Tell Me About Your Problem Members

[Uaithne 543]

Okay it's a bit more specific than what the title says. We've had a couple of conversations about whether people would tell other administrators about problem members or keep it to themselves. But it leaves me wondering how people define specific situations. For example, what would you consider to be sexual harassment?

 

This doesn't have to be limited to situations in which you'd warn another admin about the behavior if the problem members go to another site. It can be a problem you've had with a troublesome members, or maybe it's a problem someone had with you where you were (or weren't) the problem member. I'd also like to know if, if applicable, if you'd categorize it in a certain manner because I'm trying to understand the blanket statements applied to certain behaviors. (If you're referring to "bullying" in another thread, I'll have a better idea of what you're talking about, for example.) Though not all situations fall into a category, so that part isn't mandatory.

[lola_shvarek 5]

The 'blanket statements' thing is why I try to look at problem members at a case by case basis. I also don't moderate alone, I think it's very good to have a democratic system. I don't feel comfortable explicity discussing problem members, but I can give you my (and my site's) definition of sexual harassment and bullying.

 

To me, it's when a member does not respect somebody's boundaries and seeks to act sexually (this can be romantic, flirtatious, etc) towards someone who isn't consenting or interested. Again, context varies and no two situations are exactly the same, but the rule of thumb is when people are uncomfortable with the situation and the individual is not respecting that. There's also assuming consent, like assuming that sexual/romantic roleplay extends to someone's real life persona and not just their characters.

 

Bullying is another blanket statement, yes. I think context applies just as much, and it's important to take into consideration the feelings of all persons involved. In my rules, I am more specific about harassment than bullying. It's basically if players get heated to a personal extent, name calling and breaching privacy and making threats. I also take discrimination very seriously and I don't feel obligated to tolerate people who are against somebody elses way of life or how they were born (sexism, lgbt-phobia, racism, etc). As a bottom line, if someone is making my community an unsafe place, they can go somewhere else.

[Death Kitten 200]

I will attempt to mediate anything that comes up, and a vast majority of problems I've come across have been worked out when a third party (that's trusted by those involved) steps in to mediate. But sometimes there is a person who won't compromise and won't respect the other person's boundaries. Those are the problem players.

 

The boundaries can be like what Lola laid out: sexual and romantic, or bullying, or they can be as simple as respecting people when they're slower to write than the problem person likes. But as long as one person doens't respect the other enough to acknowledge and accept the other person's boundaries, there's a problem.

 

I had a problem player recently that was getting hostile in character, and was isolating themself out of character, while giving my XO (co-admin) an earful about everything they disliked about my game. My XO was new to the role, and took it upon herself to try to appease the player, without telling me what was going on*, and the player's frustration was coming up in character so much it was actively disrupting the plot. When my XO finally told me what she'd been doing to try to appease this player, she and I agreed it was time for them to go. And when I told them to leave (I disabled their account, sent them the notification they were gone, and then removed them from the discord), they snapped on me and absolutely confirmed I was 200% correct in my assessment they didn't belong. To the point where they showed me how the way my site software doesn't actually fully lock out a player because they vandalized their character bios to call me names, as well as yelled at me via every chat media they had me on (until I blocked them), then proceeded to leave a really nasty review on another directory site. (Some of you on this site's discord may remember when this happened, I ranted about it a bit.)

 

I've also had a few players in past in games I helped run (but wasn't the head admin on) where players attempted to gaslight me (and others) to varying degrees, some more successful than others. And while I absolutely would have removed those players from those games if it'd been my call, I wasn't able to because it wasn't.

 

*A side note about my XO: she and I talked about what happened after the fact, and I absolutely understand where she was coming from in how she attempted to handle it. At the time we'd been lean on active players, and she wanted to take care of the problem without bothering me. She meant well, there was more information in play that she'd realized and I hadn't yet told her about, and since then we've talked about all of it and have agreed that there's no secrets between us in regards to the sim. So it was a learning experience in the end.

[Naen 2]

I think it all depends on the severity and frequency of the problem. Certainly if you wanted an eye kept on them, thinking it might happen again, then other admins would need informed of it. 

[Elena 546]

Trolls who weren't honest, productive members (ie that one who joins to send inappropriate messages) aside, I have banned, in 7 years and almost a half, I think, only 1 person for being rude and disrespectful. 3 persons who had become toxic for the community had been asked to leave without being banned, and one who didn't know enough English to write with us, but used google translate instead, hadn't been approved and had been told kindly to look elsewhere,

[Uaithne 543]

What if members don't verbalize their boundaries or they are uncomfortable telling another member that the boundaries are being crossed? I've been on both sides of this, and it's pretty hard to recognize.

 

Also I'd like to thank @Morrigan for the note at the top. I wasn't thinking about that aspect when I made the thread. Fortunately I haven't had noteworthy problem members in awhile (I returned to RPing after a break) and it didn't even occur to me that these may be ongoing problems for some of you.

[Death Kitten 200]

It *is* hard when the person being harassed doesn't speak up or ask for help... but there are a lot of times I've seen harassers say 'well, they didn't tell me to stop' when they were very clearly crossing boundaries that they should have known. So then it becomes a judgement call on the part of the admin team. I tend to err on the side of the harassed person, but I will try to take into account if the harasser seems to be genuine in their lack of understanding... unless there's a pattern or they do it again with someone else.

 

You absolutely have to take more into consideration than just what the people involved say happened. You have to look at the larger picture, see how the people involved behave with others too. One thing we're seeing in all these big cases of celebrities and government figures being called out for harassment? A lot of them are claiming they didn't know better. Regardless if they're saying that in ernest or if it's just to try to soften the blow, the fact remains that society has long protected the harassers and has conditioned them to believe that an absence of no is a yes, instead of an absence of a yes is a no. It's a hard mindset to change if that's what you've been taught your whole life, if that's what all of popular media shows, if that's what all your mentors have done. So while we may want to err on the side of being nice to everyone, sometimes kindness means being firm and teaching someone a lesson when they don't understand what they did wrong.

[Death Kitten 200]

It *is* hard when the person being harassed doesn't speak up or ask for help... but there are a lot of times I've seen harassers say 'well, they didn't tell me to stop' when they were very clearly crossing boundaries that they should have known. So then it becomes a judgement call on the part of the admin team. I tend to err on the side of the harassed person, but I will try to take into account if the harasser seems to be genuine in their lack of understanding... unless there's a pattern or they do it again with someone else.

 

You absolutely have to take more into consideration than just what the people involved say happened. You have to look at the larger picture, see how the people involved behave with others too. One thing we're seeing in all these big cases of celebrities and government figures being called out for harassment? A lot of them are claiming they didn't know better. Regardless if they're saying that in ernest or if it's just to try to soften the blow, the fact remains that society has long protected the harassers and has conditioned them to believe that an absence of no is a yes, instead of an absence of a yes is a no. It's a hard mindset to change if that's what you've been taught your whole life, if that's what all of popular media shows, if that's what all your mentors have done. So while we may want to err on the side of being nice to everyone, sometimes kindness means being firm and teaching someone a lesson when they don't understand what they did wrong.

[Richard Castle 7]

I've mentioned this elsewhere, but I've had issues with people using VPN services to get around rules or bans. Obviously, with it being a proxy, we can't keep them off our site nor do we trust every new member we get. It got to a point where we had to temporarily shut down new member registration, which sucked, because once you do that and admit that there's a problem, the site is almost guaranteed to die a slow, painful death.

[Guest BETA BLUE]

2 hours ago, Richard Castle said:

I've mentioned this elsewhere, but I've had issues with people using VPN services to get around rules or bans. Obviously, with it being a proxy, we can't keep them off our site nor do we trust every new member we get. It got to a point where we had to temporarily shut down new member registration, which sucked, because once you do that and admit that there's a problem, the site is almost guaranteed to die a slow, painful death.

1

I have had this problem. It 's the biggest annoyance that people have so little joy in their lives that hey had to mess up a hobby for someone else. It's disgusting that people stalk sites in order to close them for various pathetic reasons.