave up the criticism and went on to critique his game mechanics.
This is what I have a problem with. This is being to "nice". You feel as though you have acted because you said a thing but the ultimate action of the community was not to punish, in any way, but to simply let it slide. Your "kind and empathetic" approach did not succeed in getting the character removed. And supporting his game, through offering advice on game design despite continuing sexist content only serves to support a sexist environment on this forum - one that is hostile to the women who might be interested in joining or participating.
So, to conclude from the last couple of posts (and I went back to my orginal posts in pierre's thread where tone and context can easily be seen): I never asked for pierre to be banned. I did ask to start a discussion of why we would want someone like him around. I did ask for punishment to be implemented, as pierre had at this point not conceded to points made to him and was refusing to change his (sexist) character.
And to go back a little further, I have shared the link to some studies on how to change the group norms. And how group norms that create a certain environment can be harmful etc. Can we return to that discussion on how to improve our forum/community?
Now, does anyone want to discuss ways to improve our forums?
This is what I have a problem with. This is being to "nice". You feel as though you have acted because you said a thing but the ultimate action of the community was not to punish, in any way, but to simply let it slide. Your "kind and empathetic" approach did not succeed in getting the character removed. And supporting his game, through offering advice on game design despite continuing sexist content only serves to support a sexist environment on this forum - one that is hostile to the women who might be interested in joining or participating.
I think this is a key point. Rather than trying to argue that this perception is wrong (because it is, I don't think anyone here wants to be hostile to women interested in participating in this community), can we work to identify what's causing that perception and work to change those triggers? Current triggers that I can see: Only providing token resistance to sexist work. Letting a "no I don't care about that" dictate the discussion of sexism instead of keeping it an issue. And the big one: Being seen as a community to be more worried about the ego of an individual than the social impact on many - scare quotes about banning made this way worse.
Obviously we still want to be able to provide feedback on projects and designs. Obviously we don't want to ban everyone for reasons they don't seem to understand (I don't understand why this is the only thing people consider when punishment is discussed, a formal warning system was floated, as were other forms of potential censure). Obviously we want this forum to be a safe space without tacitly accepted sexism, racism or an adversarial culture.
How do we put all those things together? I'm not 100% sure yet, but I do find it incredibly interesting that almost ANY perceived action against sexism is seen as "too much" or "extremely worrying" by a number of posters. I'd posit that we all just get over that, please. We obviously need to do more and, no, that doesn't mean instant bannings.
As creators, specifically of interactive media and entertainment that is intended to be consumed by an audience, our work can potentially hurt or help real people, and affect the culture and behaviour of our consumers. It's idealistic but ignorant to believe that we can or should do whatever we want as if anything we make deserves freedom from consequence.
One of the most basic rules of morality that existed since we discovered humanity is to not hurt innocent people . If it's being done unintentionally, then it needs to be corrected so it is not continued or repeated.
When a game is being criticised for being sexist, racist or otherwise harmful to innocent people, the game and it's creators aren't being attacked, "thought policed" or victimised. They are being instructed to stop hurting others. If they ignore the advice, they are saying that they don't care that they're hurting people, their personal tastes are more important. If this attitude is considered acceptable within a community, it's not surprising that people will leave and newcomers will see it as toxic, or unappealing.
So, how can we improve the community? Nurture empathy, encourage positivity and improvement, etc, certainly.
But I think the point is that tolerating continued toxic attitudes or content despite prior advice, guidance and warnings perhaps should not be prioritised above basic morality.
Actually, most of us supported the media being removed.
The point of contention was whether he should be banned.
literally not what happened.
A game with problematic content was shown at a meetup, apparently nobody said anything about problematic aspect. Problematic content is then posted on forum, where a lot of community members stepped up to pointing it out and discussing it, and the creator of said problematic content disregarded this and the members of the community proceeded to interact with the content creator regardless of his maintaining a damaging stance.
:/ So, I'm saddened that anyone is bothering to give any other feedback on the game here because clearly @Pierre sees that as support of the game in its entirety (and thus support from the community at large) when quite obviously there is a horrendous sexualisation problem. Yes, everyone is also mentioning that (sometimes just at the end of the a long post praising the rest of his work) but he's happily ignoring all of that feedback.
I'm just asking you guys if you want someone like this around? Because I would rather just not have this kind of awful shit on our forums and continuing to offer support to him is going to keep him here and say we're okay with this.
Ignoring the feedback is a conversation stopper for me too. In fact I hadn't wanted to participate on that thread entirely ( a reaction I'm working to curb because I'm slowly learning and internalizing my own voice's value)
In your breakdown below, you appear to specifically obscure @dammit's concern ( in response to @dammit repeating a concern about our community's social norm, noggal)
In two other studies, the primary factor influencing men’s willingness to intervene to prevent sexual assault was men’s perception of other men’s willingness to intervene ...{two separate quotes, but the forum is fighting back}
The social norm here is not to intervene and say, hey, we don't like this kind of crap on our forums.
That's simply not true.
To check, I went back to Pierre's post and counted all the posts made by male forum members negatively critiquing the sexualized avatar.
(For the purposes of this exercise I only counted posts directed AT Pierre, not posts by other members talking amoungst themselves ABOUT Pierre, although those were also mostly negative. I only counted male posters, and I only counted up to the point where he changed the avatar to the one he called Normi, since that was after the thread about banning him)
Posts by males containing critique of the sexualized avatar character/criticism of Pierre's defense of it: 15 (75%) Posts by males containing no critique of the sexualized avatar character: 5 (25%)
(Some of the men in category 2 had already posted a category 1 post)
Pierre's sexualised design was called out by the men here, repeatedly and clearly.
Let's be honest, the problem you have isn't that he wasn't called out. It's that he wasn't banned. Anything less than that, you're going to define as being "too nice".
See I went and counted those posts, not excluding the women (why would this be the delineator?), and saw this: Posts Specifically condemning problematic content and not continuing the remainder of the discussion (8) Posts straddling problematic content, but continuing the conversation about gamefeel, new demo, AAA production value, grapplinghook, etc (7) up to @dammit's post quoted above. Also, that (8) changes to (3) with only dislekcia, brondin and steamhat(sortof, the sword-wang is muddied) surviving the cut if we go by individual and not post, so later posts push people like Tuism, Elyaradine etc into the straddling category.
1.Basing the tally on the actual concern; different results. 2. Turns out, no reason exclude women in the tally if we go up to @dammit's post, literally the first post from a women, unless others have since been deleted? 3. Centrally, how many people continuing the conversation is too many? How many people allowing this normalization qualifies as "too nice"
Sexist content is damaging.
For me it's a conversation stopper. And it should be a conversation stopper, because it not being a conversation stopper is exactly how we got to this messed up social norm in the first place. This is exactly what I see reflected in dammit's message. in the second thread being started, in the clarification she keeps offering. Not a call for banning, but a "hey, why are we disregarding this, it's a stopping point!" " There should be a consequence to this!"
Normalizing sexist content is not okay. Continuing to talk about game feel and double jumps IS the normalization that @dammit is calling out.
@garethf IS being condescending. @garethf IS substituting @dammit's message with his own version. In what seems to be an effort to dismiss her as a whole; Or outright ignoring the information she's bringing to the table.
This is mansplaining, particularly that endpoint. Just because the word's "Well actually..." are not being used, or the poster is not actually being interrupted, doesn't make it untrue.
I'm not ignoring the information she's bringing. I'm saying the evidence contradicts what she's saying.
The community wasn't "too nice" to Pierre, the comments directed toward his project were overwhelmingly criticizing the sexualization of the avatar, as I showed. Males spoke out to tell him it wasn't ok, as the studies she mentioned indicate that we should do, speak out on what is wrong with a fellow man's attitudes.
Her prior posts contradict her claim that she wasn't calling for him to be banned. She's tried to sidestep that claim with some semantic dancing, but sorry, no.
I am not ignoring her, but neither am I agreeing with her claims about men being too nice or her claims that she wasn't calling for him to be banned.
That's disagreement. And it's certainly challenging, perhaps even rudely so. But it's not ignoring.
Nor is it mansplaining. That word is not a magical shield to be invoked as protection from criticism, disagreement or challenge.
Perhaps you don't realize that you're reinterpreting and dismissing Dammit?
Sexist(and racist) content and, more specifically, maintaining defence of it, is a dealbreaker. Any "nice" is probably "too nice"
1. I think the newly accepted discrimination against men voicing their opinions rather than empowering women to voice their own will have a stifling effect on communication in general. Making this a "them vs us" issue is wilfully creating an outgroup, which is something we are ostensibly trying to eradicate by promoting inclusivity. Thus I cannot support such measures.
Hang on. Are you sure you want to be labeling the "discrimination against men voicing their opinions" as on an equal impact level as the centuries of oppression and marginalisation of women? I really don't think that's a good idea, but that's where this argument comes from: All that men are being asked to do is understand the impact of the societal power they wield and use that to make spaces where women feel welcome and are able to interact as equals. The key point here is "women feel welcome", which, as this thread is hopefully managing to emphasise, is a thing that is continuously misinterpreted and misunderstood.
This is about addressing the EXISTING outgroup situation that's chased women away from the internet, from tech, from games and from the discussion. To do that, the current ingroup (men) need to give up a little bit of their privilege. That this process is so often miscast as "discrimination" or "us vs them" animosity is just proof that privileged groups don't know what marginalisation looks like. That said, I'm perfectly fine with sexists feeling unwelcome here and becoming an outgroup, I'm not sure why anyone would think this would be a bad thing...
2. Agreed, eradicating marginalisation is a laudable goal. However, I have no data on which to base an opinion of which is more damaging to this community. My read on the situation based on the community nights I attend is that participants of all sexes feel extremely welcome.
Community nights are different to these forums and they work on different societal rules. I'm not sure why the community nights are relevant to this discussion when we have examples of exactly how women feel marginalised by the culture of this forum right here, but I can guarantee that community nights are still rife with sexism and are different concerns for men and women. Everything from the number of men and women that attend the events (and how they're not equal) to how women need to carefully consider what they wear when going to meetup, to how women will already be thinking about who is likely to be at an event and what they might expect of them... The meetups aren't free from the impact of sexism.
Perhaps an easier way to ask the original question is this: Do you think that the number of men who want so strongly feel that they want to be sexist and who will leave this forum as a result of not having that opportunity here, outnumbers the number of women that interact with game development in SA? Should we be reaching out to those women and can we do so without alienating willfully sexist men?
3. If you are referring to @dammit's input as the factual input, I have no idea. However, being a human, @dammit is indeed fallible, so to point out such perceived flaws is not sacrilegious. I will read the mentioned studies for perspective, thank you. However, there is a huge volume, so directing me to the relevant texts would be helpful.
I'd love more people to read those studies. And yes, it's a lot. That's why I defer to her reading on the matter :) My original question was why do you think the reaction to her expertise in this area is as vehement as it is, not if any one human can be fallible. Do you think that the reaction is justified?
4. "Sexist content" is a complicated subject. However, the lazy use of the term is not helpful. The gender terms "male" and "female" are they themselves "sexist", by definition, as they promote discrimination between individuals by sex. Unfair discrimination by gender and/or sex is the real concern. The creation of certain content to the exclusion of all others, would indeed be an echo chamber, however I do not see that manifest on these forums. Topics are currently diverse and interesting.
Sorry, but we've had this discussion already in the other thread. Yes, sexism is a complex concept, but the basic cheat sheet is this "when people say something is sexist, listen to them and try to understand". Basically, the discussion of sexism in this thread is about how women are represented in games and how institutionalised sexism impacts everyone.
The topics that you consider diverse and interesting, how many women posters do they have in them? How many people of colour post in them? How diverse is this community, really?
If the intent is to attract more of a certain type of user that is currently not participating, expelling existing members is certainly one way to proceed, however it will damage the existing community. Promoting the types of content that are attractive to these potential members while still catering to existing members is the ideal to strive for.
Expelling existing members is not the focus of this discussion (nor is it the focus of discussing punishments for forum transgressions), making this forum a place that doesn't tolerate or welcome sexism is the only way to make it a welcoming place for women. That's going to require a lot of re-education about sexism and the experience of sexism. We need to build a culture that's a lot less precious about that. Right now, the forum is pretty bad at listening to women and giving them the authority over their own experiences.
The approach that one can stamp out an existing mindset by force is laughable. One cannot. The individuals simply leave, taking their mindset with them, to exist elsewhere. However, this being the internet and not the wild west, being an outlaw just means you go to where people think exactly the same way as you do already, or are at least tolerant of you - instead of perishing in the wilds. There is no penalty for being expelled from an online community since the internet allows communities to form instantaneously.
Taking a hard tack on this matter is extremely ill advised.
So far the best approach that's been made available is controlling unacceptable behavior via punishment. The other approach has been discredited (and argued that it's difficult to do in the setting of a forum). I think there are two problems with what you're saying here: Firstly, the severity of punishments has been constantly overstated and turned into bullshit slippery-slope arguments, that needs to stop. Secondly, having strong forum rules means those rules need tools to be enforceable, right now the forum is in an enforcement vacuum, so things are always going to look harsh in comparison. Why is "how harsh enforcing this is going to be for men" always the focus?
Nobody is trying to stamp out a mindset, we're just trying not to give that mindset a platform to chase people away. If people want to leave the forum so they can be sexist elsewhere, great!
So, to summarize @damousey, you're taking my response and implying I counted wrong because I counted posts by people who didn't post their criticism then refuse to engage any further with Pierre?
Do you see what you've done here? You (or you on behalf of @dammit) are insisting that anything less than giving Pierre the cold shoulder until he changed his mind is unacceptable.
Do you see why that's problematic? Insisting that unless Pierre agrees with our views no one must engage with him further is functionally equivalent to insisting that unless he agrees with our views he must be banned.
Sorry, but no.
And man, as an aside, the political left really has a problem with these kinds of demands for purity. Did you criticize? Did you criticize enough? Enough by my standards? No?!?!
THEN I NAME YOU DEFENDER OF THE ENEMY, ALMOST AS BAD AS THE ENEMY HIMSELF!
For me it's a conversation stopper.
That's your choice. But don't insist that it's the only choice. Personally, I find "stopping the conversation" to be harmful and ineffective. There needs to be space for people to be (politely) wrong and be gently guided to being right over time. Not everyone is level 100 in Social Justice, some people are level 1.
Part of that is giving some helpful feedback along with the negative, demonstrating that you aren't just out to get the person. It is not ok for anyone to insist that members can't give any other feedback to Pierre other than about that avatar.
And I hope no one claims that "well, he had his chance to change his mind" or I will have to remind people that the event in question happened over the course of like 48 hours, and the discussion on banning a further week or so. To expect people to radically shift their world views in a week is completely unrealistic.
He was critiqued, he was told to remove the problematic media, and he made a small step in the right direction with his next attempt. That is about the best you can expect.
I did not obscure her meaning or concern. She literally asked forum members if we want to keep him(Pierre) around. Sorry, no amount of semantic dancing will get around that. She was agitating to get him pushed out.
So, to summarize @damousey, you're taking my response and implying I counted wrong because I counted posts by people who didn't post their criticism then refuse to engage any further with Pierre?
Do you see what you've done here? You (or you on behalf of @dammit) are insisting that anything less than giving Pierre the cold shoulder until he changed his mind is unacceptable.
Do you see why that's problematic? Insisting that unless Pierre agrees with our views no one must engage with him further is functionally equivalent to insisting that unless he agrees with our views he must be banned.
This is a false assumption: The opposite of normalising sexism is not demanding that someone change their views.
The complaint is that the community as a whole spent a lot of time normalising and dismissing sexist art. @Pierre can believe what he likes, all we need to do as a community is not give him a platform to chase people away with those views. The operational point here is not changing someone's mind, it's not showing sexist material and not dismissing concerns about sexism. While someone is actively showing sexist material AND arguing that they should be allowed to do so, they're not acting in a way that is acceptable on this community and they're not welcome to participate in it. @Pierre was made welcome despite his arguing that he should be able to display his sexist art as he wishes. That's the issue, not what he believes.
What's wrong with giving someone the cold shoulder? And when did that become banning?
That's your choice. But don't insist that it's the only choice. Personally, I find "stopping the conversation" to be harmful and ineffective. There needs to be space for people to be (politely) wrong and be gently guided to being right over time. Not everyone is level 100 in Social Justice, some people are level 1.
That it's not a conversation stopper, that's your privilege. That you don't feel dismissed, marginalised or worthless and have the option to carry on "the conversation" about other topics, that's your privilege. Please understand that's a luxury you enjoy and for some that's simply not an option, don't dismiss their complaints as baseless just because you're not subjected to a constant system of oppression that uses exactly those tools to shut people up.
Part of that is giving some helpful feedback along with the negative, demonstrating that you aren't just out to get the person. It is not ok for anyone to insist that members can't give any other feedback to Pierre other than about that avatar.
So I guess a relevant question is this: How do you give feedback on other pieces of a work without normalising the sexism that it exhibits? This shouldn't be hard, people do it all the time. There probably has to be a line beyond which any interaction that isn't outright calling out is problematic normalisation:
Is that when someone's actively displaying sexist or racist themes or representations in their game? (I'm not sure, that's always going to be a spectrum - this is where you seem to believe that the issue with @Pierre was, that's not the case)
Is that when someone's actively dismissing complaints about sexism or racism in their games and citing some misguided right to free speech argument? (Yeah, I'd argue that's too far, if someone's doing that, then any engagement with them that isn't about the -ism dismisses the complaints of those that raised the issue and lends credence to the misguided arguments - This is where @Pierre was and I believe this is what people are saying should be examined)
Is the line only a token thing that we can never actually step beyond for fear of offending people that are actively posting regressive and harmful content? (This is what it looks like you're arguing for)
Is the line a thing we ignore completely and everything goes and only those with the most privilege are welcome here?
TLDR: No, the argument is not that displaying sexist art should equal social censure and instant banning (it should equal being called out and responding in a reasoned manner). The complaint is that supporting someone that's actively dismissing sexism as a concern and advocating that their sexist art not be removed normalises sexism and drives people away that we can't afford to lose.
What's at stake is the growth and development of the gaming industry.
Let's try to apply empathy here. Imagine being a girl, say 15 or so. You've played a few awesome games, and you're thinking about digging deeper into the industry, but you're not sure where to start, so you and your friends attend a conference that's supposed to be welcoming to everyone, but when you get there you see that the attendance is 90% guys, and on the screens they show games where the few female characters are practically always portrayed as either helpless, sexual or irrationally underdressed. The mascot is a woman with her butt sticking out, the posters are covered with men in thick badass armour but women in skimpy bikinis. In fact, almost everything even remotely female has giant heaving breasts and bedroom eyes.
On the forums someone mentions that this is probably bad because maybe people shouldn't be continuously fed this sort of false representation that distorts and affects their values and perceptions, and it makes women feel very uncomfortable because it looks like guys are obsessed with our genitals, and the reactions are along the lines of "nope, you're wrong, our values are infallible", or "yeah it's probably bad but look this guy is sort of thinking about it, oh he doesn't think it's a problem, oh well", or "hey, that's too bad, but look, swords!"
How would you feel, being that 15 year old girl? Would you be like "Yes! THIS is where I want to make my future!"
What about everyone else who might be interested in working with us, and seeing this careless attitude towards sexism? This isn't about one or two people being offended. It's about the attitude of the community as a whole and how that affects those who wants to interact with us.
All over the world, game devs and even publishers are attempting to make these more conscientious decisions. There's a lot more to be gained by being inclusive than there is to being dismissive, and the only thing that needs to change is that women should be portrayed less often as gratuitous sexual fantasies. It would be great if this happened naturally and automatically, but it's become evident that it takes serious or official warnings before people at least realise that this is something that they should actually take quite seriously, since the reaction otherwise has been "sexism, it's just an opinion, let's talk about texturing instead".
Above all, however, this is nevertheless a platform that has the right to decide what it wishes to host, and what it deems irrelevant or undesirable. This isn't grandmothers front porch where life lessons and basic morality can be slowly passed down through generations.
If someone is INDEED creating sexist content, has been warned, advised and warned again, and refuses to acknowledge that there's a problem, then it needs to be seriously addressed and efficiently dealt with, it can't just be casually glossed over or politely sidestepped.
That's what the guidelines are for. They aren't for trigger happy banning. Whether or not who said what three weeks ago is not conductive to progress right now. Arguing semantics or who was right or who meant what when they said this or that, why does it even matter? What matters is what is being said now. Calling someone out on something they said in the past because you suspect that they might have changed their minds without explicitly declaring so since then helps little, and I suggest we stop doing this.
How to make forums better? Allow minority chance to speak without overreacting, we are still minority after all, we're not going to take away all your toys. Discourage sexist, racist, homophobic or otherwise hateful content, encourage empathy, even towards offenders, but also remember that this is a public forum, it's currently though hopefully not permanently the face of mgsa, and if religion has taught us anything, it's that sometimes all it takes is the idea of punishment to convince someone to behave morally. >_>
@garethf - What do you want from me? I honestly give up at this point because I have explained what I meant at so many points but you refuse to believe me.
What if we say, who cares? What if we simply now start the discussion of how to make our forums better? Cause I really, really, really am trying to steer the conversation that way.
I agree with the general notion that our membership could do with fewer bad faith assumptions among people who are trying to do positive work. If this doesn't change, I fear more threads degenerating into hives of speculation, suspicion and infighting while the actual trolls stand on the sidelines and chuckle.
So, very little of what we do around here is focused on rehabilitating sexists when they show up -- which is sad, but understandable, given that a hodge-podge of mostly male game developers is never *really* going to be a qualified force to deal with a delicate matter like unpacking someone's deeply ingrained sexist patterns (said hodge-podge is arguably not even qualified to determine what is sexist, which is why I'm glad we have at least some vocal women around).
Amateur attempts at this rehab are noble, but unless you know exactly what you're doing and do it particularly well (and who among us can claim that?) it's very easy to slip into a pattern where you're passively endorsing sexism instead. And even if one person among several succeeds at riding this line properly, we still have the perceived majority backpatting negative behaviour. So this approach doesn't work as well on a public forum.
The opposite is also a problem, especially when male allies deem themselves protected by the shields and measures designed to help women: I've seen men argue that they don't need to exercise empathy and patience when tackling sexism (bad move), I've seen a general pattern of allies engaging in definition wars and feminist fisticuffs with one another when a woman has already demonstrated a handle on the conversation (bad move), and I've even seen allies claiming victimhood when their advocacy is challenged or even counter-called (co-option of oppression, very bad move).
Being allies, a lot of our well-intended advocacy comes with these flaws plus many more, and trolls can see that instantly. It wrecks our position.
I think that the best way to break a lot of our problematic patterns in the forums is if the most earnest male allies exercised a little more humility, gave thought to being less wordy where possible and started to find more active and creative ways to defer to women in uncertain situations pertaining to sexism.
For example, I feel that the best way to break the "niceness pattern" outlined above -- when men passively endorse a thread's content by engaging with it, even after expressing disapproval -- is for an ally or two to actively seek out the opinions or comments of *affected* forum members so that the content can be judged a little more reliably (instead of being stuck in the scenario where it's overwhelmingly men who make the diagnosis of sexism -- inappropriate when seeking a woman's opinion is so easy). This does not necessarily mean an @ callout or something that's going to drain the energy of the potentially affected group (please don't force a woman to bring their attention to something, and make appropriate use of TW!), but enough of us are, say, connected enough with @dammit and others that it would be really easy to check before making up our own minds and either getting on our high horses as Well-Meaning Allies, or shrinking into the inaction of the Passive Oppressor.
Better yet, one could simply approach a woman who has structural, "obliged" authority in MGSA (a female member of admin, for example), or who has specifically advertised themselves as being open to these approaches (like I'm, uh, admittedly just assuming with @dammit) to avoid unfair energy drain.
The simple ritual of approaching our female forum members can also be a mark of validation that enables them: for example, it's intimidating for a woman to step into a thread cold and call out sexism (due to perceived backlash), but it becomes a lot easier when there's knowledge that at least one male ally is paying attention and ready to support where needed.
And the best part: as a long-term trend, we may eventually see sexism callouts on MGSA being led by women instead of men, and new women arriving in the community will have readier access to examples of role models in their group instead of a more questionable "guardian state" dominated by the voices of allies.
The snag is that this translates into a little more work for women: but if guys co-operate when they step up, there's a massive payoff for that in terms of genuine empowerment, and I'm sure that's exactly what marginalised forum members want to see! And if we don't like this ad-hoc roping in of women, I would once again like to advocate for the election of some formal representative for any given marginalised group who explicitly agrees to take on that burden.
TL;DR if men like me see troubling content on MGSA, don't spend too much energy trying to engage or make a judgement call (within reason, I suppose, but be careful with self-promoting bias on that ...). Find and invite/promote a woman's voice instead. You'll avoid both the passive endorsement of sexism AND the risk of committing an Ally 101 fuckup. :D
Bonus content: it's nice that from a structural / admin point of view, MGSA seems to respect the voices of women (swift response to dammit's call for escalation, etc). Having this as our bottom line helps SO much.
The opinions above are not strictly my own thinking, but based on knowledge I've gleaned from women-led groups, feminist understanding and multiple examples of ally-led groups which all eventually collapse under some variation of well-meaning toxicity. The concept makes sense to me but I am not precious about carrying it out just so.
Actually, most of us supported the media being removed.
The point of contention was whether he should be banned.
literally not what happened.
A game with problematic content was shown at a meetup, apparently nobody said anything about problematic aspect. Problematic content is then posted on forum, where a lot of community members stepped up to pointing it out and discussing it, and the creator of said problematic content disregarded this and the members of the community proceeded to interact with the content creator regardless of his maintaining a damaging stance.
This just sunk in for me. Was Pierre's game actually shown at the meetup first? And no one said anything? Is that a thing that happened?
:( That makes me incredibly sad because I do believe that there are people who were at that meetup who would have possibly felt the content was not okay but felt that they couldn't say anything because no one else said anything. I've seen this happen at our own meetups in CPT but remember @theFuntastic being brave enough to actually say something while other devs simply argued about the game mechanics. In fact, it's often the actions of @theFuntastic (among other important people who already know who they are) that make me brave enough to stand up for these kinds of things.
*sigh*
Anyway, I think this thread is coming to a natural conclusion. I know the finalised updated rules for the forum are still being, well, finalised, but I think it's safe to make the following concluding statements here:
1. As @Nandrew has pointed out quite eloquently, the forums are not a well designed space to implement any rehabilitation strategies. We are not going to be changing someone's mindset and beliefs here - regardless of empathy or punishment. 2. No one seems to actually want racist or sexist content on the forums. 3. No one here is required to be a perfect human without sexist, racist mistakes. We're okay with people making mistakes and we're okay talking to each other about these. We're all fallible. 4. In situations were a forum poster has been clearly called out on problematic content but is refusing to remove said content from the forums (refer to point 2 - assuming that no one wants that kind of content on the forums), then the next step would be to flag that content for moderators to get involved. 5. Ideally, once a forum poster has made it clear that they do not wish to remove or change racist or sexist content they have posted on the forums, other forum users should not engage with them in game dev discussions in the same thread so as to avoid creating a social norm of the racist or sexist content being acceptable (ie: passively endorsing the content through non critical action). 6. Mods can then contact any one of the women on the forums (if content is flagged as sexist) or any of the person's of colour (if the content is flagged as racist) if they wish to gain further insight, etc, before making any decisions about the actions they are at liberty to take. 7. If anyone on the forums is ever unsure if content is okay or not, flagging it for inspection or asking your nearest mod, person you trust etc is a very cool thing to do. It helps all of us learn.
The pushback has never been against women's voices being the primary ones in identifying sexism. The pushback has been afterward, in the response once sexism is identified.
Maybe an analogy will help.
That recent Rhodes statue thing, right? The protesters wanted the statue taken down, he was a colonial oppressor, making the descendants of the people he oppressed walk past a statue celebrating the man was harmful.
I completely agree with that.
But imagine if after the extensive debate about whether to pull it down or not, after the statue (the problematic media) was removed, the protesters moved on to demanding that everyone who had publicly stated that they didn't think the statue should be removed or they don't agree that it was a problem for whatever reason should also be expelled from the university. Teachers, students, admin staff. Anyone who defended keeping the statue there.
The statue had been taken down, the students didn't have to see it anymore, but that's not enough. The people who didn't recant their defense of the statue should also be expunged, it's argued. If not expunged, boycotted until they recanted. Anyone interacting with them while they haven't recanted is implicitly endorsing their support of the statue, it's asserted.
Now imagine you say "Whoa, I agree that the statue was a problem, and I support it being taken down. But I don't think that disagreement over whether that was right should get you kicked out."
After which you get accused of white privilege and passively endorsing the media(the statue) and of being more concerned with protecting bigots than the victims of oppression. :/
People don't seem to understand why I have an issue with where this discussion has taken us, but I do have a real problem with has been said here and in the past. And I won't be shouted down, nor berated into not bringing it up as a concern. Pierre was forced to remove his media. But where we got to, very quickly, was discussing whether him disagreeing that it was problematic should get him expelled, even if he complied with the request to remove it.
Dissent should be permissible so long as promblematic media, harassment and abuse is not. Wanting to ban opinions is a extremely dangerous place to be at.
It's not ok, guys. And it's not ok to try to bludgeon anyone who brings up these concerns into silence with cries of mansplaining and bigotry. It creates a really toxic environment in a forum where you're either with us or against us. I've got a fairly thick skin but lots of people simply stop engaging. There is a very real chilling effect to labeling all disagreement as bigotry.
So if you folks want to boycott his threads you can do so. Everyone must do what makes them comfortable, of course. But don't tell me that I must also do so or I'm guilty of passively endorsing sexist media.
That simply won't fly, sorry.
And this is probably the last thing I'm going to post on the topic. I don't think I can put it any clearer than that, and I doubt I'll reach anyone who has already decided that I'm a sexist asshole, regardless.
@garethf No one is getting expelled. No one is getting banned because they passively endorsed sexism on this forum. Seriously. This is not even the discussion.
1. As @Nandrew has pointed out quite eloquently, the forums are not a well designed space to implement any rehabilitation strategies. We are not going to be changing someone's mindset and beliefs here - regardless of empathy or punishment. 2. No one seems to actually want racist or sexist content on the forums. 3. No one here is required to be a perfect human without sexist, racist mistakes. We're okay with people making mistakes and we're okay talking to each other about these. We're all fallible. 4. In situations were a forum poster has been clearly called out on problematic content but is refusing to remove said content from the forums (refer to point 2 - assuming that no one wants that kind of content on the forums), then the next step would be to flag that content for moderators to get involved. 5. Ideally, once a forum poster has made it clear that they do not wish to remove or change racist or sexist content they have posted on the forums, other forum users should not engage with them in game dev discussions in the same thread so as to avoid creating a social norm of the racist or sexist content being acceptable (ie: passively endorsing the content through non critical action). 6. Mods can then contact any one of the women on the forums (if content is flagged as sexist) or any of the person's of colour (if the content is flagged as racist) if they wish to gain further insight, etc, before making any decisions about the actions they are at liberty to take. 7. If anyone on the forums is ever unsure if content is okay or not, flagging it for inspection or asking your nearest mod, person you trust etc is a very cool thing to do. It helps all of us learn.
Think this is great way to handle these situations in future. I thinks a lot of the recent points of contention between forum members was because we didn't have guidelines like this. They make sense. That is why many sites have a "report this post" button. Too many voices on the internet never works.
@garethf No one is getting expelled. No one is getting banned because they passively endorsed sexism on this forum. Seriously. This is not even the discussion.
Just because it's not happening, doesn't mean it wasn't called for by people. What @garethf was pointing out was the demand, the route taken, not the result.
@garethf No one is getting expelled. No one is getting banned because they passively endorsed sexism on this forum. Seriously. This is not even the discussion.
Just because it's not happening, doesn't mean it wasn't called for by people. What @garethf was pointing out was the demand, the route taken, not the result.
Please, please enlighten me as to where it was said that people who passively endorsed sexism on the forums (by not saying anything, or saying they disagree with views) would be banned?
*Note: This is a separate argument from the argument that people who actively posted sexist content were called to be banned (a point I still contend actually happened, but whatever).
Please, please enlighten me as to where it was said that people who passively endorsed sexism on the forums (by not saying anything, or saying they disagree with views) would be banned?
I think you might have misread what I wrote. Read through it again, perhaps.
Please, please enlighten me as to where it was said that people who passively endorsed sexism on the forums (by not saying anything, or saying they disagree with views) would be banned?
I think you might have misread what I wrote. Read through it again, perhaps.
But imagine if after the extensive debate about whether to pull it down or not, after the statue (the problematic media) was removed, the protesters moved on to demanding that everyone who had publicly stated that they didn't think the statue should be removed or they don't agree that it was a problem for whatever reason should also be expelled from the university. Teachers, students, admin staff. Anyone who defended keeping the statue there.
You're mistaking the people who defended the media/statue as not being a problem (in this case, Pierre) with the people who thought that banning or shunning the people in the first group was going too far(others, myself included).
The second group thinks the media is a problem and should be removed but that the first group, people who don't think the media was a problem, shouldn't be expelled or shunned.
I didn't suggest that the second group was in danger of being banned or shunned, only that they were expected to ban or shun the people in the first group, or else they'd be labelled as passively supporting the first group's attitudes and behaviors.
5. Ideally, once a forum poster has made it clear that they do not wish to remove or change racist or sexist content they have posted on the forums, other forum users should not engage with them in game dev discussions in the same thread so as to avoid creating a social norm of the racist or sexist content being acceptable (ie: passively endorsing the content through non critical action)
This thread is making me incredibly sad... I honestly don't know why there's this massive focus on being adversarial from the guys involved. It's causing blatantly false arguments, like, not even subtle straw man stuff and gross overstatements designed to turn men into the victims (of sexist portrayal of women, what?).
But imagine if after the extensive debate about whether to pull it down or not, after the statue (the problematic media) was removed, the protesters moved on to demanding that everyone who had publicly stated that they didn't think the statue should be removed or they don't agree that it was a problem for whatever reason should also be expelled from the university. Teachers, students, admin staff. Anyone who defended keeping the statue there.
What? No. This is a seriously misleading straw man... All that's happening, to use the analogy, is that people who pointed out how problematic the statue was are telling the people that defended the statue that what they did wasn't cool and could they please examine why so that they don't do it next time this crops up.
That's it! It's not a witch hunt going after people that, y'know, normalised sexism. It's an examination of what happened to raise awareness that a lot of people who probably didn't mean to do it, y'know, normalised sexism and that's hopefully a thing they don't want to be doing so could they learn from this please and not do it again.
Casting it as a witch hunt with this laughably extreme "it's you making it an us-vs-them" angle is literally only destructive. Why do it?
Now imagine you say "Whoa, I agree that the statue was a problem, and I support it being taken down. But I don't think that disagreement over whether that was right should get you kicked out."
Nobody is saying this. What's being asked is that, as a community, we understand that we ended up normalising sexism through either inaction or tacitly supporting arguments that dismissed sexism as an issue worth discussing. That's all: Understand that that happened and why it's not okay that it did.
Why is that hard to do? Why is being asked to understand something like that suddenly so horrible that it conjures these false claims of persecution?
After which you get accused of white privilege and passively endorsing the media(the statue) and of being more concerned with protecting bigots than the victims of oppression. :/
So, hang on, if people did normalise sexism, are we not allowed to talk about how that happened? Because that's what went down: People DID passively endorse the media. People were more concerned with protecting bigots than listening to marginalised voices. The community didn't engage well with the topic, it showed that this isn't something that's well understood and it showed where our weaknesses in terms of guidelines and culture lie. Is talking about it a crusade to get everyone who messed up banned?
Fuck no, it isn't. And pretending that it is, well that's a goddamn shit thing to do. There's another path here, please take it.
P.S. White privilege is something you can't be accused of. It's not a crime... "You're not understanding this thing I'm trying to tell you about because your privilege is preventing empathy here" "I'm not privileged! How dare you accuse me of that! I'm a good person! You're just attacking me!"
P.S. White privilege is something you can't be accused of. It's not a crime... "You're not understanding this thing I'm trying to tell you about because your privilege is preventing empathy here" "I'm not privileged! How dare you accuse me of that! I'm a good person! You're just attacking me!"
White privilege is something I have, of course - I'm white. And male privilege, straight privilege, and a range of others.
Because the way I phrased it above may be ambiguous, let me clarify. The accusation part is when you say "You don't understand this because of your privilege". The accusation is of the form: X because Y.
I do understand it, I simply disagree. Not every disagreement is based in privilege blindness.
You can, of course, counter that I would be blind to my own blindness, which is a fair point to raise, and something everyone should consider. But the reverse should also be carefully considered, whether the argument is not one of privilege but based on a reasoned position and/or commitment to certain important values and principles.
Otherwise, accusations of 'privilege blindness' become a trump card people can throw down to discredit any opposing views. That's the danger of these words - they can rapidly become weaponized.
You informed me that if I only address part of what you post you'll delete my comments for being corrosive to the discussion, so as to the rest of your post:
I've already presented my arguments and evidence for what I've said. You clearly disagree, but I can't do anything else here other that repeat myself, which would be redundant.
Since saying "please reread what I've posted" would be taken as a sign of hostility or thread derailing, let's just agree to disagree.
@garethf - You haven't responded to my post, but @dislekcia has mentioned this above. You seem to be saying that you don't want people saying that you've passively endorsed sexism on the forums because you didn't feel you wanted to cold shoulder someone. I cannot make you do anything, and my point 5 does use the word "ideally", but I will say that just because you don't like the idea that you might be passively endorsing sexism through your behaviour doesn't mean you aren't passively endorsing sexism. You are. By continuing to engage with sexist content as if it weren't problematic, you are endorsing the problematic content.
In this case, it's like slapping someone and then saying you don't want anyone to say that you're slapping someone. Facts are facts.
@garethf: You say "let's agree to disagree" as though the only people affected by this discussion are you and I. That's not the case because this discussion is not private and we're talking about motivations for cultural change and action, people will use these arguments to justify or explain future behavior. The responsibility for future actions is at least partly ours to bear for addressing this in public. I'm comfortable advocating that we be open to discussing how things like passively endorsing sexism affect people. Apparently you're comfortable saying that people stop talking about it because if they do they're accusing people of nebulous wrongdoings. Which approach does the least damage? To who?
Because the way I phrased it above may be ambiguous, let me clarify. The accusation part is when you say "You don't understand this because of your privilege". The accusation is of the form: X because Y.
"X because Y" is a relationship. It's a reason... You're fond of definitions, so if an accusation is "a charge or claim that someone has done something illegal or wrong", how is "X because Y" an accusation? Perhaps if you explain what you're saying people are accusing you of, it might help us get to the bottom of this extreme reaction.
I do understand it, I simply disagree. Not every disagreement is based in privilege blindness.
What do you understand and what do you disagree with? Do you understand how sexism was normalised on the forum? Do you understand how that's a bad thing? Do you disagree that we should be able to talk about that without people flying off the handle about how they're being attacked? Do you disagree that sexism was normalised at all? Are you disagreeing with fictional punishments that weren't proposed? What are you actually saying (besides "shut up")?
You can, of course, counter that I would be blind to my own blindness, which is a fair point to raise, and something everyone should consider. But the reverse should also be carefully considered, whether the argument is not one of privilege but based on a reasoned position and/or commitment to certain important values and principles.
Otherwise, accusations of 'privilege blindness' become a trump card people can throw down to discredit any opposing views. That's the danger of these words - they can rapidly become weaponized.
That was a point I made about the strangeness of defending against an accusation that isn't an accusation. I didn't make the point to call anyone privileged (that was a few posts ago when I asked you not to dismiss the invalidation that women can feel when casually sexist attitudes crop up, to listen to why something might be a conversation stopper), I made it to ridicule the argumentative responses to information.
You informed me that if I only address part of what you post you'll delete my comments for being corrosive to the discussion, so as to the rest of your post:
I've already presented my arguments and evidence for what I've said. You clearly disagree, but I can't do anything else here other that repeat myself, which would be redundant.
Since saying "please reread what I've posted" would be taken as a sign of hostility or thread derailing, let's just agree to disagree.
You still haven't addressed my actual post, instead focusing your entire reply on a PS instead... You could answer the questions I asked: -Why are you casting this as a witch hunt against men? -Why is being asked to understand something like [how sexism is passively normalised] suddenly so horrible that it conjures these false claims of persecution? -If people did normalise sexism, are we not allowed to talk about how that happened? -Is talking about [specific instances of how sexism was normalised in discussions] a crusade to get everyone who messed up banned?
What's your evidence for anything? All you seem to be doing is insisting you know what @dammit meant better than she did and that, somehow, that means that any and all discussion motivated in learning and understanding how we can behave better as a community towards women is somehow an attack on ... someone. What are you saying should happen instead of this spate of "X because Y" "accusations"?
You're also completely ignoring @dammit's posts. Are they that inconvenient?
Right now all I'm getting from you as an alternative is "stop talking about it" and the consequences of that aren't okay.
This. I know there may be some on the forum who are tired of this conversation, but - unfortunately for them - I am actually not going to stop having this conversation. It's 2015 - we should be well beyond sexist, racist, homophobic and other bullshit but sadly we're not. And not talking about it, pretending it isn't there, passively endorsing it through almost-inaction is not going to make it go away. And if talking about it - as much as it often stresses me out terribly to do - is helping other people feel safer on the forums, giving them voice and space to talk about these issues that affect them (and all of us in turn in some way), or even educating them on these issues, then I cannot not say anything.
And to those who often throw the comment of "can't we just make games instead of arguing on the forums?" my response is this: Don't you think you'd make better, more original games, if you consider the diversity issues and struggles of the people that are so often not represented in games? How would you know about those issues, and the diversity of experience, if no one ever talked about them? Games are so often about people - you can't pretend some people don't exist and expect to make good games.
As I said in the Rhodes statue post, that was the last post I wanted to make on this subject.
I've only posted since then to clarify possible ambiguity in the statue post. First, to you, on who I was saying was being threatened with banning, and secondly, in response to @disleckia, on what I meant about accusations of privilege.
So while this isn't quite a direct response to recent posts in this thread, I feel like it still falls comfortably under the topic of "how people shift their views" as well as "how do we improve this forum and the interactions it contains".
Clarity of communication is a problem. In this thread alone there have been many posts largely dedicated to asking somebody to clarify what they meant, and while its obviously necessary to make such posts and get clarification, it would surely be better if clarification was not needed in the first place, if users were able to say what it is that they wish to say clearly and unambiguously the first time they say it. Now obviously communication is hard and being constrained to text makes it even harder and so the exact selection of words is of great importance in conveying meaning and nuance.
As an example that I've wanted to mention for a while is @dislekcia's way of interacting on these forums. Multiple times he's simply asked people some questions with purely good intent, and has been met with defensiveness and accusations of being hostile. As a reader of these same posts and others, I often agree (to some extent at least), the wording comes across as hostile and it sounds as if he's being condescending or accusatory or rude or whatever, when that isn't actually the case at all. From my (comparatively minimal) real-world interactions with him that's just the way he talks, its not his fault or anything, but when trying to communicate with text as your only tool its really hard to get across the intent and tone in the same way that you can when you're face-to-face with somebody.
Speaking of only being able to communicate via text, I haven't been following this thread and so I've just read the whole thing almost from start to finish. More than once in that time, I had to stop and read a sentence three or four times over just to try and see what the person meant, and typing or grammatical errors sometimes make it almost impossible.
Another example is in @dammit's original response to @Pierre's game where the words were: "...if you want someone like this around? ..." Do we want him around? (A person making games on the make games forum) Yes! Do we want him to be blatantly sexist? And show off sexist work? And be applauded for it? No! Can we help people to understand why such things are detrimental to all parties involved and let everyone grow from the experience? Hopefully! Admittedly @dammit might not feel this way herself but this is what I think at least, and I can only proceed with the line of thought from my point of view. I feel like its important to distinguish between the person and the product (after all it keeps being said when talking about responding to criticism that constructive criticism is not a personal attack on the creator of the material being criticized). It is entirely possible that the choice of the word "someone" (as opposed to "something") was entirely arbitrary and that on another day another word could have been used, but when reading what other users have written I take it that what they wrote is exactly what they meant and as a result, would see this as a personal attack on the person, instead of the product.
This lines up with what @Asbestos was saying in his original reply regarding the rules. Its not that the rules for topic X should say Y, or that there should be no rules for topic X or whatever, but rather that the rules should be carefully crafted such that undesirable outcomes (such as shunning individuals just for having a different opinion) are avoided. As @dislekcia pointed out the rules take time to put together so that they can achieve exactly this goal. Great.
I understand that people are busy and don't have hours of their time to dedicate to writing a forum post, or that English may not be their home language, but I think we should just be mindful of exactly what it is that we write. Read over the post before you post it, think about exactly what it is that you're trying to convey and check that your words accurately convey it.
Another example is in @dammit's original response to @Pierre's game where the words were: "...if you want someone like this around? ..." Do we want him around? (A person making games on the make games forum) Yes! Do we want him to be blatantly sexist? And show off sexist work? And be applauded for it? No! Can we help people to understand why such things are detrimental to all parties involved and let everyone grow from the experience? Hopefully! Admittedly @dammit might not feel this way herself but this is what I think at least, and I can only proceed with the line of thought from my point of view. I feel like its important to distinguish between the person and the product (after all it keeps being said when talking about responding to criticism that constructive criticism is not a personal attack on the creator of the material being criticized). It is entirely possible that the choice of the word "someone" (as opposed to "something") was entirely arbitrary and that on another day another word could have been used, but when reading what other users have written I take it that what they wrote is exactly what they meant and as a result, would see this as a personal attack on the person, instead of the product.
Actually, that's exactly what I meant. Do you want a person who - after being told repeatedly that the content was unacceptable and problematic and was refusing to change it despite being offered "warm and empathetic" responses that included science links showing just how damaging this kind of content is to women and the human race at large - on our forums? There are a load of other awesome people making awesome games that are not full of sexist crap - why would you want to keep this one around? Just because he makes games? Well, that's exactly a problem I pointed out in the original and subsequent threads. That's not a good enough reason.
A nice extreme example to maybe help you understand why this is not okay:
What if the "Kill the Faggot" game dev arrived on these forums and posted that game here? Is that a person you want contributing content to the forum - if we've asked him to take down the problematic content and he has refused even after reasonable people have pointed out why it's not okay? It is fine to just leave him here because he makes games? That's really a bizarre idea. Leaving that content on these forums and allowing the dev to continue posting on these forums while that content is still there would be reinforcing his ideas and passively promoting homophobia and transphobia. Is that something you want to be part of?
This is also not an "attack". This was a conversation starter. And very successful one at that. If it was an "attack" I would have directed my comment at pierre himself rather than at the rest of the people posting in that thread.
@D3zmodos: Wow, well done for reading the whole thread in one go, that can't have been much fun. I totally get what you're saying about communicating better. I think that text is always going to be imprecise and confusing, so until we establish a culture of being okay with people asking you what you meant if they didn't understand something, or even just echoing back what they DID understand from something that was written, we'll always have problems with defensiveness. I've been on a few forums where that sort of culture has prevailed and it takes a lot of effort to keep it that way - new people have to see constant examples of veterans choosing to read things the best possible way and asking and answering questions in good faith... I honestly can't overstate how important working together towards clarity is in maintaining a healthy forum culture.
Thanks for seeing that's what I'm trying to do when I ask these annoying questions of mine :) We can all do better though and I'm perfectly happy to take your points on board about how saying "someone" instead of "someone's actions" could be seen as a more personal (and thus touchier) thing. Note how in @dammit's reply above she's only talking about a person once that person has made it clear that criticism of their actions will not result in a change to those actions. Once that's happened, do you see why she's saying that things have moved to a different type of discussion?
such as shunning individuals just for having a different opinion
And finally, I just want to address this quickly: Sexism is not just an opinion. It actively harms people and reinforces systemic problems that make people's lives worse (and not just the lives of women either). We can and should be able to judge opinions for the impact they have on other people. Shunning someone over a harmless opinion like, say, "This UI would look better if it were red rather than blue" is a silly reaction, yes. Refusing to let someone on a school education board change the subject after they've mentioned that they don't believe in evolution and aren't going to teach it is not shunning, it's engaging with an opinion that's going to do a lot of harm to try and prevent that damage. As @dammit pointed out above, sometimes asking if a person's positive contribution outweighs their negative impact is a good discussion to have. What's been worrying to both me and her is how people don't seem to believe that sexism has as big an impact as it does. Calling it "just an opinion" and classing it as a thing that can be safely ignored is a version of that. I hope that's not what you meant :)
Unfortunately this only occurred to me after making the post, naturally there's a difference between a person posting something, being criticized for it and then updating their work; and a person who posts something, gets criticized for it and responds with "no, I won't change it, I like it this way". At that point you cannot really separate the person from the product any longer and you have to respond accordingly. I guess that example was not quite as well thought out as I wanted it to be because that's exactly what happened (details of what went on later when he changed things/took things down etc have been discussed at length above, so I won't go into it).
I want to say that the point still holds some validity in the general case though (even though it now completely lacks a good example). The idea that even just a single word, chosen without a second thought, could cause people to greatly misjudge the tone/intention behind a sentence or an entire post. Although as @dislekcia says (and has been said earlier in this thread), having a positive atmosphere, where people start out assuming that others have good intentions, really helps.
@dislekcia I didn't have sexism in mind when I gave that example, I just used it because I was talking about @Asbestos's post and that was the example that came to mind when reading it. I agree that sexism isn't an opinion in the same way that gravity isn't an opinion.
I wouldn't usually voice my opinion in a thread like this, because it seems to have mostly descended into a "He said, She said" conversation. I agree that content that is seen to be sexist or racist in any way should not be condoned nor encouraged nor ignored. I do however disagree with completely shunning accused "perpetrators". This will achieve nothing, as was stated by many other members.
Now, not one usually to stir the pot, but can't help commented on some points in the recent post of @dammit.
Actually, that's exactly what I meant. Do you want a person who - after being told repeatedly that the content was unacceptable and problematic and was refusing to change it despite being offered "warm and empathetic" responses that included science links showing just how damaging this kind of content is to women and the human race at large - on our forums? There are a load of other awesome people making awesome games that are not full of sexist crap - why would you want to keep this one around? Just because he makes games? Well, that's exactly a problem I pointed out in the original and subsequent threads. That's not a good enough reason.
For me, this again confirms the claim of @garethf that you want "this person" banned.
A nice extreme example to maybe help you understand why this is not okay:
What if the "Kill the Faggot" game dev arrived on these forums and posted that game here? Is that a person you want contributing content to the forum - if we've asked him to take down the problematic content and he has refused even after reasonable people have pointed out why it's not okay? It is fine to just leave him here because he makes games? That's really a bizarre idea. Leaving that content on these forums and allowing the dev to continue posting on these forums while that content is still there would be reinforcing his ideas and passively promoting homophobia and transphobia. Is that something you want to be part of?
Kill the faggot? Really? This is an utterly useless comparison. If Pierre had have called his game "Tits and Ass" and made lude sound effects every time her breasts swayed, then I could agree.
Again, don't read this as condoning anything. Just speaking my mind is all.
after being told repeatedly that the content was unacceptable and problematic and was refusing to change it despite being offered "warm and empathetic" responses that included science links showing just how damaging this kind of content is to women and the human race at large
Anyway, I think this thread is coming to a natural conclusion. I know the finalised updated rules for the forum are still being, well, finalised, but I think it's safe to make the following concluding statements here:
1. As @Nandrew has pointed out quite eloquently, the forums are not a well designed space to implement any rehabilitation strategies. We are not going to be changing someone's mindset and beliefs here - regardless of empathy or punishment. 2. No one seems to actually want racist or sexist content on the forums. 3. No one here is required to be a perfect human without sexist, racist mistakes. We're okay with people making mistakes and we're okay talking to each other about these. We're all fallible. 4. In situations were a forum poster has been clearly called out on problematic content but is refusing to remove said content from the forums (refer to point 2 - assuming that no one wants that kind of content on the forums), then the next step would be to flag that content for moderators to get involved. 5. Ideally, once a forum poster has made it clear that they do not wish to remove or change racist or sexist content they have posted on the forums, other forum users should not engage with them in game dev discussions in the same thread so as to avoid creating a social norm of the racist or sexist content being acceptable (ie: passively endorsing the content through non critical action). 6. Mods can then contact any one of the women on the forums (if content is flagged as sexist) or any of the person's of colour (if the content is flagged as racist) if they wish to gain further insight, etc, before making any decisions about the actions they are at liberty to take. 7. If anyone on the forums is ever unsure if content is okay or not, flagging it for inspection or asking your nearest mod, person you trust etc is a very cool thing to do. It helps all of us learn.
Am I missing anything here?
So are we ready yet to move forward? Are we in disagreement about specific points? (It seems people are getting a bit lost in the history rather than concentrating on the concrete aspects above.)
I wouldn't usually voice my opinion in a thread like this, because it seems to have mostly descended into a "He said, She said" conversation. I agree that content that is seen to be sexist or racist in any way should not be condoned nor encouraged nor ignored. I do however disagree with completely shunning accused "perpetrators". This will achieve nothing, as was stated by many other members.
Now, not one usually to stir the pot, but can't help commented on some points in the recent post of @dammit.
Actually, that's exactly what I meant. Do you want a person who - after being told repeatedly that the content was unacceptable and problematic and was refusing to change it despite being offered "warm and empathetic" responses that included science links showing just how damaging this kind of content is to women and the human race at large - on our forums? There are a load of other awesome people making awesome games that are not full of sexist crap - why would you want to keep this one around? Just because he makes games? Well, that's exactly a problem I pointed out in the original and subsequent threads. That's not a good enough reason.
For me, this again confirms the claim of @garethf that you want "this person" banned.
*sigh*
Asking if everyone else wants a certain person around is not the same as requesting that he is banned. I wanted to know what everyone thought about the situation. For example, asking if everyone wants oranges for breakfast is not the same as requesting oranges for breakfast - or even forcing people to have oranges for breakfast.
But, really, seriously, whatever. If this is a witch hunt and you want me to say I want pierre banned and have always wanted pierre banned and that all my posts have been about pierre being banned, sure, here's you winning at the internet.
Now, if that's done, can we please move on? Does anyone have any objections to the list I posted?
Does anyone have any objections to the list I posted?
Yes.
I'm fine with all those points except 1 and 5.
5, I've already discussed my problems with. 1 is an opinion asserted as fact to discredit the "empathy and education" approach as being a waste of time.
Because, if you're not going to change anyone's opinion anyway, then there isn't much point in trying. Which makes it easier to justify just throwing out the offender rather than risking them re-offending, since all that can really be done in those circumstances is damage control.
I'm not in favour of writing cynicism into forum guidelines, even if they're informal forum guidelines.
If someone wants to prove that no one can is going to have their minds changed through forum discussion, I'm open to credible evidence proving that people never change their views because of forum discussion.
It is certainly a challenging task, though. That I will give you.
If someone wants to prove that no one can is going to have their minds changed through forum discussion, I'm open to credible evidence proving that people never change their views because of forum discussion.
I give you the same request. Please prove that someone can have their minds changes through forum discussion and please outline exactly how this should be achieved. I haven't been able to change your mind, for instance - so my argument's looking pretty strong that minds can't be changed through forum discussions :P
Point 1 doesn't stop people who want to have conversations with anyone in a way as to try and change their minds, but a reminder that it is actually more important to get harmful content removed from the forums rather than tip toeing around issues under the guise of "empathy".
Point 5. The word "ideally" should let you know that it is optional. But your choice of actions (at any point in life) have consequences. One consequence of anyone engaging in passive sexism on these forums is that you'll be called out on it.
Because, if you're not going to change anyone's opinion anyway, then there isn't much point in trying. Which makes it easier to justify just throwing out the offender rather than risking them re-offending, since all that can really be done in those circumstances is damage control.
Wait, what's the offense here?
Are you talking about the offense being posting sexist content?
Or are you talking about the offense being someone dismissing complaints about the sexist content that they posted and refusing to engage with discussion on the forum about the impact of their actions?
Because if it's the latter, it should be patently obvious why continued forum interaction is a daft idea.
I have been wondering, if we agree on 2, why not just remove the problematic content without asking? (We do the same with spam). That way we do not have to worry about punishment, and further engagement with the content. The original poster is then free to fix the content before reposting to get feedback on it. If there is an issue with an unfair removal, it is up to the poster to do the work and convince whoever, rather than the work being on the side of the remover (having to ask, argue, convince, call out).
(I also assume here the goal is not to change people's mindsets; just to have damaging content off as soon and decidedly as possible. Of course, people can still have their mind-changing discussions, just not decorated with the content we are trying to disallow.)
I give you the same request. Please prove that someone can have their minds changes through forum discussion and please outline exactly how this should be achieved. I haven't been able to change your mind, for instance - so my argument's looking pretty strong that minds can't be changed through forum discussions :P
Shifting the burden of proof . Also, I'm not the one who wants my opinion codified into the forum policy. If you can't prove it, don't put it in.
You haven't been able to change my mind because your arguments haven't been convincing, at least to me. But I have in the past changed my mind on forums. When presented with sufficiently convincing arguments or evidence. I have also changed the minds of other people and witnessed people changing their minds when interacting with a 3rd party.
I realize that you won't find my assurances convincing. But again, I'm not wanting my opinion written into official rules and guidelines.
I have been wondering, if we agree on 2, why not just remove the problematic content without asking?
For egregious breaches (posting a game gleefully advocating hate crimes), yes, for minor missteps (a sexy avatar that is a bit too much) it is unnecessarily alienating to simply delete content without asking.
I realize that people who write empathy in quotation marks might not agree with that opinion.
I give you the same request. Please prove that someone can have their minds changes through forum discussion and please outline exactly how this should be achieved. I haven't been able to change your mind, for instance - so my argument's looking pretty strong that minds can't be changed through forum discussions :P
Shifting the burden of proof fallacy. Also, I'm not the one who wants my opinion codified into the forum policy. If you can't prove it, don't put it in.
*Sigh*
Perhaps you should read the links you post?
Your assertion is that people can have their minds changed through empathy etc on the forums Mine is that they cannot.
From your link:
In an argument, the burden of proof is on the person making an assertion. That is, if a person says that the moon is made of cheese, then it is up to that person to support this assertion.
So far, the evidence in this thread does not support your (positive) assertion. Anecdotal evidence does not support your assertion. The study that started this thread has been retracted and no longer supports your assertion.
You haven't been able to change my mind because your arguments haven't been convincing, at least to me....
Thanks okay. For the longest time, I haven't been trying to change your mind. The PMs , private conversations and emails I've gotten while having this long-winded thread argument with you have underscored the value - to me - of continuing to have these kinds of conversations.
I realize that you won't find my assurances convincing. But again, I'm not wanting my opinion written into official rules and guidelines.
I want to remind you that we are not discussing my "opinions". What pierre posted was sexist - that is a fact. Pierre also did not want to change it - after conversations - that is also a fact. People continued to engage with him thus supporting him and passively endorsing sexism - this is also a fact.
The rules I've suggested are not "opinions" either. They're suggestions to which the entire community is open to question - like you are doing right now.
I have been wondering, if we agree on 2, why not just remove the problematic content without asking?
For egregious breaches (posting a game gleefully advocating hate crimes), yes, for minor missteps (a sexy avatar that is a bit too much) it is unnecessarily alienating to simply delete content without asking.
I realize that people who write empathy in quotation marks might not agree with that opinion.
This is actually why I have not suggested simply removing the content without asking - it allows for some discussion and no one feels like they were attacked. Every person is given opportunity to correct there mistakes because - as I've said - we're all human and fallible.
For egregious breaches (posting a game gleefully advocating hate crimes), yes, for minor missteps (a sexy avatar that is a bit too much) it is unnecessarily alienating to simply delete content without asking.
But is it a bad thing? We want to make the forums less alienating to women. Part of that is making it a more alien experience to post content that goes against that goal. And it seems to me that if content is bad enough for us to ask someone to remove it with consequences if the person does't, we may as well skip ahead and just delete it. And it does not need to be harsh, a message (perhaps automated) that explains why, point to the guidelines, and gives pointers in correcting the issue will take some of the sting out, if necessary.
Pierre also did not want to change it - after conversations - that is also a fact.
Guess this still stands as a true fact.
If I were to post something here, thinking or believing that it is not sexist (because I didn't realize/know), and another forum members points it out to me (quite politely as was done) that it is, I would apologize, remove the content in question and then start a conversation about how I would/could/should change it. I think that is what the reasonable man would do. If everyone is saying it is harmful except me, I would consider myself to be the common denominator. Again, I believe that most forum members would do that. Wouldn't you? Which is why I am a bit confused as to why some members would rather continue defending the person that posted harmful content. Most of us would have removed the content the moment it was pointed out to us as being harmful or against the goals of the community, regardless of whether we agreed or not, certainly before association members had to get involved. Wouldn't you?
Comments
1. I think the newly accepted discrimination against men voicing their opinions rather than empowering women to voice their own will have a stifling effect on communication in general. Making this a "them vs us" issue is wilfully creating an outgroup, which is something we are ostensibly trying to eradicate by promoting inclusivity. Thus I cannot support such measures.
2. Agreed, eradicating marginalisation is a laudable goal. However, I have no data on which to base an opinion of which is more damaging to this community. My read on the situation based on the community nights I attend is that participants of all sexes feel extremely welcome.
3. If you are referring to @dammit's input as the factual input, I have no idea. However, being a human, @dammit is indeed fallible, so to point out such perceived flaws is not sacrilegious. I will read the mentioned studies for perspective, thank you. However, there is a huge volume, so directing me to the relevant texts would be helpful.
4. "Sexist content" is a complicated subject. However, the lazy use of the term is not helpful. The gender terms "male" and "female" are they themselves "sexist", by definition, as they promote discrimination between individuals by sex. Unfair discrimination by gender and/or sex is the real concern.
The creation of certain content to the exclusion of all others, would indeed be an echo chamber, however I do not see that manifest on these forums. Topics are currently diverse and interesting.
If the intent is to attract more of a certain type of user that is currently not participating, expelling existing members is certainly one way to proceed, however it will damage the existing community. Promoting the types of content that are attractive to these potential members while still catering to existing members is the ideal to strive for.
The approach that one can stamp out an existing mindset by force is laughable. One cannot. The individuals simply leave, taking their mindset with them, to exist elsewhere. However, this being the internet and not the wild west, being an outlaw just means you go to where people think exactly the same way as you do already, or are at least tolerant of you - instead of perishing in the wilds. There is no penalty for being expelled from an online community since the internet allows communities to form instantaneously.
Taking a hard tack on this matter is extremely ill advised.
We want somebody like @Pierre around because he is a good person, with good intentions, trying to create a game that he feels proud of, to enrich the community of game developers around him with knowledge, and to enrich the community of gamers with new and fascinating experiences. This is why we want him around. Perhaps some of his methods are misguided, I cannot say, however, this is a community of learning, and personal growth. Expulsion accomplishes neither.
These are the same reasons we want you around. You have enriched us with new experiences and knowledge.
As an aside, punishment is immaterial here, there is nothing at stake and so punishment will have no appreciable effect on the individual being punished. The effect of a punitive regime, however, will have a pronounced effect on how the community is perceived, its vibrancy, and its composition.
The definitive/ textbook definition as exampled by the spiderman discussion in @garethf's post is maybe not what's happening.
But what I see happening, repeatedly, is that @dammit's posts are being pulled out of context, invariable creating a straw dammit to replace and dismiss what she's saying.
@garethf IS being condescending.
@garethf IS substituting @dammit's message with his own version. In what seems to be an effort to dismiss her as a whole;
Or outright ignoring the information she's bringing to the table.
This is mansplaining, particularly that endpoint. Just because the word's "Well actually..." are not being used, or the poster is not actually being interrupted, doesn't make it untrue.
Actually, because it's happening on this thread, I feel like I don't want to participate here. And that's thing we're trying to not have happen, right? We're trying for better, right? My trying for better is this post.
The community wasn't "too nice" to Pierre, the comments directed toward his project were overwhelmingly criticizing the sexualization of the avatar, as I showed. Males spoke out to tell him it wasn't ok, as the studies she mentioned indicate that we should do, speak out on what is wrong with a fellow man's attitudes.
Her prior posts contradict her claim that she wasn't calling for him to be banned. She's tried to sidestep that claim with some semantic dancing, but sorry, no.
I am not ignoring her, but neither am I agreeing with her claims about men being too nice or her claims that she wasn't calling for him to be banned.
That's disagreement. And it's certainly challenging, perhaps even rudely so. But it's not ignoring.
Nor is it mansplaining. That word is not a magical shield to be invoked as protection from criticism, disagreement or challenge.
This is what I have a problem with. This is being to "nice". You feel as though you have acted because you said a thing but the ultimate action of the community was not to punish, in any way, but to simply let it slide. Your "kind and empathetic" approach did not succeed in getting the character removed. And supporting his game, through offering advice on game design despite continuing sexist content only serves to support a sexist environment on this forum - one that is hostile to the women who might be interested in joining or participating.
Obviously we still want to be able to provide feedback on projects and designs. Obviously we don't want to ban everyone for reasons they don't seem to understand (I don't understand why this is the only thing people consider when punishment is discussed, a formal warning system was floated, as were other forms of potential censure). Obviously we want this forum to be a safe space without tacitly accepted sexism, racism or an adversarial culture.
How do we put all those things together? I'm not 100% sure yet, but I do find it incredibly interesting that almost ANY perceived action against sexism is seen as "too much" or "extremely worrying" by a number of posters. I'd posit that we all just get over that, please. We obviously need to do more and, no, that doesn't mean instant bannings.
One of the most basic rules of morality that existed since we discovered humanity is to not hurt innocent people . If it's being done unintentionally, then it needs to be corrected so it is not continued or repeated.
When a game is being criticised for being sexist, racist or otherwise harmful to innocent people, the game and it's creators aren't being attacked, "thought policed" or victimised. They are being instructed to stop hurting others. If they ignore the advice, they are saying that they don't care that they're hurting people, their personal tastes are more important. If this attitude is considered acceptable within a community, it's not surprising that people will leave and newcomers will see it as toxic, or unappealing.
So, how can we improve the community? Nurture empathy, encourage positivity and improvement, etc, certainly.
But I think the point is that tolerating continued toxic attitudes or content despite prior advice, guidance and warnings perhaps should not be prioritised above basic morality.
A game with problematic content was shown at a meetup, apparently nobody said anything about problematic aspect. Problematic content is then posted on forum, where a lot of community members stepped up to pointing it out and discussing it, and the creator of said problematic content disregarded this and the members of the community proceeded to interact with the content creator regardless of his maintaining a damaging stance.
at which point: Ignoring the feedback is a conversation stopper for me too. In fact I hadn't wanted to participate on that thread entirely ( a reaction I'm working to curb because I'm slowly learning and internalizing my own voice's value)
In your breakdown below, you appear to specifically obscure @dammit's concern ( in response to @dammit repeating a concern about our community's social norm, noggal) See I went and counted those posts, not excluding the women (why would this be the delineator?), and saw this:
Posts Specifically condemning problematic content and not continuing the remainder of the discussion (8)
Posts straddling problematic content, but continuing the conversation about gamefeel, new demo, AAA production value, grapplinghook, etc (7)
up to @dammit's post quoted above.
Also, that (8) changes to (3) with only dislekcia, brondin and steamhat(sortof, the sword-wang is muddied) surviving the cut if we go by individual and not post, so later posts push people like Tuism, Elyaradine etc into the straddling category.
1.Basing the tally on the actual concern; different results.
2. Turns out, no reason exclude women in the tally if we go up to @dammit's post, literally the first post from a women, unless others have since been deleted?
3. Centrally, how many people continuing the conversation is too many? How many people allowing this normalization qualifies as "too nice"
Sexist content is damaging.
For me it's a conversation stopper. And it should be a conversation stopper, because it not being a conversation stopper is exactly how we got to this messed up social norm in the first place. This is exactly what I see reflected in dammit's message. in the second thread being started, in the clarification she keeps offering. Not a call for banning, but a "hey, why are we disregarding this, it's a stopping point!" " There should be a consequence to this!"
Normalizing sexist content is not okay. Continuing to talk about game feel and double jumps IS the normalization that @dammit is calling out. Perhaps you don't realize that you're reinterpreting and dismissing Dammit?
Sexist(and racist) content and, more specifically, maintaining defence of it, is a dealbreaker. Any "nice" is probably "too nice"
This is about addressing the EXISTING outgroup situation that's chased women away from the internet, from tech, from games and from the discussion. To do that, the current ingroup (men) need to give up a little bit of their privilege. That this process is so often miscast as "discrimination" or "us vs them" animosity is just proof that privileged groups don't know what marginalisation looks like. That said, I'm perfectly fine with sexists feeling unwelcome here and becoming an outgroup, I'm not sure why anyone would think this would be a bad thing... Community nights are different to these forums and they work on different societal rules. I'm not sure why the community nights are relevant to this discussion when we have examples of exactly how women feel marginalised by the culture of this forum right here, but I can guarantee that community nights are still rife with sexism and are different concerns for men and women. Everything from the number of men and women that attend the events (and how they're not equal) to how women need to carefully consider what they wear when going to meetup, to how women will already be thinking about who is likely to be at an event and what they might expect of them... The meetups aren't free from the impact of sexism.
Perhaps an easier way to ask the original question is this: Do you think that the number of men who want so strongly feel that they want to be sexist and who will leave this forum as a result of not having that opportunity here, outnumbers the number of women that interact with game development in SA? Should we be reaching out to those women and can we do so without alienating willfully sexist men? I'd love more people to read those studies. And yes, it's a lot. That's why I defer to her reading on the matter :) My original question was why do you think the reaction to her expertise in this area is as vehement as it is, not if any one human can be fallible. Do you think that the reaction is justified? Sorry, but we've had this discussion already in the other thread. Yes, sexism is a complex concept, but the basic cheat sheet is this "when people say something is sexist, listen to them and try to understand". Basically, the discussion of sexism in this thread is about how women are represented in games and how institutionalised sexism impacts everyone.
The topics that you consider diverse and interesting, how many women posters do they have in them? How many people of colour post in them? How diverse is this community, really? Expelling existing members is not the focus of this discussion (nor is it the focus of discussing punishments for forum transgressions), making this forum a place that doesn't tolerate or welcome sexism is the only way to make it a welcoming place for women. That's going to require a lot of re-education about sexism and the experience of sexism. We need to build a culture that's a lot less precious about that. Right now, the forum is pretty bad at listening to women and giving them the authority over their own experiences. So far the best approach that's been made available is controlling unacceptable behavior via punishment. The other approach has been discredited (and argued that it's difficult to do in the setting of a forum). I think there are two problems with what you're saying here: Firstly, the severity of punishments has been constantly overstated and turned into bullshit slippery-slope arguments, that needs to stop. Secondly, having strong forum rules means those rules need tools to be enforceable, right now the forum is in an enforcement vacuum, so things are always going to look harsh in comparison. Why is "how harsh enforcing this is going to be for men" always the focus?
Nobody is trying to stamp out a mindset, we're just trying not to give that mindset a platform to chase people away. If people want to leave the forum so they can be sexist elsewhere, great!
Do you see what you've done here? You (or you on behalf of @dammit) are insisting that anything less than giving Pierre the cold shoulder until he changed his mind is unacceptable.
Do you see why that's problematic? Insisting that unless Pierre agrees with our views no one must engage with him further is functionally equivalent to insisting that unless he agrees with our views he must be banned.
Sorry, but no.
And man, as an aside, the political left really has a problem with these kinds of demands for purity. Did you criticize? Did you criticize enough? Enough by my standards? No?!?!
THEN I NAME YOU DEFENDER OF THE ENEMY, ALMOST AS BAD AS THE ENEMY HIMSELF! That's your choice. But don't insist that it's the only choice. Personally, I find "stopping the conversation" to be harmful and ineffective. There needs to be space for people to be (politely) wrong and be gently guided to being right over time. Not everyone is level 100 in Social Justice, some people are level 1.
Part of that is giving some helpful feedback along with the negative, demonstrating that you aren't just out to get the person. It is not ok for anyone to insist that members can't give any other feedback to Pierre other than about that avatar.
And I hope no one claims that "well, he had his chance to change his mind" or I will have to remind people that the event in question happened over the course of like 48 hours, and the discussion on banning a further week or so. To expect people to radically shift their world views in a week is completely unrealistic.
He was critiqued, he was told to remove the problematic media, and he made a small step in the right direction with his next attempt. That is about the best you can expect.
I did not obscure her meaning or concern. She literally asked forum members if we want to keep him(Pierre) around. Sorry, no amount of semantic dancing will get around that. She was agitating to get him pushed out.
The complaint is that the community as a whole spent a lot of time normalising and dismissing sexist art. @Pierre can believe what he likes, all we need to do as a community is not give him a platform to chase people away with those views. The operational point here is not changing someone's mind, it's not showing sexist material and not dismissing concerns about sexism. While someone is actively showing sexist material AND arguing that they should be allowed to do so, they're not acting in a way that is acceptable on this community and they're not welcome to participate in it. @Pierre was made welcome despite his arguing that he should be able to display his sexist art as he wishes. That's the issue, not what he believes.
What's wrong with giving someone the cold shoulder? And when did that become banning? That it's not a conversation stopper, that's your privilege. That you don't feel dismissed, marginalised or worthless and have the option to carry on "the conversation" about other topics, that's your privilege. Please understand that's a luxury you enjoy and for some that's simply not an option, don't dismiss their complaints as baseless just because you're not subjected to a constant system of oppression that uses exactly those tools to shut people up. So I guess a relevant question is this: How do you give feedback on other pieces of a work without normalising the sexism that it exhibits? This shouldn't be hard, people do it all the time. There probably has to be a line beyond which any interaction that isn't outright calling out is problematic normalisation:
Is that when someone's actively displaying sexist or racist themes or representations in their game? (I'm not sure, that's always going to be a spectrum - this is where you seem to believe that the issue with @Pierre was, that's not the case)
Is that when someone's actively dismissing complaints about sexism or racism in their games and citing some misguided right to free speech argument? (Yeah, I'd argue that's too far, if someone's doing that, then any engagement with them that isn't about the -ism dismisses the complaints of those that raised the issue and lends credence to the misguided arguments - This is where @Pierre was and I believe this is what people are saying should be examined)
Is the line only a token thing that we can never actually step beyond for fear of offending people that are actively posting regressive and harmful content? (This is what it looks like you're arguing for)
Is the line a thing we ignore completely and everything goes and only those with the most privilege are welcome here?
TLDR: No, the argument is not that displaying sexist art should equal social censure and instant banning (it should equal being called out and responding in a reasoned manner). The complaint is that supporting someone that's actively dismissing sexism as a concern and advocating that their sexist art not be removed normalises sexism and drives people away that we can't afford to lose.
Let's try to apply empathy here.
Imagine being a girl, say 15 or so. You've played a few awesome games, and you're thinking about digging deeper into the industry, but you're not sure where to start, so you and your friends attend a conference that's supposed to be welcoming to everyone, but when you get there you see that the attendance is 90% guys, and on the screens they show games where the few female characters are practically always portrayed as either helpless, sexual or irrationally underdressed. The mascot is a woman with her butt sticking out, the posters are covered with men in thick badass armour but women in skimpy bikinis. In fact, almost everything even remotely female has giant heaving breasts and bedroom eyes.
On the forums someone mentions that this is probably bad because maybe people shouldn't be continuously fed this sort of false representation that distorts and affects their values and perceptions, and it makes women feel very uncomfortable because it looks like guys are obsessed with our genitals, and the reactions are along the lines of "nope, you're wrong, our values are infallible", or "yeah it's probably bad but look this guy is sort of thinking about it, oh he doesn't think it's a problem, oh well", or "hey, that's too bad, but look, swords!"
How would you feel, being that 15 year old girl? Would you be like "Yes! THIS is where I want to make my future!"
What about everyone else who might be interested in working with us, and seeing this careless attitude towards sexism? This isn't about one or two people being offended. It's about the attitude of the community as a whole and how that affects those who wants to interact with us.
All over the world, game devs and even publishers are attempting to make these more conscientious decisions. There's a lot more to be gained by being inclusive than there is to being dismissive, and the only thing that needs to change is that women should be portrayed less often as gratuitous sexual fantasies. It would be great if this happened naturally and automatically, but it's become evident that it takes serious or official warnings before people at least realise that this is something that they should actually take quite seriously, since the reaction otherwise has been "sexism, it's just an opinion, let's talk about texturing instead".
Above all, however, this is nevertheless a platform that has the right to decide what it wishes to host, and what it deems irrelevant or undesirable. This isn't grandmothers front porch where life lessons and basic morality can be slowly passed down through generations.
If someone is INDEED creating sexist content, has been warned, advised and warned again, and refuses to acknowledge that there's a problem, then it needs to be seriously addressed and efficiently dealt with, it can't just be casually glossed over or politely sidestepped.
That's what the guidelines are for. They aren't for trigger happy banning. Whether or not who said what three weeks ago is not conductive to progress right now. Arguing semantics or who was right or who meant what when they said this or that, why does it even matter? What matters is what is being said now. Calling someone out on something they said in the past because you suspect that they might have changed their minds without explicitly declaring so since then helps little, and I suggest we stop doing this.
How to make forums better? Allow minority chance to speak without overreacting, we are still minority after all, we're not going to take away all your toys. Discourage sexist, racist, homophobic or otherwise hateful content, encourage empathy, even towards offenders, but also remember that this is a public forum, it's currently though hopefully not permanently the face of mgsa, and if religion has taught us anything, it's that sometimes all it takes is the idea of punishment to convince someone to behave morally. >_>
What if we say, who cares? What if we simply now start the discussion of how to make our forums better? Cause I really, really, really am trying to steer the conversation that way.
So, very little of what we do around here is focused on rehabilitating sexists when they show up -- which is sad, but understandable, given that a hodge-podge of mostly male game developers is never *really* going to be a qualified force to deal with a delicate matter like unpacking someone's deeply ingrained sexist patterns (said hodge-podge is arguably not even qualified to determine what is sexist, which is why I'm glad we have at least some vocal women around).
Amateur attempts at this rehab are noble, but unless you know exactly what you're doing and do it particularly well (and who among us can claim that?) it's very easy to slip into a pattern where you're passively endorsing sexism instead. And even if one person among several succeeds at riding this line properly, we still have the perceived majority backpatting negative behaviour. So this approach doesn't work as well on a public forum.
The opposite is also a problem, especially when male allies deem themselves protected by the shields and measures designed to help women: I've seen men argue that they don't need to exercise empathy and patience when tackling sexism (bad move), I've seen a general pattern of allies engaging in definition wars and feminist fisticuffs with one another when a woman has already demonstrated a handle on the conversation (bad move), and I've even seen allies claiming victimhood when their advocacy is challenged or even counter-called (co-option of oppression, very bad move).
Being allies, a lot of our well-intended advocacy comes with these flaws plus many more, and trolls can see that instantly. It wrecks our position.
I think that the best way to break a lot of our problematic patterns in the forums is if the most earnest male allies exercised a little more humility, gave thought to being less wordy where possible and started to find more active and creative ways to defer to women in uncertain situations pertaining to sexism.
For example, I feel that the best way to break the "niceness pattern" outlined above -- when men passively endorse a thread's content by engaging with it, even after expressing disapproval -- is for an ally or two to actively seek out the opinions or comments of *affected* forum members so that the content can be judged a little more reliably (instead of being stuck in the scenario where it's overwhelmingly men who make the diagnosis of sexism -- inappropriate when seeking a woman's opinion is so easy). This does not necessarily mean an @ callout or something that's going to drain the energy of the potentially affected group (please don't force a woman to bring their attention to something, and make appropriate use of TW!), but enough of us are, say, connected enough with @dammit and others that it would be really easy to check before making up our own minds and either getting on our high horses as Well-Meaning Allies, or shrinking into the inaction of the Passive Oppressor.
Better yet, one could simply approach a woman who has structural, "obliged" authority in MGSA (a female member of admin, for example), or who has specifically advertised themselves as being open to these approaches (like I'm, uh, admittedly just assuming with @dammit) to avoid unfair energy drain.
The simple ritual of approaching our female forum members can also be a mark of validation that enables them: for example, it's intimidating for a woman to step into a thread cold and call out sexism (due to perceived backlash), but it becomes a lot easier when there's knowledge that at least one male ally is paying attention and ready to support where needed.
And the best part: as a long-term trend, we may eventually see sexism callouts on MGSA being led by women instead of men, and new women arriving in the community will have readier access to examples of role models in their group instead of a more questionable "guardian state" dominated by the voices of allies.
The snag is that this translates into a little more work for women: but if guys co-operate when they step up, there's a massive payoff for that in terms of genuine empowerment, and I'm sure that's exactly what marginalised forum members want to see! And if we don't like this ad-hoc roping in of women, I would once again like to advocate for the election of some formal representative for any given marginalised group who explicitly agrees to take on that burden.
TL;DR if men like me see troubling content on MGSA, don't spend too much energy trying to engage or make a judgement call (within reason, I suppose, but be careful with self-promoting bias on that ...). Find and invite/promote a woman's voice instead. You'll avoid both the passive endorsement of sexism AND the risk of committing an Ally 101 fuckup. :D
Bonus content: it's nice that from a structural / admin point of view, MGSA seems to respect the voices of women (swift response to dammit's call for escalation, etc). Having this as our bottom line helps SO much.
The opinions above are not strictly my own thinking, but based on knowledge I've gleaned from women-led groups, feminist understanding and multiple examples of ally-led groups which all eventually collapse under some variation of well-meaning toxicity. The concept makes sense to me but I am not precious about carrying it out just so.
:( That makes me incredibly sad because I do believe that there are people who were at that meetup who would have possibly felt the content was not okay but felt that they couldn't say anything because no one else said anything. I've seen this happen at our own meetups in CPT but remember @theFuntastic being brave enough to actually say something while other devs simply argued about the game mechanics. In fact, it's often the actions of @theFuntastic (among other important people who already know who they are) that make me brave enough to stand up for these kinds of things.
*sigh*
Anyway, I think this thread is coming to a natural conclusion. I know the finalised updated rules for the forum are still being, well, finalised, but I think it's safe to make the following concluding statements here:
1. As @Nandrew has pointed out quite eloquently, the forums are not a well designed space to implement any rehabilitation strategies. We are not going to be changing someone's mindset and beliefs here - regardless of empathy or punishment.
2. No one seems to actually want racist or sexist content on the forums.
3. No one here is required to be a perfect human without sexist, racist mistakes. We're okay with people making mistakes and we're okay talking to each other about these. We're all fallible.
4. In situations were a forum poster has been clearly called out on problematic content but is refusing to remove said content from the forums (refer to point 2 - assuming that no one wants that kind of content on the forums), then the next step would be to flag that content for moderators to get involved.
5. Ideally, once a forum poster has made it clear that they do not wish to remove or change racist or sexist content they have posted on the forums, other forum users should not engage with them in game dev discussions in the same thread so as to avoid creating a social norm of the racist or sexist content being acceptable (ie: passively endorsing the content through non critical action).
6. Mods can then contact any one of the women on the forums (if content is flagged as sexist) or any of the person's of colour (if the content is flagged as racist) if they wish to gain further insight, etc, before making any decisions about the actions they are at liberty to take.
7. If anyone on the forums is ever unsure if content is okay or not, flagging it for inspection or asking your nearest mod, person you trust etc is a very cool thing to do. It helps all of us learn.
Am I missing anything here?
Maybe an analogy will help.
That recent Rhodes statue thing, right? The protesters wanted the statue taken down, he was a colonial oppressor, making the descendants of the people he oppressed walk past a statue celebrating the man was harmful.
I completely agree with that.
But imagine if after the extensive debate about whether to pull it down or not, after the statue (the problematic media) was removed, the protesters moved on to demanding that everyone who had publicly stated that they didn't think the statue should be removed or they don't agree that it was a problem for whatever reason should also be expelled from the university. Teachers, students, admin staff. Anyone who defended keeping the statue there.
The statue had been taken down, the students didn't have to see it anymore, but that's not enough. The people who didn't recant their defense of the statue should also be expunged, it's argued. If not expunged, boycotted until they recanted. Anyone interacting with them while they haven't recanted is implicitly endorsing their support of the statue, it's asserted.
Now imagine you say "Whoa, I agree that the statue was a problem, and I support it being taken down. But I don't think that disagreement over whether that was right should get you kicked out."
After which you get accused of white privilege and passively endorsing the media(the statue) and of being more concerned with protecting bigots than the victims of oppression. :/
People don't seem to understand why I have an issue with where this discussion has taken us, but I do have a real problem with has been said here and in the past. And I won't be shouted down, nor berated into not bringing it up as a concern. Pierre was forced to remove his media. But where we got to, very quickly, was discussing whether him disagreeing that it was problematic should get him expelled, even if he complied with the request to remove it.
Dissent should be permissible so long as promblematic media, harassment and abuse is not. Wanting to ban opinions is a extremely dangerous place to be at.
It's not ok, guys. And it's not ok to try to bludgeon anyone who brings up these concerns into silence with cries of mansplaining and bigotry. It creates a really toxic environment in a forum where you're either with us or against us. I've got a fairly thick skin but lots of people simply stop engaging. There is a very real chilling effect to labeling all disagreement as bigotry.
So if you folks want to boycott his threads you can do so. Everyone must do what makes them comfortable, of course. But don't tell me that I must also do so or I'm guilty of passively endorsing sexist media.
That simply won't fly, sorry.
And this is probably the last thing I'm going to post on the topic. I don't think I can put it any clearer than that, and I doubt I'll reach anyone who has already decided that I'm a sexist asshole, regardless.
*Note: This is a separate argument from the argument that people who actively posted sexist content were called to be banned (a point I still contend actually happened, but whatever).
The second group thinks the media is a problem and should be removed but that the first group, people who don't think the media was a problem, shouldn't be expelled or shunned.
I didn't suggest that the second group was in danger of being banned or shunned, only that they were expected to ban or shun the people in the first group, or else they'd be labelled as passively supporting the first group's attitudes and behaviors.
A "with us or against us" scenario.
Does that help clarify?
There really is another way here. What? No. This is a seriously misleading straw man... All that's happening, to use the analogy, is that people who pointed out how problematic the statue was are telling the people that defended the statue that what they did wasn't cool and could they please examine why so that they don't do it next time this crops up.
That's it! It's not a witch hunt going after people that, y'know, normalised sexism. It's an examination of what happened to raise awareness that a lot of people who probably didn't mean to do it, y'know, normalised sexism and that's hopefully a thing they don't want to be doing so could they learn from this please and not do it again.
Casting it as a witch hunt with this laughably extreme "it's you making it an us-vs-them" angle is literally only destructive. Why do it? Nobody is saying this. What's being asked is that, as a community, we understand that we ended up normalising sexism through either inaction or tacitly supporting arguments that dismissed sexism as an issue worth discussing. That's all: Understand that that happened and why it's not okay that it did.
Why is that hard to do? Why is being asked to understand something like that suddenly so horrible that it conjures these false claims of persecution? So, hang on, if people did normalise sexism, are we not allowed to talk about how that happened? Because that's what went down: People DID passively endorse the media. People were more concerned with protecting bigots than listening to marginalised voices. The community didn't engage well with the topic, it showed that this isn't something that's well understood and it showed where our weaknesses in terms of guidelines and culture lie. Is talking about it a crusade to get everyone who messed up banned?
Fuck no, it isn't. And pretending that it is, well that's a goddamn shit thing to do. There's another path here, please take it.
P.S. White privilege is something you can't be accused of. It's not a crime... "You're not understanding this thing I'm trying to tell you about because your privilege is preventing empathy here" "I'm not privileged! How dare you accuse me of that! I'm a good person! You're just attacking me!"
Because the way I phrased it above may be ambiguous, let me clarify. The accusation part is when you say "You don't understand this because of your privilege". The accusation is of the form: X because Y.
I do understand it, I simply disagree. Not every disagreement is based in privilege blindness.
You can, of course, counter that I would be blind to my own blindness, which is a fair point to raise, and something everyone should consider. But the reverse should also be carefully considered, whether the argument is not one of privilege but based on a reasoned position and/or commitment to certain important values and principles.
Otherwise, accusations of 'privilege blindness' become a trump card people can throw down to discredit any opposing views. That's the danger of these words - they can rapidly become weaponized.
You informed me that if I only address part of what you post you'll delete my comments for being corrosive to the discussion, so as to the rest of your post:
I've already presented my arguments and evidence for what I've said. You clearly disagree, but I can't do anything else here other that repeat myself, which would be redundant.
Since saying "please reread what I've posted" would be taken as a sign of hostility or thread derailing, let's just agree to disagree.
In this case, it's like slapping someone and then saying you don't want anyone to say that you're slapping someone. Facts are facts.
-Why are you casting this as a witch hunt against men?
-Why is being asked to understand something like [how sexism is passively normalised] suddenly so horrible that it conjures these false claims of persecution?
-If people did normalise sexism, are we not allowed to talk about how that happened?
-Is talking about [specific instances of how sexism was normalised in discussions] a crusade to get everyone who messed up banned?
What's your evidence for anything? All you seem to be doing is insisting you know what @dammit meant better than she did and that, somehow, that means that any and all discussion motivated in learning and understanding how we can behave better as a community towards women is somehow an attack on ... someone. What are you saying should happen instead of this spate of "X because Y" "accusations"?
You're also completely ignoring @dammit's posts. Are they that inconvenient?
And to those who often throw the comment of "can't we just make games instead of arguing on the forums?" my response is this: Don't you think you'd make better, more original games, if you consider the diversity issues and struggles of the people that are so often not represented in games? How would you know about those issues, and the diversity of experience, if no one ever talked about them? Games are so often about people - you can't pretend some people don't exist and expect to make good games.
I've only posted since then to clarify possible ambiguity in the statue post. First, to you, on who I was saying was being threatened with banning, and secondly, in response to @disleckia, on what I meant about accusations of privilege.
For the rest, I've said my piece now.
Clarity of communication is a problem. In this thread alone there have been many posts largely dedicated to asking somebody to clarify what they meant, and while its obviously necessary to make such posts and get clarification, it would surely be better if clarification was not needed in the first place, if users were able to say what it is that they wish to say clearly and unambiguously the first time they say it.
Now obviously communication is hard and being constrained to text makes it even harder and so the exact selection of words is of great importance in conveying meaning and nuance.
As an example that I've wanted to mention for a while is @dislekcia's way of interacting on these forums. Multiple times he's simply asked people some questions with purely good intent, and has been met with defensiveness and accusations of being hostile. As a reader of these same posts and others, I often agree (to some extent at least), the wording comes across as hostile and it sounds as if he's being condescending or accusatory or rude or whatever, when that isn't actually the case at all. From my (comparatively minimal) real-world interactions with him that's just the way he talks, its not his fault or anything, but when trying to communicate with text as your only tool its really hard to get across the intent and tone in the same way that you can when you're face-to-face with somebody.
Speaking of only being able to communicate via text, I haven't been following this thread and so I've just read the whole thing almost from start to finish. More than once in that time, I had to stop and read a sentence three or four times over just to try and see what the person meant, and typing or grammatical errors sometimes make it almost impossible.
Another example is in @dammit's original response to @Pierre's game where the words were:
"...if you want someone like this around? ..."
Do we want him around? (A person making games on the make games forum) Yes!
Do we want him to be blatantly sexist? And show off sexist work? And be applauded for it? No!
Can we help people to understand why such things are detrimental to all parties involved and let everyone grow from the experience? Hopefully!
Admittedly @dammit might not feel this way herself but this is what I think at least, and I can only proceed with the line of thought from my point of view.
I feel like its important to distinguish between the person and the product (after all it keeps being said when talking about responding to criticism that constructive criticism is not a personal attack on the creator of the material being criticized). It is entirely possible that the choice of the word "someone" (as opposed to "something") was entirely arbitrary and that on another day another word could have been used, but when reading what other users have written I take it that what they wrote is exactly what they meant and as a result, would see this as a personal attack on the person, instead of
the product.
This lines up with what @Asbestos was saying in his original reply regarding the rules. Its not that the rules for topic X should say Y, or that there should be no rules for topic X or whatever, but rather that the rules should be carefully crafted such that undesirable outcomes (such as shunning individuals just for having a different opinion) are avoided. As @dislekcia pointed out the rules take time to put together so that they can achieve exactly this goal. Great.
I understand that people are busy and don't have hours of their time to dedicate to writing a forum post, or that English may not be their home language, but I think we should just be mindful of exactly what it is that we write. Read over the post before you post it, think about exactly what it is that you're trying to convey and check that your words accurately convey it.
A nice extreme example to maybe help you understand why this is not okay:
What if the "Kill the Faggot" game dev arrived on these forums and posted that game here? Is that a person you want contributing content to the forum - if we've asked him to take down the problematic content and he has refused even after reasonable people have pointed out why it's not okay? It is fine to just leave him here because he makes games? That's really a bizarre idea. Leaving that content on these forums and allowing the dev to continue posting on these forums while that content is still there would be reinforcing his ideas and passively promoting homophobia and transphobia. Is that something you want to be part of?
This is also not an "attack". This was a conversation starter. And very successful one at that. If it was an "attack" I would have directed my comment at pierre himself rather than at the rest of the people posting in that thread.
Thanks for seeing that's what I'm trying to do when I ask these annoying questions of mine :) We can all do better though and I'm perfectly happy to take your points on board about how saying "someone" instead of "someone's actions" could be seen as a more personal (and thus touchier) thing. Note how in @dammit's reply above she's only talking about a person once that person has made it clear that criticism of their actions will not result in a change to those actions. Once that's happened, do you see why she's saying that things have moved to a different type of discussion? And finally, I just want to address this quickly: Sexism is not just an opinion. It actively harms people and reinforces systemic problems that make people's lives worse (and not just the lives of women either). We can and should be able to judge opinions for the impact they have on other people. Shunning someone over a harmless opinion like, say, "This UI would look better if it were red rather than blue" is a silly reaction, yes. Refusing to let someone on a school education board change the subject after they've mentioned that they don't believe in evolution and aren't going to teach it is not shunning, it's engaging with an opinion that's going to do a lot of harm to try and prevent that damage. As @dammit pointed out above, sometimes asking if a person's positive contribution outweighs their negative impact is a good discussion to have. What's been worrying to both me and her is how people don't seem to believe that sexism has as big an impact as it does. Calling it "just an opinion" and classing it as a thing that can be safely ignored is a version of that. I hope that's not what you meant :)
I want to say that the point still holds some validity in the general case though (even though it now completely lacks a good example). The idea that even just a single word, chosen without a second thought, could cause people to greatly misjudge the tone/intention behind a sentence or an entire post. Although as @dislekcia says (and has been said earlier in this thread), having a positive atmosphere, where people start out assuming that others have good intentions, really helps.
@dislekcia I didn't have sexism in mind when I gave that example, I just used it because I was talking about @Asbestos's post and that was the example that came to mind when reading it. I agree that sexism isn't an opinion in the same way that gravity isn't an opinion.
Now, not one usually to stir the pot, but can't help commented on some points in the recent post of @dammit. For me, this again confirms the claim of @garethf that you want "this person" banned. Kill the faggot? Really? This is an utterly useless comparison. If Pierre had have called his game "Tits and Ass" and made lude sound effects every time her breasts swayed, then I could agree.
Again, don't read this as condoning anything. Just speaking my mind is all.
Also, she stated:
Asking if everyone else wants a certain person around is not the same as requesting that he is banned. I wanted to know what everyone thought about the situation. For example, asking if everyone wants oranges for breakfast is not the same as requesting oranges for breakfast - or even forcing people to have oranges for breakfast.
But, really, seriously, whatever. If this is a witch hunt and you want me to say I want pierre banned and have always wanted pierre banned and that all my posts have been about pierre being banned, sure, here's you winning at the internet.
Now, if that's done, can we please move on? Does anyone have any objections to the list I posted?
I'm fine with all those points except 1 and 5.
5, I've already discussed my problems with. 1 is an opinion asserted as fact to discredit the "empathy and education" approach as being a waste of time.
Because, if you're not going to change anyone's opinion anyway, then there isn't much point in trying. Which makes it easier to justify just throwing out the offender rather than risking them re-offending, since all that can really be done in those circumstances is damage control.
I'm not in favour of writing cynicism into forum guidelines, even if they're informal forum guidelines.
If someone wants to prove that no one can is going to have their minds changed through forum discussion, I'm open to credible evidence proving that people never change their views because of forum discussion.
It is certainly a challenging task, though. That I will give you.
Point 1 doesn't stop people who want to have conversations with anyone in a way as to try and change their minds, but a reminder that it is actually more important to get harmful content removed from the forums rather than tip toeing around issues under the guise of "empathy".
Point 5. The word "ideally" should let you know that it is optional. But your choice of actions (at any point in life) have consequences. One consequence of anyone engaging in passive sexism on these forums is that you'll be called out on it.
Are you talking about the offense being posting sexist content?
Or are you talking about the offense being someone dismissing complaints about the sexist content that they posted and refusing to engage with discussion on the forum about the impact of their actions?
Because if it's the latter, it should be patently obvious why continued forum interaction is a daft idea.
(I also assume here the goal is not to change people's mindsets; just to have damaging content off as soon and decidedly as possible. Of course, people can still have their mind-changing discussions, just not decorated with the content we are trying to disallow.)
You haven't been able to change my mind because your arguments haven't been convincing, at least to me. But I have in the past changed my mind on forums. When presented with sufficiently convincing arguments or evidence. I have also changed the minds of other people and witnessed people changing their minds when interacting with a 3rd party.
I realize that you won't find my assurances convincing. But again, I'm not wanting my opinion written into official rules and guidelines. For egregious breaches (posting a game gleefully advocating hate crimes), yes, for minor missteps (a sexy avatar that is a bit too much) it is unnecessarily alienating to simply delete content without asking.
I realize that people who write empathy in quotation marks might not agree with that opinion.
Perhaps you should read the links you post?
Your assertion is that people can have their minds changed through empathy etc on the forums
Mine is that they cannot.
From your link: So far, the evidence in this thread does not support your (positive) assertion. Anecdotal evidence does not support your assertion. The study that started this thread has been retracted and no longer supports your assertion.
Thanks okay. For the longest time, I haven't been trying to change your mind. The PMs , private conversations and emails I've gotten while having this long-winded thread argument with you have underscored the value - to me - of continuing to have these kinds of conversations. I want to remind you that we are not discussing my "opinions". What pierre posted was sexist - that is a fact. Pierre also did not want to change it - after conversations - that is also a fact. People continued to engage with him thus supporting him and passively endorsing sexism - this is also a fact.
The rules I've suggested are not "opinions" either. They're suggestions to which the entire community is open to question - like you are doing right now. This is actually why I have not suggested simply removing the content without asking - it allows for some discussion and no one feels like they were attacked. Every person is given opportunity to correct there mistakes because - as I've said - we're all human and fallible.
Anyone have any empathy, compassion and understanding to throw at him? Anyone?
If I were to post something here, thinking or believing that it is not sexist (because I didn't realize/know), and another forum members points it out to me (quite politely as was done) that it is, I would apologize, remove the content in question and then start a conversation about how I would/could/should change it. I think that is what the reasonable man would do. If everyone is saying it is harmful except me, I would consider myself to be the common denominator. Again, I believe that most forum members would do that. Wouldn't you? Which is why I am a bit confused as to why some members would rather continue defending the person that posted harmful content. Most of us would have removed the content the moment it was pointed out to us as being harmful or against the goals of the community, regardless of whether we agreed or not, certainly before association members had to get involved. Wouldn't you?