wD Mafia Master Post

[worcej]

I wrote a post and then deleted it.

This conversation is difficult, because we all still feel strongly about the incident, and we can't really discuss a path forward without talking about it, but unless we intend to ban someone for the events that transpired, I think that we're better off avoiding details that aren't strongly necessary for getting to that path forward. I don't think I'm any more likely to convince worcej of my positions on the underlying differences between us than he is me.

I don't expect you and I to ever be friends in any way, but I can easily play games of Mafia without berating you or making you feel uncomfortable.

All I can do is control myself and be better for this community. I hope you try to do the same.

[dargorygel]

I wrote a post and then deleted it.

This conversation is difficult, because we all still feel strongly about the incident, and we can't really discuss a path forward without talking about it, but unless we intend to ban someone for the events that transpired, I think that we're better off avoiding details that aren't strongly necessary for getting to that path forward. I don't think I'm any more likely to convince worcej of my positions on the underlying differences between us than he is me.

In the end, I share those worries/concerns, ghug. But i also see value in airing them in HERE, and hopefully the articulations will enable 'us' to feel heard... and make some conclusions about what we will do NEXT time... smile, drink medium amounts of good bourbon... and play Mafia.

I can't promise medium amounts.

"Medium" is so very, very, very relative.

[Fluminator]

Yeah, to expand on some of the things, implementing more rules is probably not going to solve anything.

As Darg said, if the rules we currently have didn't work, I don't really think adding a "do not be toxic" rule will help things. Because it's such a fuzzy line. Mafia is a very aggressive game. If someone is always extremely aggressive to one player for example, that could be interpreted as personally targeting or being toxic.
I also think the threat of modkill won't stop players from bending the rules and pushing boundaries. That's why I think players should be aware the GM can request game bans from the council for certain players. When the council was first implemented this was in place and it worked well enough.

Being in the mix at the time, the GMs commanded everyone to stop escalating things and were promptly ignored, and I think a part of it was no one expected their "last word" on the topic would be the thing that pushes them into a modkill. Everyone knows no GM doesn't want to modkill anyone. (That's at least how I felt). Also in the heat of the moment they don't really care.
But yeah, the future game ban threat would stop people from pushing the boundaries in the first place, because the tolerance level can be a lot less at a practical level. And even if they don't ever learn, that's just less games they can be in and ruin.

[BunnyGo]

My point is I'd have called Durga the same thing if she was a man. It was not gendered, but was received as gendered, thus I am in the wrong.

So yes, with that important context established, I can spend several paragraphs saying how I profusely apologized for my sexist comment and in the same breath say that your comment wasn't intended to be sexist.

I understand what you are saying, but what you are saying is wrong. Its the equivalent of saying calling someone a Jew for being cheap isn't anti-Semitic because you call all your cheap friends Jews regardless of whether they are Jewish or not. Do you see why that is problematic?

The issue I have with the example presented here (and what I countered with Durga when she presented the N word) is that the word you're using is such an obvious 'no-no' due to the racism and history of the word. Perhaps I am splitting hairs, but obvious~racist~words are a duuuuuh where 'a female dog' is used a lot more liberally now and days.

I am not saying what I did wasn't problematic - again, I own that portion that what I did was in the wrong and it isn't tolerable.

I'm largely in agreement with you about a lot of things, but I'm going to suggest you reconsider your position here on two counts:

1) Jew is not always a no-no word (although, yes it's quite jarring in the context above). For a hilarious and accurate example of this difference please see: It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia Season 2 Episode 2 "The gang goes jihad" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mLIS7qAWeaA)

2) "where 'a female dog' is used a lot more liberally now and days." Maybe it shouldn't be? Maybe it only is in your group or other groups you don't want to be affiliated with? I don't use it nearly as much as I used to when I was younger. And when I do it is not done in humor nor at my best.

[BunnyGo]

While I abhor psychobabble, other than MINE... I'll answer, bunny. Even though it will reveal my deep inner insecurities and strange issues.

First, I need to have my self identity as a goldfish acknowledged.

But more seriously, I need to have the position of GM and Council respected. Not ME... but it offended and offends me that the GM and Council in 'that game' were ignored repeatedly.

Sure, psychobabble is useless. But the intentions can help. You put a lot of work into this group, just so other people can play a game. And not just you, the structure of organization set up so people (like me) can randomly show up and play. You need that effort and organization respected.

[worcej]

I understand what you are saying, but what you are saying is wrong. Its the equivalent of saying calling someone a Jew for being cheap isn't anti-Semitic because you call all your cheap friends Jews regardless of whether they are Jewish or not. Do you see why that is problematic?

The issue I have with the example presented here (and what I countered with Durga when she presented the N word) is that the word you're using is such an obvious 'no-no' due to the racism and history of the word. Perhaps I am splitting hairs, but obvious~racist~words are a duuuuuh where 'a female dog' is used a lot more liberally now and days.

I am not saying what I did wasn't problematic - again, I own that portion that what I did was in the wrong and it isn't tolerable.

I'm largely in agreement with you about a lot of things, but I'm going to suggest you reconsider your position here on two counts:

1) Jew is not always a no-no word (although, yes it's quite jarring in the context above). For a hilarious and accurate example of this difference please see: It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia Season 2 Episode 2 "The gang goes jihad" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mLIS7qAWeaA)

2) "where 'a female dog' is used a lot more liberally now and days." Maybe it shouldn't be? Maybe it only is in your group or other groups you don't want to be affiliated with? I don't use it nearly as much as I used to when I was younger. And when I do it is not done in humor nor at my best.

1)My Jewish friends would disagree with you on this and the word is inherently negative slang...

2) Not going to deny this - my use of the word today (at work) was in context I knew wouldn't be offensive. For here: I should've thought more when I used it here, but didn't because of my liberal use in other places.

[kgray]

lmao okay Bunny, I love Always Sunny but you can't use that as an example for why things aren't offensive

The whole point of that show is to use unacceptable humor. The first episode is literally called "The Gang Gets Racist."

[kgray]

Also would someone be willing to run a mini game while we wait for Chaqa's and Eden's non-mafia thing?

[BunnyGo]

@worcej, none of you jewish friends would think that Sunny is missing the mark there. The first use is 100% correct, accurate, and appropriate. The second isn't. If anyone ever disagrees, you can site this post. I hereby give you permission as a representative that a phrase such as "We don't have a problem with Jews" or "That Bunny from the website said I could refer to people as Jews instead of always needing to say 'person of the jewish faith who may or may not be religious'."

@kgray. Really. It is not inherently an offensive word. That said, @Tom, your use was pushing decorum.

[BunnyGo]

lmao okay Bunny, I love Always Sunny but you can't use that as an example for why things aren't offensive

The whole point of that show is to use unacceptable humor. The first episode is literally called "The Gang Gets Racist."

The joke of that clip was how clueless Dennis is. He cannot fathom that the word can be used appropriately because he is so anti-semitic that he can only use it derogatorily. The show isn't just unacceptable, it's very well written and insightful (the Racist episode was thoughtful in its boundary pushing--but I'll not speak for another community).

[BunnyGo]

@worcej, none of you jewish friends would think that Sunny is missing the mark there. The first use is 100% correct, accurate, and appropriate. The second isn't. If anyone ever disagrees, you can site this post. I hereby give you permission as a representative that a phrase such as "We don't have a problem with Jews" or "That Bunny from the website said I could refer to people as Jews instead of always needing to say 'person of the jewish faith who may or may not be religious'."

@kgray. Really. It is not inherently an offensive word. That said, @Tom, your use was pushing decorum.

https://forward.com/ (leading liberal american jewish paper uses it in their tagline)

[Fluminator]

To repeat some things from another observer's point of view of the whole debacle regarding Durga.

Some players were extremely aggressive to Durga specifically at the start when Durga was being very milquetoast comparatively and I could not recognize any difference in her aggression level compared to any other player.
She basically disengaged and voted ND saying she didn't want to deal with it.

And there were quite a few people who came in with "both sides need to calm down" bullshit.
It eventually escalated and the people defending her did cross the line eventually, but at the start that was absolutely garbage to say Durga was being as toxic as some of the other people.
I'm not calling out anyone as sexist, but I do wonder why her actions are considered so much more "aggressive and toxic" comparatively to other players when at least from my point of view there is literally no difference.

That was the core issue that I think triggered a lot of the escalation, and this is what one side still doesn't seem to get and is bothering the other, even though apologies have been made.

With specifics to Worcej, he's outright admitted that he doesn't like Durga after their time GMing together and it colours his perception on everything she does so I can see why he'd read her as much more toxic than she is, but I'm really disappointed in some of the other people who were admonishing Durga well before she crossed any line in this case because the simplest explanation as to why is a depressing one.

Again I really don't think I'm giving a free pass to Durga because we've had a ton of arguments in the past and I've even called her out in the past on other things (and vice versa lmao) and I'm not the type to simp for the sake of simping.

[worcej]

@worcej, none of you jewish friends would think that Sunny is missing the mark there. The first use is 100% correct, accurate, and appropriate. The second isn't. If anyone ever disagrees, you can site this post. I hereby give you permission as a representative that a phrase such as "We don't have a problem with Jews" or "That Bunny from the website said I could refer to people as Jews instead of always needing to say 'person of the jewish faith who may or may not be religious'."

@kgray. Really. It is not inherently an offensive word. That said, @Tom, your use was pushing decorum.

I just don't call them Jews or label people by their religion. I find religion to be inherently divisive and avoid it personally...

[Hellenic Riot]

Many years ago, back in 2016 or whenever, this conversation first came up after numerous events of similar vitriolic conditions. Back then, the solution was to first form the Mafia Council (so as to avoid the mod team having to moderate Mafia), which had a mandate to make an attempt at fixing each of the things which had been creating Mafia drama back then. It was pretty successful, and mafia generally got much friendlier/less dramatic (whether that was because of one of the main initiators back then being banned or because of the council itself could be a matter of debate).

It seems that in the years since then, the Council very much receded in prominence as there weren't significant issues occurring anymore. But when it comes to the game in question, I feel the main reason it was ignored was because it was badly mishandled initially by the GM who attempted to brush it under the rug (sorry PE), and there was far too much equivocation at that time, which meant that things had escalated to a point whereby it was too little too late by the time any serious attempts to actually shut it down began. A critical mass of vitriol had occurred and it was dominating the thought process of multiple players. Whilst you could delve into it and portion blame out to each individual act of escalation that occurred in that chain of events, at the end of the day the primary reason that it blew out of control was because it was mishandled by the GM when they had the chance to shut it down, and I don't think that digging in to blame every individual post is going to be beneficial in any way here.

It could and should have been cut out at the root, and the main lesson to be learnt here is that that's what should be done in future.

[BunnyGo]

@worcej, none of you jewish friends would think that Sunny is missing the mark there. The first use is 100% correct, accurate, and appropriate. The second isn't. If anyone ever disagrees, you can site this post. I hereby give you permission as a representative that a phrase such as "We don't have a problem with Jews" or "That Bunny from the website said I could refer to people as Jews instead of always needing to say 'person of the jewish faith who may or may not be religious'."

@kgray. Really. It is not inherently an offensive word. That said, @Tom, your use was pushing decorum.

I just don't call them Jews or label people by their religion. I find religion to be inherently divisive and avoid it personally...

This is getting off-topic, but it's as much an ethnicity. Seeing people for who they are or their culture is not by itself divisive. I do understand many people have had unpleasant experiences with religion, that's cool too.

[BunnyGo]

Many years ago, back in 2016 or whenever, this conversation first came up after numerous events of similar vitriolic conditions. Back then, the solution was to first form the Mafia Council (so as to avoid the mod team having to moderate Mafia), which had a mandate to make an attempt at fixing each of the things which had been creating Mafia drama back then. It was pretty successful, and mafia generally got much friendlier/less dramatic (whether that was because of one of the main initiators back then being banned or because of the council itself could be a matter of debate).

It seems that in the years since then, the Council very much receded in prominence as there weren't significant issues occurring anymore. But when it comes to the game in question, I feel the main reason it was ignored was because it was badly mishandled initially by the GM who attempted to brush it under the rug (sorry PE), and there was far too much equivocation at that time, which meant that things had escalated to a point whereby it was too little too late by the time any serious attempts to actually shut it down began. A critical mass of vitriol had occurred and it was dominating the thought process of multiple players. Whilst you could delve into it and portion blame out to each individual act of escalation that occurred in that chain of events, at the end of the day the primary reason that it blew out of control was because it was mishandled by the GM when they had the chance to shut it down, and I don't think that digging in to blame every individual post is going to be beneficial in any way here.

It could and should have been cut out at the root, and the main lesson to be learnt here is that that's what should be done in future.

Are there any lessons from the halcyon days of the Council that could be used to set the community on a better course?

[President Eden]

Many years ago, back in 2016 or whenever, this conversation first came up after numerous events of similar vitriolic conditions. Back then, the solution was to first form the Mafia Council (so as to avoid the mod team having to moderate Mafia), which had a mandate to make an attempt at fixing each of the things which had been creating Mafia drama back then. It was pretty successful, and mafia generally got much friendlier/less dramatic (whether that was because of one of the main initiators back then being banned or because of the council itself could be a matter of debate).

It seems that in the years since then, the Council very much receded in prominence as there weren't significant issues occurring anymore. But when it comes to the game in question, I feel the main reason it was ignored was because it was badly mishandled initially by the GM who attempted to brush it under the rug (sorry PE), and there was far too much equivocation at that time, which meant that things had escalated to a point whereby it was too little too late by the time any serious attempts to actually shut it down began. A critical mass of vitriol had occurred and it was dominating the thought process of multiple players. Whilst you could delve into it and portion blame out to each individual act of escalation that occurred in that chain of events, at the end of the day the primary reason that it blew out of control was because it was mishandled by the GM when they had the chance to shut it down, and I don't think that digging in to blame every individual post is going to be beneficial in any way here.

It could and should have been cut out at the root, and the main lesson to be learnt here is that that's what should be done in future.

Don't be sorry, I agree, my stance was too weak

[Hellenic Riot]

As for some of the other suggestions, I'm pretty bemused by the idea that applying the site rules to Mafia is some kind of groundbreaking change. Mafia has never been some completely unmoderated free-for-all throwback to the Old Forums. Yes, the mod team (particularly the mods that don't play mafia) have no interest whatsoever in pissing their time away reading entire mafia threads (and a good thing too, the time they spend on the site is used on far more important things), but when site rules were actually being broken back then, the Council was formed with a mod representative who cared about mafia to ensure that the community self-moderated this, and there was the very real background prospect that if the Council had failed in this then Mafia would've been banned entirely. I cannot imagine that this position has changed even if the personnel have - There has not and never will be carte blanche to ignore site rules whilst playing mafia.

Which, once again, reinforces my point that the GM & Council should have stepped in much sooner in M62 to deal with this.


As for banning people from calling each other bad players or criticising their thought processes... Well. In a game that has a fundamental premise of working things out and then arguing your points, it seems rather strange that any form of attack on said processes is going to be deemed too far. Once again I refer to the site rules - And last I checked, there is not a rule about not calling people bad Diplomacy players .

Blanket bans of X & Y sound great but in a community like this just end up leaving huge loopholes or risk causing more problems due to stupidly strict overmoderation. Mafia is a nuanced game, and webDip is a nuanced site - Hence why the site rules have the "common sense" rule attached to them. The GM's and/or Council need to be able to apply that nuance to issues in mafia just as much as the mods apply nuance when reading into every other forum activity. Common sense applies here too.

[Hellenic Riot]

Many years ago, back in 2016 or whenever, this conversation first came up after numerous events of similar vitriolic conditions. Back then, the solution was to first form the Mafia Council (so as to avoid the mod team having to moderate Mafia), which had a mandate to make an attempt at fixing each of the things which had been creating Mafia drama back then. It was pretty successful, and mafia generally got much friendlier/less dramatic (whether that was because of one of the main initiators back then being banned or because of the council itself could be a matter of debate).

It seems that in the years since then, the Council very much receded in prominence as there weren't significant issues occurring anymore. But when it comes to the game in question, I feel the main reason it was ignored was because it was badly mishandled initially by the GM who attempted to brush it under the rug (sorry PE), and there was far too much equivocation at that time, which meant that things had escalated to a point whereby it was too little too late by the time any serious attempts to actually shut it down began. A critical mass of vitriol had occurred and it was dominating the thought process of multiple players. Whilst you could delve into it and portion blame out to each individual act of escalation that occurred in that chain of events, at the end of the day the primary reason that it blew out of control was because it was mishandled by the GM when they had the chance to shut it down, and I don't think that digging in to blame every individual post is going to be beneficial in any way here.

It could and should have been cut out at the root, and the main lesson to be learnt here is that that's what should be done in future.

Are there any lessons from the halcyon days of the Council that could be used to set the community on a better course?

Perhaps

From what I recall (though my memory is pretty hazy of most things before 2019), the Council was born from a mod or admin team discussion about the problematic situations Mafia was causing. The idea had been kicked around for a while on the forums, but the impetus was added after said conversation. The idea back then was for one mod team representative to be on the Council (which was myself) alongside a couple of respected community members (Captainmeme and Fluminator). And this was pretty much forced onto the mafia community of the time: It was a like or lump it last chance approach to avoid Mafia being banned entirely. Some players were happy, some players were not, but over time I believe most of the people who had either opposed the idea entirely or opposed the people on it came around to it, and the problems did indeed generally stop. Though, as mentioned above, the banning of a certain player (A man of many accounts who was made into a true April Fool) who had been involved in a lot of the drama around that time probably also helped.

Obviously I'm not involved in any way with the mod team nowadays so I don't speak for them or claim to know their thoughts, but a cursory glance at who is suggests that the admin perspective probably hasn't changed since 2016 and therefore if mafia really got out of control then the threat of a total ban could still lurk in the background. A similar look at the council now suggests that dargorygel has taken over my old role of being the Mod Representative on it, and Jamie is the community representative. But from what I can see, the Council had sort of fallen by the wayside in the years since I stepped down because issues presumably weren't occurring much anymore (until now). And now the Council seems not to be taken very seriously anymore - At least going by Darg's posts in this thread. A polite reminder that what the Council says goes or else probably wouldn't go amiss. And perhaps they need to take a stronger approach going forward, as we did the first time around in said halcyon days. The comment about how one of Darg or Jamie is going to stay out of all future games is a good step in that direction there, as having an unbiased perspective is very important here. Captainmeme really fulfilled that role back in the early days; and he basically GM'd or co-GM'd almost every game too which ensured Council oversight was always very present.

Perhaps I'd suggest they think of adding a third member to help in that regard (and no, I'm not suggesting we start nominating people for said post - Someone who they can both work well with is far more important than whether or not the community approves of said person), but if they're confident that there's always going to be one of them around to provide said unbiased view then that's great too. Darg seems to already sort of fulfill that old Captainmeme role of often being a co-GM, too. And I'm sure Darg & Jamie have their own thoughts on how they wish to run the council, which are probably much more prescient than those of a recently returned grizzly old veteran like myself

[Fluminator]

Yes, 2016 was a wild time. We had a string of broken setups, player drama, the unnamed person getting banned mid-GMing a game, jockeying for game order, etc. It was really really bad but interesting memories lol.

People hated the idea of a council but from my perspective it worked out well.
My role on it was basically help people with their setups and making sure it was balanced since that's what I was skilled at. We had some really bad games before it lol.
Meme was basically the universal backup GM, bot controller, he wrote a nice guide on it still linked in the bot. Tbh he did like 90% of the work haha.
HR enforced it officially and enforced future game bans at GMs requests if they had legitimate complaints (which rarely happened after the council appeared. I can't even think of a time it got bad enough to reach the council.)