Journal of Other Forum Analysis (Volume II, Issue 2)

[benji]

https://www.resetera.com/threads/remember-golden-axe.1521922/#post-155020471

I often forget that before polygons, Sega knew how to make really good looking sprites

 

That reminds me of one thing that keeps surprising me. I've seen and even reported posts over time that are absolutely just open hostility, insults, etc... but it seems to get a pass, and those who do get banned for actual hostility often seem to stop just short of a perma-ban even if I've seen 'em be banned like two or three times and never change their behaviour. It's to where I wonder if the reporting/ban system is dysfunctional or overloaded and things get missed, or if certain people are just immune somehow. It's weird, especially when some catch bans for much less.

Obviously is the first one.  

https://www.resetera.com/threads/kamala-harris-says-democrats-need-“expanded-playbook”-floats-dismantling-electoral-college-expanding-scotus-awarding-statehood-to-dc-pr.1521226/page-3#post-155020846

never-
Now imagine if nazi tattoo guy supported a genocide and ran on the american war machine?

The idea that we should be outraged at Platner and not Kamala seems bonkers.

I don’t understand. They act as if Gaza is the only thing that exists. And actively forget and ignore others that have now gotten worse. I absolutely hate this rhetoric.

These are also the same people who told us two years ago that all of Gaza is destroyed and everyone there is dead. Maybe stop bringing it up like anything can be done about it now?

Obviously not a mod here, but I have a pretty long history of doing it elsewhere (forums, Twitch, Discord etc.). This sounds like the ideal, in reality though the poster's notoriety very often factors into decisions some way. A user who has been around longer and has a record of good posting only to make a slip-up or have a bad streak, might be given a bit more consideration when it comes to the severity of a decision when there is ambiguity. Rules are rarely enforced perfectly consistently in cases where there is grey area, because most moderation decisions aren't just getting rid of the "obviously bad" stuff, there is often a ton of nuance involved that you basically have to factor the individuals details of the poster into decisions.

And in some ways, while that sounds bad or unfair, on some level this is the system working as intended. A member who has demonstrated that they're a positive influence in the community is someone you want to try to keep around. Giving the trolls too much leeway to line-step is a bad thing, and so is getting rid of those who make the community a positive and enjoyable space to be in because you were a little too happy to use the ban hammer. You want to be able to give grace where it is due, and take more decisive action where it may be warranted.

(This isn't a knock on mods to be clear, or meant to be a comment on any specific decision or what ResetEra "should" do. It's just giving general background that there is often more nuance in stuff than "user break X rule/get Y punishment.")

This assumes that the "positive influence" is someone who constantly needs "nuance" to protect them from consequences of their actions.

At which point it becomes severely incumbent on the moderators to explain why the rules don't apply to certain posters. And additionally why the system of increasingly severe punishments is one they're also exempt from.

The staff would never want to do this and especially not in the case of Fat4all because there's nothing they hate more than having to explain their decision making. Look at the defenses Fat4all and others are running for him, that it's because the staff hate his sexuality or treat him worse because he's now trans. That trans posters simply can't handle an environment where they're treated the same as everyone else, something hachikoma and others strongly agree with. Even though we're supposed to believe that all of Fat4all's "positive influence" (that nobody can articulate) came before he discovered he was trans due to his love of cock. As if the problem is that the already deliberately twisted system hasn't become perverse enough to balance out all the intersectionality required.

It's all bullshit. Just be honest about wanting the staff to play favorites and reward those who they feel are in the clique by exempting them from the system that everyone considered uncool has to follow beyond the letter of the law. It's exactly on these meaningless topics that y'all reveal how unfit you are to govern. Rather than pursue any simple, clear and fair process for everyone you instead bend over backwards to create an entirely arbitrary system where access to power is all that matters. Then you pat yourself on the back for being "nuanced" and "progressive" for implementing the oldest and regularly corrupt system in the book. Anything but simply be honest with yourself and others.

[Jansen]

I've been mulling over giving my piece on the drama regarding Fat4all because I know we aren't supposed to be relitigating bans and because I know that some of what I have been wanting to say would verge on also breaking the rules regarding thread whining and backseat modding. With that said, I am not going to deny that this whole thing feels like another point of frustration for me that I know a lot of other posters are certainly feeling, so I'm going to go ahead and just post and just accept it if I get dinged for it. My apologies ahead of time for this being long and probably rambling.



Fat4all has undeniably been one of the community icons for a long time. I know her style is not always the easiest for everyone to get along with, and her gimmick posting can sometimes just be...weird. That said, I think her presence is something that has been a net positive for the community and her absence is going to be sorely felt. That her departure from the community is a result of this all is not the best look, and it is also admittedly not the best look when considering her prior clashing with staff (to be clear, I do not think that was really a factor here, but I am also not going to be surprised if people *think* it is given past tensions between the staff and the userbase). I know people often see ban messages referencing posting history as someone dodgy given the site doesn't let us actually see that history, but having been here from the beginning and just remembering when a lot of the more prominent users ate bans and were gone for a time, I know that she does have a past history for getting banned by taking things a little too far, so I don't disagree with there being a ban for a clear rule violation, given parody threads are against the rules and this specific parody thread was directly mocking a specific user, and this one being harsher given said history. She's a prominent member of the community, but I agree that a person should not be exempt from the rules even if they are a prominent poster, and it honestly is frustrating when that *does* happen here (or, it at least *appears* that it does). I wish she wouldn't have bounced from this forum, but I do get that sometimes you do have to make an example.



At the same time, I also get *why* that thread was bound to happen.



I'm going to be blunt. I have not always thought the best of the target of her parody thread in the past (and that includes back when they were posting under their old account before they had that deleted for unfortunate reasons). Like a lot of people here, it was easy to just see them as, at worst, a bot just posting random articles as thread, and, at best, someone who was basically flooding the forum with their RSS feed. I will openly even admit to reporting a lot of their threads because there were times they would just post whole articles (which is supposed to be against the rules), because they were posting things with basically no commentary (also against the rules), and they were posting stuff that really had little point for actually discussing (not necessarily against the rules, but something discouraged).



I've since interacted with them a little more and have just accepted that they are actually a relatively nice person who is just enthusiastic about sharing news (i am bolding this because I specifically want people to take this to mind for themselves), especially if it has to do with their local/regional community. I bare no ill will towards them anymore and have mostly eased off of groaning whenever I see the unmistakable formatting of their thread titles.



That said, the numerous Marriott threads were a step too far and were bound to result in someone finding a creative way to lash out because, at the end of the day, we posters are kind of powerless to do much about trying to curb threads like this. Pushing back in them in the threads themselves is a breach of the threadwhining rule. We get told to report them, but I know I am not the only person who has done so and just been...ignored. We get told set the poster to ignore but that also means we miss out on when that poster posts things that actually *are* worth seeing. We get told to ignore tags, but that also has its weaknesses. We can always just ignore individual threads as they come, but also, like it'll just keep happening as things are the way they are. I can't blame Fat4all for deciding to go the parody route when it probably felt like nothing would be done about those threads.



If it wasn't going to be Fat4all being the one to do it and the poster in question being the one it happened to, it was going to happen to someone else doing something to make light of a different poster because it *has* happened before. We have a number of posters at this site who basically treat the site as a dumping ground for the most random news. I get that one of the benefit of this site is that it can and does serve as a way for people to curate news for discussion, but there are a lot of threads that don't really feel like they ultimately pass the sniff test for being really all that worthy of a thread. Often times, you will even have some of these posters overlapping in the same interests and in their rush to try and create these threads, we will occasionally end up with multiple threads on the same topic, often all with the same barebones effort that often falls short of the effort we've all been asked to give when making new threads. Reporting them often doesn't feel like it does much, unless it is a particularly egregious example. When there is punishment for someone spamming these types of threads, it rarely feels like the punishment amounts to much and those posters are right back to their old habits (which, I do want to reiterate that it feels rare, because I know that there are a few examples of people losing thread making privileges).



I know some people might not see this as a big problem, but I think it has significantly impacted the readability of this forum and has contributed to a lot of potentially good discussion threads getting buried because of the constant flood of low effort news threads. Even some good news threads feel like they also end up getting lost in the weeds because of this issue. I don't want people to stop posting new threads to share information, but I do think it sucks that we are likely going to keep shedding posters who make for good discussions in order to prop up the people who just post threads. Fat4all isn't the first person we've lost because of this and I suspect she won't be the last.



tl;dr: I think this whole drama is a sign that perhaps we need to have some kind of formal dialogue and consideration of an update to the forum rules to maybe curb the sheer amount of low effort threads with little to discuss because I think we are going to keep having people lashing out and potentially get run off the forum if we end up in a situation where we care more about the creation of more threads than we do about the
 quality of discussion.

[HaughtyFrank]

One could wonder why fat4all is banned for three months over a parody thread but it's totally okay for Nepenthe to accuse people of being slave hunters over Luigi Mangione but even asking that question would likely earn you a ban

[benji]

but I do think it sucks that we are likely going to keep shedding posters who make for good discussions in order to prop up the people who just post threads. Fat4all isn't the first person we've lost because of this and I suspect she won't be the last.

List of good discussions that Fat4all has created:

[Boredfrom]

but I do think it sucks that we are likely going to keep shedding posters who make for good discussions in order to prop up the people who just post threads. Fat4all isn't the first person we've lost because of this and I suspect she won't be the last.

List of good discussions that Fat4all has created:

Cum

[benji]

There's also all the threads about the food or sommit that gave him gout.

[simiansmarts]

i wonder if fat4all's end goal is to get mod/admin privileges so he can have a captive audience to his retarded posting like slayven

if he works with the trans mafia, he could probably strong arm his way into that position.

[JoeBoy101]

There's also all the threads about the food or sommit that gave him gout.

Cum

[NekoFever]

I have not always thought the best of the target of her parody thread in the past (and that includes back when they were posting under their old account before they had that deleted for unfortunate reasons).

I think that’s the first open reference I’ve seen to him being an apparently mod-approved alt account.

IIRC the unfortunate reasons referred to were when he demanded an account deletion during one of the regular user revolts and no one else did.

[Let's Cyber]

Fat4all has undeniably been one of the community icons for a long time.

[Nintex]

fat4yall

a guy that licks cum from toilet seats is their community icon

[benji]

In case anyone would like to risk their account by sharing this "positive influence" "community icon" openly declaring for over two years that they wanted B-Dubs to ban them and would be trying to get him to do it:







Related thoughts from the same social circle from over a year ago:



Fuller context of "i want him to ban me", they're talking about Kingdom Come Deliverance 2 not getting forum-wide banned:

Spoiler:  (click to show)(click to hide)

[benji]

If B-Dubs literally wouldn't perm him and only give him month long bans because of his demanding it on Bluesky (while staying silent on Era about his complaints), then

[Greatness Gone]

He wants to be some sort of faggy forum martyr so bad 

“I want him to perma me so baddd!!!111” but literally got sent into a depressive episode because of a three month ban

[benji]

That's not even half his Bluesky tweets bitching about being banned for like a week or so, it's just the ones where he openly declares wanting to be permed by B-Dubs thinking it would cause an uprising. Now a major complaint in the constructive thread is how nobody even knew he got banned again. 

[kaleidoscopium]

Another reminder that no one uses bluesky

[kaleidoscopium]

In my humble opinion, Rousey's main issue is she hangs around problematic people. Now, thats on her, but Carano she isn't. I won't be watching.

She's a sandy hook "truther" isn't she? So no fuck her, awful person.

Transphobic as well

https://www.resetera.com/threads/netflix-announces-gina-carano-vs-ronda-rousey-whoever-wins-we-lose.1438180/page-4#post-155053462

[benji]

Surprised they're so ignorant of the dossier on Rousey. She was cancelled years ago. And then she went to work for the WWE.  

Nobody in this thread even mentions her time in the WWE but they're writing fanfic about her renouncing her fash views in character inbetween posts about "science" proving trans women have no advantage: https://www.reddit.com/r/AEWFanHub/comments/1rx6cqh/ronda_rousey_in_aew_transphobia/

Lucky_Guarantee_3552
2mo ago
Filthy queer enby here - I believe she’s demonstrated that she is open to working on her harm and ignorance, and that’s ideal in this climate. I want them to write it in - Come to AEW when you betray your old fash ideals, please. Love that. Betray them louder. Come to AEW with dramatic support for Thunder Rosa. Be better. Make a show of your conversion to human rights.

I listened to a relationship podcast where she was a guest and she said sane, human things, that led me to believe she has critical thinking skills. I’m not saying clean slate , but she isn’t hateful or stupid. Hold her feet to the fire on this as fans!

Blorkablorkbleep
2mo ago
I would be so pumped if they wrote it in. Have her get interrupted by someone calling her out for being a bigot and redeem her character either by apology or just beating it out of her, forcing a change in heart. This all sounds dumb and corny typed out but I believe it could be done well. It would be nice to know Rousey isn't the bitch whiny bitch she is portrayed as on social media and she's willing to change and work the business.

Lucky_Guarantee_3552
2mo ago
I’m saying! True Kayfabe. Maximum Kayfabe. I hope they don’t botch this by being boring and doing whatever dumb shit her agent is into.

Blorkablorkbleep
2mo ago
Truly the worst thing they could do is be silent about it entirely. They didn't hire Trey Miguel for comments he made and immediately apologized for, and kept the briscoes off television because of comments made years before. So to hire Rousey seems odd, as a fan of TK's 2026 hiring spree picks. Is she just a celebrity hire to get UFC fans to watch? I hope it's something more than that.

[Jansen]

Honestly, I've been thinking about this a lot and, while I do get the logic, I do think this is the wrong way to go about it.

Instead of not posting in threads where we don't think we can make a contribution, why don't we just post in threads about things we find enjoyable instead? Why do we go into these sorts of threads where we only make ourselves angry in the first place? If we all sat down and said, "I want to post about things that excite me, things that interest me, things that bring me joy and happiness" then the culture would change overnight.

It's not just about posting happy news and stuff either, it's having a positive discussion on the topic. So instead of, "Hey congrats to the devs for that game selling so well" why not "That's really awesome, I bet it was because of this thing in the game that I really like," which then turns the thread talking about why they like the game so much. Instead of a bunch of positive drive-bys, it turns into a real conversation, the sort of conversation I imagine the developers would love to see and all that requires is a slight shift in how we talk about the topic.

The truth is the mods and I don't set the tone of the community, the posters do. All of us. When we let people who are overly negative or just try and shut down discussions they don't want to see win, when we don't make constructive posts about things we like, then the people acting like schmucks win. The solution isn't to post less, it's to post more in topics and threads we actually find joy in.


This is generally what OTs are meant to be and why they really do need to be refreshed far more often than they currently are. If an OT is refreshed every three months, for example, then it gets to spend like three months a year in the main forum and that helps bring in new faces. The problem is people drift toward these huge megathreads that run for years and years and when we go in to try and get someone to refresh the thread we get met with "we don't wanna" and we either have to force it and piss people off or the megathread sticks around and becomes far harder to break into
.

[Gameboy Nostalgia]

If B-Dubs literally wouldn't perm him and only give him month long bans because of his demanding it on Bluesky (while staying silent on Era about his complaints), then

BASED B-DUBS?! 

[Gameboy Nostalgia]

List of good discussions that Fat4all has created:

Cum

best post of weekend bire

[benji]

I like the Bluesky theory that B-Dubs, and B-Dubs alone, is behind everything they dislike and the rest of the staff, like Nepenthe, are completely cowed by his powerful presence. All 300+ staff, even the trans staff (not there's enough of them) and other marginalized staff, completely in B-Dubs irrepressible thrawl. Even after destroying PoliEra to prevent Nepenthe from having to explain why she wanted genocide or allowing the Nazi comparisons. Those must have been the times they were able to resist, proving all the other bad times are B-Dubs.

[Gameboy Nostalgia]

y'all forget how he told nep to eat his ass? She's emotionally and physically scarred from that textual assault.

[Gameboy Nostalgia]

He really is the mastermind of everything. 

[Taco Bell Tower]

https://www.resetera.com/threads/sony-published-the-best-multiplayer-game-of-all-time-nintendo-should-steal-it-and-reskin-it-as-a-star-fox.1522510/

Today, Nintendo is my favorite publisher, but in the Wii era I was falling off them hard. A lot of their priorities just weren't landing with me.

But thankfully, the PS3 was there to save gaming for me. And the crown jewel of the PS3 library was a little game called WARHAWK.

First, let me just reminisce how good we had it back then. PSN was *free,* and you could download a Warhawk demo that you could easily play forever. But of course, the full game was even better.

The secret sauce to it all was how you could play with up to four players in local splitscreen while being in an online 16v16 match at the same time. So when playing Capture the Flag, you and a roomful of IRL friends could work together driving jeeps, tanks and the eponymous planes (which can switch between hovering like a helicopter and flying like a jet), taking on the world across vast, beautiful maps where the violence never felt offputting (thank you, goofy ragdoll physics) but where the action always felt impactful, whether it was the controller rumbling in your hand as you streaked across the sky in a frantic dogfight, or your turret shooting down pursuing jets from the back of a jeep as your buddy slammed the pedal and booked it back to base with flag in hand.

While I feel Warhawk did it best, there were obviously other games prior to it that had similar qualities. One of them was actually the multiplayer mode in Star Fox Assault. The maps were smaller, but you could still freely jump in and out of arwings and landmasters, and even zip around with jetpacks.

I can't help but dream about that same multiplayer mode but scaled up to Warhawk PS3 levels, and with the stunning visuals of Star Fox on Nintendo Switch 2.

They could go even more ham on the "furry fanservice," too. For example, let everyone create their own animal OC, and then include the fursona-style vtuber avatars for everyone in GameChat, even in public matches (no safety risk when all the other side sees is your cat/dog/frog/whatever yapping away!).

[Let's Cyber]

y'all forget how he told nep to eat his ass?

I'm missing out on years of lore and need to catch up

[benji]

I'm missing out on years of lore and need to catch up

All the way back in the first volume (arrows by the "Bire username wrote" will take you to the place in that thread), there's more fallout in the first part of this volume, B-Dubs would wind up deleting this post:

B-Dumbs vs Nep
https://www.resetera.com/threads/biden-administration-no-longer-supporting-an-immediate-ceasefire-in-lebanon.1005735/page-9#post-130015242

I am not bullshitting Dubs. You know me. However, you were bullshitting when you earlier compared the Ukranian people to the Palestinians.

Honestly, fuck off with this. Seriously. I was going to go back and get rid of it, but nah. Fuck off. Eat the hell out of me.

Like there's a HUGE fucking gap between wanting to protect people and pulling the lever reluctantly and the GOP pulling the lever so that billionaires can become multi-billionaires and you know that. You know that's different.

Going to be really real, if you're going to hold people accountable for that then they have every right to hold you accountable for staying home if Trump wins.

FIGHT!!! FIGHT!!!! FIGHT!!!!

Posts that pissed him off:

The rest of Professor Nepenthe's lecture:

You can do all of these things to protect yourself and your community, and you can also vote for the lesser of two evils -- without an endorsement of their unfavorable policies -- as a means of protection.

That is true, but again you cannot vote for someone and then talk out of the side of your neck that you're not endorsing them. We did not allow Trump voters to say "I'm not voting for the racism," so I'm not allowing anyone else any quarter for their chosen candidate. This principle must remain logically consistent. Ultimately, a vote is a wholesale endorsement. It is you saying "I am empowering you to do as much as you can within your term." Again, people need to be honest about this.

I don't really have a way to reconcile those things, other than to say that there is no such thing as a perfect candidate, and that perfect is the enemy of good in situations like this, and we can still vote for the candidate that's generally considered to be good in this instance.

I think it's irrelevant to appeal to this aphorism because people aren't looking for a perfect candidate inasmuch as they're looking for a candidate that aligns 100% with every single political opinion they have. People are looking for a candidate that won't support genocide. That should be a red line that peoeple can unite on but here I am at 12:30 at night on a video game forum fighting to get people to understand why that is a red line.

The fox has vowed to protect us from the wolf, who is the biggest threat to the farm. It's unfortunately possible that some of the chickens won't make it out alive if we accept the fox's help but we can't have a chicken coop, much less any chickens to put in it, if the wolf is allowed onto the farm since the wolf intends to eat us too.

We can accept the fox's help while keeping our eyes open to the reality that the fox is a carnivore that REALLY likes the taste of chicken.

Allowing the fox to eat the chickens is an admittance that the fox is not actually adequate protection from the wolf eating the chickens. Chickens are still getting eaten. It must also be noted that the fox is not actually going to let you build the coop either. After all, how will he get his free chickens? He'll delay things, say that systemic barriers prevented him from killing the wolf, say that another fox friend of his didn't want to vote with the plan, but ultimately assure you that he's definitely going to secure that wood any day now! "Change takes time.".... Huh, would you look at that. The fox and wolf are eating another chicken together. Weird.

Furthermore, the wolf does not intend to eat all of us, nor can he. People who blend into the wolf's pack or aren't easy targets for the wolf to pick off will be fine. We are not actually in this together on equal footing and never have been. It is the convenient veneer of "togetherness and unity" when it suits a person politically on one hand and the self-preservation aspects of the other hand that is part of the reason for why we're here. When Harris wins (I legitimately believe she will), and Era folks are thanking Black people for "saving the country" yet again, I will keep in mind their absence from threads concerning Black oppression, the lack of threads in general on the fights and genocides occuring on African continent, and outright hostility to the discussion of reparations that always happens.

Liberals want our votes but don't actually care to return the favor in terms of material change because it's really about the maintenance of US hegemonic power within their hands and not actually the freedom of Black people. I deserve better fucking allyship than that, and so do those in the Middle East if you claim to care about those lives.

The simple fact of the matter is that your vote DOES count. The simple fact of the latter is that your lack of vote DOES count, and that because of the fact that the Republicans manage to come together and vote as a unit to support right-wing policy, something that those of us on the left can't seem to do, a lack of vote, a write-in, or a third party vote does nothing but split the party and benefits the Republicans.

I don't need to explain that to you either.

I understand that my vote counts inasmuch as Harris would really like for me to give it to her. But I would really like for her to commit to changing the US' Middle Eastern foreign policy. She does that, I vote. It's that simple. She's my potential public servant. I'm not hers. I don't work for her, so I don't owe her shit. However, If she has made the calculus that she can lose my vote in Georgia and still be fine, then we just go our separate ways on the matter.

But once again, I implore you and others to recognize that Republican voters are not this amoprhous force that they're seemingly being characterized as. They are not a tsunami against the dam that is Democratic intervention. They are voters with responsibility just like anyone else. Every single vote Trump gets is the result of an asshole who used their power to try and put him in the White House. It's not the fault of people who didn't vote for Trump.

Sure. In a sane world, that would make sense. If the candidates were low-stakes and if the Republicans were also reasonable but not ideal, this would be a fair strategy.

But we are not in that sane world and the alternative is Donald Trump, a man who actively supports a fascist white supremacist uprising and has repeatedly gone on record proudly exclaiming that he'll make it so that people won't be voting anymore if he wins.

Is this you saying that the Democratic Party is essentially insane? Because this really is a quagmire of their own making.

What we need is massive-scale reform, and the only options to get reform are by voting in candidates who support it... or violence.

Again, this is a patently false dichotomy and is exemplary of the binary and flat thinking that people have towards true revolution (not reform). Mass organization by the masses in various sectors of society absolutely can affect systemic change and has all throughout human history. Violence may come, but acting like violence- both overt state and military violence, as well as slow systemic violence from capitalism utterly raping the planet- is not present within this current system that you are intent on upholding is false.

Then you support Harris.

You don't get a line-item vote of a candidate's platform. You don't get to vote for the potential of securing trans care and abortion rights while saying no to the foreign policy and immigration bullshit. You are agreeing to all of it when you vote for a candidate. That is what a vote is- a transfer of political power from you to someone else to do whatever they say on their platform they want to do.

Ergo, you don't get to weasel your way out of the material and moral consequences that your power gives any given candidate. Y'all didn't allow Trump voters to distance themselves from the racism just because they said they only voted for the tax breaks. So stand on that principle then.

You support Harris. You disliking some of her positions doesn't matter, and frankly at this point no one should care whether or not you like a candidate that you say you're going to vote for because those crocodile tears are meaningless. You are going to give her the power to enact all of it come November. So be an adult and stand on that.

Honestly, no. Just no. This is kinda bullshit and I think you know that. Under this logic, anyone voting to protect their own lives or the lives of the people they care about or the lives of their people would be responsible for every single bad thing done by said politician. There's a HUGE difference between the Trump voters who literally run around being racist shitheels and bragging about it, people who have been tacitly endorsing the GOP's bigotry the whole way through, and people who have to hold their noses to vote for people in order to protect the people they love from literal death. Fuck that. Seriously, if Trump gets in office and the ACA goes away I'm dead. So if I vote to prevent that, to protect myself from literally dying or going into a debt that I can't ever really climb out of, then I'm endorsing everything Harris does? If I vote for Harris to protect my LGBTQ+ friends from the literal libsoftiktok people taking over the government and persecuting them then I'm endorsing genocide in Gaza?

Life has hard choices and we're forced to compromise our ideals sometimes. Do I wish it was easier? Yeah, I really really do. But this post really ain't it and while you're saying you're not saying "voting for someone means endorsing everything they do," there's really no other way to read it. The logic ends at holding people voting to protect their families, loved ones, and themselves accountable for a genocide that they have no real say in.

I tend to agree with you more often than not, and maybe you weren't elegant enough here to explain what you meant, but this, as it's written, ain't it.

I am not bullshitting Dubs. You know me. However, you were bullshitting when you earlier compared the Ukranian people to the Palestinians.

We can pretend like voting for only A, B, C of a Democrat's platform is not a wholesale endorsement of the entire platform while simultaneously saying all Trump voters inherently supported a racist platform even while they were insisting to our faces that they were economically anxious and wanted the tax breaks. Or we can maintain some level of actual political and moral consistency and examine our place within a system that constantly promotes imperialist outcomes.

And it's not even really an extremely strong moral condemnation I'm leveling at loyal Democrats, at least no more than what I leveled at myself for voting for Obama and Biden (especially Biden, because hoo-boy I haven't forgotten what he did to my people with the crime bill). I'm not even saying anything I haven't leveled on myself, and I would not necessarily be convinced by anyone in this thread that I was not complicit within this country's awful foreign policies when I cast my vote for these men. I also wouldn't want the assuagement or pity. My choices are mine and mine alone to deal with. Being an American means inherently being stuck as a cog in this death machine and, if you're somewhat empathetic, it's a constant struggle with trying to do your best to mitigate the damage you will wring as an unwilling participant in this system for the time you've got on this Earth.

If anyone votes for Harris to protect their loved ones, then that's the lever they're pulling. But they cannot then turn around to me and say that they care equally for anyone affected by Middle Eastern policy. Like, on the surface, they're admitting that their family and friends come first. And humans being humans are going to act in ways that protect those whom they consider to be part of their proverbial tribe or pack. This isn't really surprising or excessively condemnable, per se; I'm not Peter Singer levels of extreme.

Hell, I imagine if you rig the hypothetical situation enough, I could be convinced to vote for Harris if, like, I was absolutely convinced me and my family were going to be wiped out if I didn't, because I also have an instinct of self-preservation. Indeed, this instinct not being activated right now in this election could be used against me by you and others to say I truly think trans Americans and Americans with disabilities are worth sacrificing. Although, I once again remind you that these demographics have still not been afforded the full protection they deserve, and the lack of protections are also something most Americans don't have a say in because this country is not run off of political will by the people, but by corporate lobbying.

Regardless, the point is that I would also not be looking for sympathy or forgiveness from anyone in the Middle East for the decision. I would not be complaining about how "hard" it is because it "conflicts with my morals." I really don't believe this conflict is meaningful for people saying this but yet saying they're going to vote for Harris anyway, because it's not actually influencing your behavior. Indeed, there is nothing to materially lose for the mere act of voting for a Democrat in the overwhelming majority of social positions, especially since your vote is largely private.

All I am looking for is some level of moral consitency and a willingness for people to examine their complicitly in an effort to understand why people like me have taking the position that they have.

Initial fallout starts around here:

https://www.resetera.com/threads/biden-administration-no-longer-supporting-an-immediate-ceasefire-in-lebanon.1005735/page-10#post-130044888

That edit post was heinous. It's amazing how much can be swept away just like that when a mod does it. Especially a mod that lost their cool in such a disappointing way.

yeah, it's something to come at a queer POC with that sexually charged hostility, another thing entirely to do so publicly to a subordinate
fuck the TOS, that conduct would get you cut from any paying job

Constructive:

Well uh, after seeing that other post...

Are there any measures in place for staff accountability when they hurl insults and abuse (which are obviously not permitted by regular users and would earn a hefty ban) towards other users, including (and this is the first time I see it, personally) their own staff?

dont think anyone else would be allowed to edit their post like that either

Yeah, the management verbally abusing their staff in front of everyone is not acceptable.

Not at all surprising. All I'll say.

would love to know as well

that post is the one i quoted here, seeing as how after spewing sexually hostile venom at a queer POC subordinate, and then followed their usual pattern and simply deleted the post

which has been the pattern for quite some time now: from the palestinian/muslim era exodus, to leftists & socialists, and other groups either silenced or pushed out.  a tantrum is thrown, harm is created, and after enough pressure, they simply edit out some words, lock the thread, or otherwise dip out & take a break

there is never any actual community accountability.  numerous instances of behavior that would & has gotten others permabanned (for much less, if we're talking about the aforementioned target groups) are literally covered up, even while that post in particular shows how this harmful behavior has only been getting worse

how many more examples of this need to happen before actual change is brought about?  i can't keep count of all the splinter communities created either directly by this pattern, or at best, under this direction of general management

at the very least, nep deserves a public apology

 

B-dubs is a dead man walking. Big Trans Boss Kyuuji piling on the pressure.

This all started with Nepenthe arguing to B-Dubs that he had a duty to die to protest Gaza rather than vote for Democrats. The guy is such a loser he then didn't vote, while Nepenthe did because she's somehow more dishonest than the rest of them.

[Gameboy Nostalgia]

benji the doxxer at it again with the info

[benji]

benji the doxxer at it again with the info

FACT CHECK: Holding capitalists accountable to community justice.

[Gameboy Nostalgia]

benji the doxxer at it again with the info

FACT CHECK: Holding capitalists accountable to community justice.

sure thing, boss