sadmanbarty
Well-known member
It was my fault for checking the forum really, but I saw a user post something the other day saying that Luke’s been routinely, overtly unkind on this forum and it’s wound me up a bit.
It’s a myth that’s become dogma to a narrow but persistently vocal section of users and, as I said before, I’ve found it particularly unkind and particularly unfounded when similar things have been said about me.
So in one last ditch effort to put this particularly unconstructive idea to bed (I say before having a strop about something else the next time I get sucked in lurking), let me try to explain.
I won’t name specific threads so as to hopefully avoid reruns of old fights, but if you do actually look at the ones where Luke’s been accused of “bullying” or “personal attacks” or “borderline nastiness” and you actually read them, those accusations just don’t hold up.
I’m not saying those who said those things were being disingenuous (though admittedly I did naively think so on some occasions at the time). But it really just isn’t the intent. They are just normal behaviours you expect within normal friendship groups (which whether you like it or not this is; we’ve known each other for years and years and years, speaking almost every day to one another in a lot of instances).
Maybe the affectionate tone of posts is harder to pick up for some users when it’s in writing- you don’t have the playful twinkle in the eye or the wry smile to reassure you- but that really isn’t the same as Luke being nasty. It just isn’t (as you can see from the fact that tons of users actively enjoy it when he does the same thing to them, they join in).
So why am I saying this? Well firstly, I think it really is a hurtful thing to say to people. Maybe Luke doesn’t mind, but I remember thinking it’s really unkind when users would imply it about me.
Secondly there is a glaring hypocrisy about who gets piled on and who doesn’t. People are more than happy to tell Luke he’s a terrible bastard because of something (more often than not, inconspicuous) he’s said, but there are users who can behave much, much worse over long stretches of time who largely get a free ride. They’re very rarely picked up for persistently bad behaviour.
Third (the number, not Techno Ayotollah Thirdform), this warped perspective of Luke leads to some harmful behaviour on the forum that brings everything to a stop or spoils the atmosphere. It means people are taking THE MOST innocuous posts and picking fights over them. It means people feel carte blanche to just be outright aggressive and personally unkind because they feel Luka is deserving. Bellicose users can justify their behaviour by telling themselves they’re standing up to a bully, rather than considering they’re in the wrong or at the very least not addressing their concerns in an appropriate tone.
Remember I’ve pretty much had to leave the forum because of how chronically toxic the behaviour on here got. Whatever people want to say, I know that I tried to encourage people and get the forum going. I know I was a sweaty. Save for losing my patience with people during squabbles as everyone does, I can't think of anything genuinely bad I did. Once you remove the conspiracy theories, vague talk of unspecified ‘mind games’ and motivated reasoning you are essentially left with a situation in which quite a nice, playful user was routinely made to feel unwelcome on a forum they’d been a big part of almost every day for half a decade. Look back at old threads, I’d bend over backwards to be reconciliatory and all I was met were accusations of bad faith.
So that really should be pause for thought for the users who, as much as they hate to admit it, really are making this environment toxic. Who are hounding users and not letting people string three sentences together before flying off the rails at them. Who are turning anything certain users say into some perceived egregious insult.
So come on. I’m not saying you all have to hop on board the bants express. If you’d rather not be part of the game politely say so and do try to bare in mind that to lots (possibly most) users feel being included in these bits of play are actually signs of affection, not aggression. No more demonisation. No more nastiness. You’ve lost a user who, whether you liked me or not, did contribute to the forum. Think about that and try to check your behaviour in the future; this can’t just be a forum full of anger and residual tension justified by a flimsy, ultimately arbitrary caricature of Luke.
It’s a myth that’s become dogma to a narrow but persistently vocal section of users and, as I said before, I’ve found it particularly unkind and particularly unfounded when similar things have been said about me.
So in one last ditch effort to put this particularly unconstructive idea to bed (I say before having a strop about something else the next time I get sucked in lurking), let me try to explain.
I won’t name specific threads so as to hopefully avoid reruns of old fights, but if you do actually look at the ones where Luke’s been accused of “bullying” or “personal attacks” or “borderline nastiness” and you actually read them, those accusations just don’t hold up.
I’m not saying those who said those things were being disingenuous (though admittedly I did naively think so on some occasions at the time). But it really just isn’t the intent. They are just normal behaviours you expect within normal friendship groups (which whether you like it or not this is; we’ve known each other for years and years and years, speaking almost every day to one another in a lot of instances).
Maybe the affectionate tone of posts is harder to pick up for some users when it’s in writing- you don’t have the playful twinkle in the eye or the wry smile to reassure you- but that really isn’t the same as Luke being nasty. It just isn’t (as you can see from the fact that tons of users actively enjoy it when he does the same thing to them, they join in).
So why am I saying this? Well firstly, I think it really is a hurtful thing to say to people. Maybe Luke doesn’t mind, but I remember thinking it’s really unkind when users would imply it about me.
Secondly there is a glaring hypocrisy about who gets piled on and who doesn’t. People are more than happy to tell Luke he’s a terrible bastard because of something (more often than not, inconspicuous) he’s said, but there are users who can behave much, much worse over long stretches of time who largely get a free ride. They’re very rarely picked up for persistently bad behaviour.
Third (the number, not Techno Ayotollah Thirdform), this warped perspective of Luke leads to some harmful behaviour on the forum that brings everything to a stop or spoils the atmosphere. It means people are taking THE MOST innocuous posts and picking fights over them. It means people feel carte blanche to just be outright aggressive and personally unkind because they feel Luka is deserving. Bellicose users can justify their behaviour by telling themselves they’re standing up to a bully, rather than considering they’re in the wrong or at the very least not addressing their concerns in an appropriate tone.
Remember I’ve pretty much had to leave the forum because of how chronically toxic the behaviour on here got. Whatever people want to say, I know that I tried to encourage people and get the forum going. I know I was a sweaty. Save for losing my patience with people during squabbles as everyone does, I can't think of anything genuinely bad I did. Once you remove the conspiracy theories, vague talk of unspecified ‘mind games’ and motivated reasoning you are essentially left with a situation in which quite a nice, playful user was routinely made to feel unwelcome on a forum they’d been a big part of almost every day for half a decade. Look back at old threads, I’d bend over backwards to be reconciliatory and all I was met were accusations of bad faith.
So that really should be pause for thought for the users who, as much as they hate to admit it, really are making this environment toxic. Who are hounding users and not letting people string three sentences together before flying off the rails at them. Who are turning anything certain users say into some perceived egregious insult.
So come on. I’m not saying you all have to hop on board the bants express. If you’d rather not be part of the game politely say so and do try to bare in mind that to lots (possibly most) users feel being included in these bits of play are actually signs of affection, not aggression. No more demonisation. No more nastiness. You’ve lost a user who, whether you liked me or not, did contribute to the forum. Think about that and try to check your behaviour in the future; this can’t just be a forum full of anger and residual tension justified by a flimsy, ultimately arbitrary caricature of Luke.
