Do staff overuse their DM fiat?

[Dar]

Personally. If only a single person who is himself black would post and say that they feel offended by the use of that world, would be enough for me not to use it. Do we have 'anyone' here like that? Just a single person is enough.  Anyone?

[valeria]

Freedom of speech doesn't mean what you think it means.  -this lawyer I know

I'm not going to wander down that particular rabbithole in this thread.  I am going to ask that you pack up your antiSJW bag, because you're missing the point.  Your premise that 'necker' is the only word that is disallowed in the game is flawed.  Plenty of words are not allowed in the game:

Clear counterexample 1) titling someone miss, mrs, or mr
* This has been stated as against inappropriate.  There was no clear pushback against it and presumably no failure to comply with it in game.

Clear counterexample 2) putting child, maiden, etc in your sdesc
* These have been stated as inappropriate for various reasons.  Maiden in particular was described as not appropriate to game-world concepts.

Less clear but equally applicable counterexample 3) the words steam, machine, waterfall, computer, etc. 
* These are not appropriate to the game world setting.  If you use them, someone will give you a talking-to.

Policing the gameworld is a function of staff and they decide what is and is not appropriate for the game world all the time.  'Necker' as a slur would make sense if elves were described as having particularly long necks.  They don't.  Therefore, it doesn't make sense for it to be a slur in the game world.  It has become a slur for some reason,* but REGARDLESS, it doesn't make sense as and IC slur and isn't appropriate to the game world. 

Their action with necker has been completely consistent with prior stances on anachronistic or inappropriate words.

*probably RL racism, and while in-game racism is appropriate, RL racism never has been

[chrisdcoulombe]

Bad boys, bad boys
Watcha gonna do
Watcha gonna do
When the word police
Come for you

[Marauder Moe]

I'm expecting a cherrypicked, strawman, likely one-line response, or an indepth extradition of every single one of my words. Save it. I'm done talking about it. I wanted to voice my opinion.

Godspeed to you, then.


Anyway, Valeria, the problem with your argument is that the staff didn't sell us this change as being about an anachronism.

Staff have made a decision to remove the usage of the word 'Necker' from the game.

This word comes with negative real world connotations and we do not wish to promote or see this in our game world.  Please refrain from using the slang word 'necker' in game.

Armageddon has always been billed as a "mature" MUD.  Our game depicts sexuality, violence, slavery, and yes, racism.  Maturity is being able to understand that these themes are limited to the game world and are not meant to be personally offensive.  People who cannot make that distinction probably shouldn't play here.

Also, elves ARE taller and more slender than other races.  Less muscular would mean smaller trapezius muscles, which would indeed give the appearance of a disproportionately longer neck.  Go look at pictures of tall, slender people in real life vs. shorter and/or more muscular ones.  I've always thought it was an appropriate description.

[Black]

I'm expecting a cherrypicked, strawman, likely one-line response, or an indepth extradition of every single one of my words. Save it. I'm done talking about it. I wanted to voice my opinion.

Godspeed to you, then.


Anyway, Valeria, the problem with your argument is that the staff didn't sell us this change as being about an anachronism.

Staff have made a decision to remove the usage of the word 'Necker' from the game.

This word comes with negative real world connotations and we do not wish to promote or see this in our game world.  Please refrain from using the slang word 'necker' in game.

Armageddon has always been billed as a "mature" MUD.  Our game depicts sexuality, violence, slavery, and yes, racism.  Maturity is being able to understand that these themes are limited to the game world and are not meant to be personally offensive.  People who cannot make that distinction probably shouldn't play here.

Also, elves ARE taller and more slender than other races.  Less muscular would mean smaller trapezius muscles, which would indeed give the appearance of a disproportionately longer neck.  Go look at pictures of tall, slender people in real life vs. shorter and/or more muscular ones.  I've always thought it was an appropriate description.

Yes, my issue with the words she stated were that I've seen elves with legitimate long necks with their desc. I mean even if I am ok with the change, I want to point out that there's IC basis for the word. I think the issue is more or less not that it's inaccurate IC, it's more that it has a direct correlation to a real life word.

[Malken]

What if we start calling them "peggers" instead? Because they sorta look like pegs and it's close enough to neckers in sound and insult, minus the perceived racism - I think that would be a fair compromise.

[sleepyhead]

I'd like to call them "leggers" but I have a feeling that would be perceived similarly to "neckers."

[valeria]

Anyway, Valeria, the problem with your argument...

My argument was particularly a counter to point out the problems with the freespeach argument, not about the change in general.

[WithSprinkles]

You know what, I'll bite here because I'm getting just a touch irritated.

I don't think that my argument should bear any more or less weight that anyone else's because of the shade of my skin and it makes me intensely uncomfortable to bring up the fact of my heritage in any discussion unless it is in a chill, happy, or off-hand sense. I've watched this discussion play out on the forums and on Discord and spoken up a little, but some of the vitriol being spewed is breathtaking. I understood when there was outrage and confusion about how the situation was handled and unease about general censorship, but when it all settled down as we were asked to simply refrain from using this one word, I thought it was over.

I believe in letting people play how they wish for the most part. Pursue their own storylines and see what comes of them for good or ill and reach for the skies or wallow in the gutter. What I don't believe in is ripping each other apart as players or directing hate at the people who staff this game. If we play a mature game, then act like the adults you want to be treated like. Don't let discussions devolve into cesspools where people don't want to participate and feel like they are being attacked. Hiding behind the notion that other people are thin-skinned is a sign that some have little self control and cannot participate in calm discourse.

That said, I didn't have an issue with people using the word. I had heard that it was a stand in for the less pleasant word used in real life and though it disgusts me and made me think less of this community, I didn't make a fuss about it because I drew that IC/OOC line. No one was calling ME that, though I have been called that IN REAL LIFE. And that SUCKS. I have heard about other IG parallels to RL offensive terms that were clearly meant as such have made me pause and shake my head, but there are asshats in real life too and you can't escape them. So if I meet them, I avoid those folk and move on. Why let someone else ruin my fun? So, once I learned that folks were using 'necker' in a way I never agreed with, I used the word 'sharp' and carried on. It's a damned game.

The assertion that black people use the n-word freely with each other is widely untrue. Some do, yes, but it has never been a word spoken by or around people I know. I personally can't get it past my lips without discomfort, nor any other slur against another person.

The point of all this is, I know some people are going to jump on me and that's fine. I don't care. Call me oversensitive, say I have some huge political agenda, call me a moron for having an opinion. There is not a computer out there that can calculate the amount of fucks I don't give. I didn't really want to post anyway because I knew I was probably stepping into a hornet's nest from the first word. I don't believe that's right, though. I'm willing to TALK about my opinion, but I won't be ATTACKED for it. I doubt it was one person who complained about this and if they are choosing not to speak up about it, I don't blame them because some folk seem to be at 11 in here.

Again, probably a rambling and likely too long and serious post, but I tend to make those.

[Synthesis]

What if we start calling them "peggers" instead? Because they sorta look like pegs and it's close enough to neckers in sound and insult, minus the perceived racism - I think that would be a fair compromise.

If this was a joke...well played.

If it wasn't...don't google "pegging" at work, my man.

[Malken]

If it wasn't...don't google "pegging" at work, my man.

The funny part is that the SFW urbandictionary version defines a pegger as a "person who runs around and robs underwear off peoples washing lines and wears them." <- Could make for a nice insulting slang for an elf!

But yeah, the NSFW version is uhh.. NSFW and also makes for a nice insulting slang for an elf.

[Molten Heart]

.

[Synthesis]

Freedom of speech doesn't mean what you think it means.  -this lawyer I know

I'm not going to wander down that particular rabbithole in this thread.  I am going to ask that you pack up your antiSJW bag, because you're missing the point.  Your premise that 'necker' is the only word that is disallowed in the game is flawed.  Plenty of words are not allowed in the game:

AdamBlue specifically did not make a freedom of speech argument:

I do not deny that the creators of Armageddon have the right to censor words as they see fit within it, but I do think it is an incredibly foolish and reactionary measure that does not fully understand itself in it's meaning.

...so leading your post with a snarky aside insinuating that he probably doesn't understand what free speech means makes me suspect that you didn't read the rest of his post, or you were just a little too ready to produce a straw man once you read "freedom of speech."

Also...listen...being anti-censorship in a private domain has absolutely nothing to do with being anti-SJW in general, except where the unreasonable aspects of each overlap, and it's a little condescending to libertarians, anarchists, et al. to imply that being against a particular implementation of censorship in a private domain that pertains to a RL term of racism entails being anti-SJW.  Maybe you're relying on a short-hand reference to the poster's prior history (I don't keep tabs on AdamBlue's post history, I admit) or something, but I'm not reading anything in particular in this thread that has anything to do with anti-SJWism.  Clearly, he makes a strong anti-censorship point that touches on particular types of censorship, but to me it seems more like that's merely aforementioned overlap.  That being said, I also don't agree with him that private-domain censorship is necessarily a bad thing.

I've stated elsewhere why I liked using the word and similar words.  To summarize:  I know that it sounded like the N word, and that resulted in a particular instant feeling that a) contributed to the realistic roleplayed feel of fantasy racism and b) isn't easily replaced.  If it offended people...that was kind of the point.  (That is:  being offended in a particular sort of way is good; being offended in other ways is not so good--cf rape, torture.)  I'm not particularly bent out of shape about the change, but thus far, the offered "acceptable replacement" words feel like the equivalent of calling someone a "cad" or something.  Rapscallion.  Offensive-Lite™.  However, as a generally utilitarian sort of person, I'm amenable to the argument that feelings of intense personal offense in a few people could outweigh the milder feelings of enjoyment in many, since hedons theoretically are a vector quantity.  I don't think enough of that sort of evidence has been produced at this point, but...that's just like, my opinion, man.

[manipura]

There are a number of slang words in game that are actual derogatory RL words.
Not words 'close to' other words, or words that 'sound like' other words. 
Should we ban those words too? 

Half-breed is a derogatory term for anyone of mixed race.  The next time someone calls my bree-- oops, I mean my half-elf a 'half-breed', should I put my complaint through the request tool or here on the GDB?

Skinny, round-eye, slant-eye are all words I've heard in game as racial slurs that are actually used in RL as racial slurs.

This is my issue with banning necker.  Where is the line drawn? 

[BadSkeelz]

You could draw the line at necker with the argument that the word itself makes little sense as an insult. I find it questionable that the trait I would want to use as an insult towards elves would be their necks, however long they supposedly are.

I would be totally onboard with calling them Peggers except I wonder if clothes pins actually exist in Zalathans. Leggers would make the most sense to me as a replacement.

[Armaddict]

You could draw the line at necker with the argument that the word itself makes little sense as an insult.

As noted in one of my previous posts on the matter, 'necker' derived from an evolution of derogatory words, most directly from 'longneck'.

Also as noted, the problem I have with this issue is not this word in and of itself, but the fact that these sorts of actions keep on happening.  If something is truly having a negative impact on the game, then it requires action.  But a couple players drawing a false correlation between a word and a real life situation and then stating that it gives them discomfort is not suitable justification for over-control and modification of the roleplay atmosphere of the game, in my opinion.  It's highly relative, and sets precedent for a lot of other actions to take place in the future.  Which is exactly why I argued against the removal of Mister/Miss.  Not because I'm so attached to the words, but because it establishes a way of dealing with non-existent problems in the name of false protections of players.

This isn't protectionism.  It's micromanagement in the wrong places.  We should really be looking to relax the atmosphere rather than tighten it up, so that we can appeal to as many different kinds of player as possible; as noted, that correlation was only 'existing' for chosen few, and so while I'm not saying the loss of the word 'necker' will result in people playing less, what I -am- saying is that these sorts of actions reveal an undertone of the continued slide away from a roleplaying atmosphere that just about anyone can exist in freely, and contribute to, no matter what type of player they are in, as long as they are not in with active interest in going against the grain of the game world.

In essence:  These sorts of rules are based on protecting people who don't need protection, at the expense of making it okay to shut things down because some people don't like it on an OOC level even if it's completely fine IC.

[BadSkeelz]

"Longneck" is kind of a stupid insult too. It's like looking at a dwarf and thinking, "these hairless stubborn single-minded stumps of muscle don't have eyelashes, let's call them lashes!" Just kind of a nonsensical thing to focus on.

I do agree that is micromanagy, but overall I'm not ruffled by the removal of necker. I don't use the word much if at all myself (always preferred sharp) and doubt staff are going to react to the occasional use as I hope they have better more enjoyable things to do with their time. I wouldn't advise doing a recitation of "Necker necker necker, why does the Arm hate neckers?" in the Gaj anytime soon though.

[manipura]

You could draw the line at necker with the argument that the word itself makes little sense as an insult. I find it questionable that the trait I would want to use as an insult towards elves would be their necks, however long they supposedly are.

I would be totally onboard with calling them Peggers except I wonder if clothes pins actually exist in Zalathans. Leggers would make the most sense to me as a replacement.

If staff had come out and said "Necker is now banned because not all elves are going to have that particular trait (longnecks)" then your argument of the line being drawn there makes some sense.  However "it doesn't make sense" wasn't the reason given, the reason given was "it comes with negative real world connotations."

So...why is the line drawn at necker and not all words that have negative real world connotations?  That's my issue, if you're going to start policing one negative word for whatever reason, then you really should be policing all the words that fall under the same reason.

Edit: I always thought sharp was sort of stupid.  If sharp is a variation of 'sharpear', which I believe it is, why are dwarves and muls not called sharps?  They both have pointed ears.

[nauta]

You could draw the line at necker with the argument that the word itself makes little sense as an insult. I find it questionable that the trait I would want to use as an insult towards elves would be their necks, however long they supposedly are.

I would be totally onboard with calling them Peggers except I wonder if clothes pins actually exist in Zalathans. Leggers would make the most sense to me as a replacement.

If staff had come out and said "Necker is now banned because not all elves are going to have that particular trait (longnecks)" then your argument of the line being drawn there makes some sense.  However "it doesn't make sense" wasn't the reason given, the reason given was "it comes with negative real world connotations."

So...why is the line drawn at necker and not all words that have negative real world connotations?  That's my issue, if you're going to start policing one negative word for whatever reason, then you really should be policing all the words that fall under the same reason.

The real life word that it connotes has a particularly nasty history to it, at least in the United States of America, and by extension the culture secreted from the USA.  What bothered me was not just the word but also the use it was put to.  There's no slippery slope.

[Armaddict]

"Longneck" is kind of a stupid insult too. It's like looking at a dwarf and thinking, "these hairless stubborn single-minded stumps of muscle don't have eyelashes, let's call them lashes!" Just kind of a nonsensical thing to focus on.

I do agree that is micromanagy, but overall I'm not ruffled by the removal of necker. I don't use the word much if at all myself (always preferred sharp) and doubt staff are going to react to the occasional use as I hope they have better more enjoyable things to do with their time. I wouldn't advise doing a recitation of "Necker necker necker, why does the Arm hate neckers?" in the Gaj anytime soon though.

It doesn't have to be smart or naturally intuitive.  It came about and caught on in an IC manner without any OOC push for any of it.  People obviously liked it.  If someone started calling dwarves lashes, and another group of people caught it and started calling dwarves lashes, it wouldn't be removed for catching on without substantial basis.  At least not until we continue down this micro-managey path.

A lot of disapproval being voiced on the GDB is simply because criticisms via the correct channels are being ignored.  As I've noted, I'm now banned from discord for discussing this topic in a civil manner.  I didn't bring it up.  I responded to things being said.  I moved on to a new topic when asked.  I've had discussions surrounding resurrections that were given in instances where I, historically, have been denied the same action (and those are events noted in my account notes).  I've been banned for expressing displeasure with decisions made, where I'd previously gone...16 years or so with no such actions taken.  These, along with administrative actions taken by the staff, are all signs not of a new interaction from me, but of a new staff direction that is seemingly so set on it that it's willing to take disciplinary actions on those with disagreement and criticisms of the foundation being built upon.  That is not a healthy direction.

So no.  I don't draw some line in the sand over this word being removed.  Because it truly isn't that big of a deal.  But I -am- trying to put big flashing lights on things that I see that reinforce the criticisms that I've been voicing in hopes that at some point, someone will realize I'm not attacking their character; I'm pointing at instances of poor decisions that demonstrate the danger that I see as very real -and- progressing forward, before it progresses to a point that it damages the game to a point that can't really be mended.

[whitt]

The real life word that it connotes has a particularly nasty history to it, at least in the United States of America, and by extension the culture secreted from the USA.  What bothered me was not just the word but also the use it was put to.  There's no slippery slope.

But it's ok that we keep allowing actual slavery and the slaves most often put upon are those of the same race this term referred to?  While the slaves of another race are "Actually treasured possessions"  That when the crowd cries for victims in the Arena, it's not just any victim's blood they want.  It's the blood of this race.  That the only acceptable places for those of this race to live are slums?  That the only thing they hold place of pride in is athleticism?  That there is an ever so subtle disgust with any breeding between the off-spring of the pure race and this other race?  That the race has a genetic and cultural predilection for thievery?  That every member of this race is actually given the Steal skill?  That when the Arm bustles into the Gaj and drags out a random victim... it's always an elf.  That the starving children chased away are always chased away because someone spawned with this race?  Not that the only truly prideful of this race are actually called Tribals?  That they practice animism and live on booze?  And you're worried about a word?

I'm at a loss here.  If you want to be offended by things in this grimdark reflecting the real world you have a LOT more to take offense at then a word folks have decided sounds too much like some other word.  There are -actual- direct parallels to horrible things in the real world that are the very fabric of this game's world.  Those are fine?

[manipura]

You could draw the line at necker with the argument that the word itself makes little sense as an insult. I find it questionable that the trait I would want to use as an insult towards elves would be their necks, however long they supposedly are.

I would be totally onboard with calling them Peggers except I wonder if clothes pins actually exist in Zalathans. Leggers would make the most sense to me as a replacement.

If staff had come out and said "Necker is now banned because not all elves are going to have that particular trait (longnecks)" then your argument of the line being drawn there makes some sense.  However "it doesn't make sense" wasn't the reason given, the reason given was "it comes with negative real world connotations."

So...why is the line drawn at necker and not all words that have negative real world connotations?  That's my issue, if you're going to start policing one negative word for whatever reason, then you really should be policing all the words that fall under the same reason.

The real life word that it connotes has a particularly nasty history to it, at least in the United States of America, and by extension the culture secreted from the USA.  What bothered me was not just the word but also the use it was put to.  There's no slippery slope.

The words immediately coming to mind that are actual RL racial slurs are...actual RL racial slurs.  People of mixed race, anyone of mixed race but particularly people who are half-white and half-Native American are called half-breeds in a derogatory way.  I'm pretty sure the treatment of Native Americans and their ancestors (even the ones with just a bit of ancestry ) was rather nasty.  Same with Asians.  Or is the history not nasty enough?  Is that where the line is drawn?  You can use RL racial slurs in game as long as the RL connotation isn't a certain level of nasty?  Does the slippery slope apply to some words but not others?  Some words come from a nasty history, but others aren't quite nasty enough so they're still fair game?

My point isn't to be argumentative or nit-picky, my point is that picking and choosing what words we're going to police, when others fit under the same reasoning, doesn't make sense. 

[manipura]

The real life word that it connotes has a particularly nasty history to it, at least in the United States of America, and by extension the culture secreted from the USA.  What bothered me was not just the word but also the use it was put to.  There's no slippery slope.

But it's ok that we keep allowing actual slavery and the slaves most often put upon are those of the same race this term referred to?  While the slaves of another race are "Actually treasured possessions"  That when the crowd cries for victims in the Arena, it's not just any victim's blood they want.  It's the blood of this race.  That the only acceptable places for those of this race to live are slums?  That the only thing they hold place of pride in is athleticism?  That there is an ever so subtle disgust with any breeding between the off-spring of the pure race and this other race?  That the race has a genetic and cultural predilection for thievery?  That every member of this race is actually given the Steal skill?  That when the Arm bustles into the Gaj and drags out a random victim... it's always an elf.  That the starving children chased away are always chased away because someone spawned with this race?  Not that the only truly prideful of this race are actually called Tribals?  That they practice animism and live on booze?  And you're worried about a word?

I'm at a loss here.  If you want to be offended by things in this grimdark reflecting the real world you have a LOT more to take offense at then a word folks have decided sounds too much like some other word.  There are -actual- direct parallels to horrible things in the real world that are the very fabric of this game's world.  Those are fine?

whitt, all of that is just fine in this harsh, harsh world, as long as you refer to them as sharps and not neckers.

[Armaddict]

There's no slippery slope.

The same action was made about non-offensive terms not long ago, with a similar reaction from the playerbase which is 'Not a big deal, but not a fan of the action.'  When actions repeat themselves, that is exactly where slippery slopes come into play.

That's if you keep it at surface value.  If we implant the implications of it, which is overmanagement (particularly in the wrong areas), and make note that it happens both IC and OOC, then I find slippery slopes very fitting for analysis right now.

[BadSkeelz]

You could draw the line at necker with the argument that the word itself makes little sense as an insult. I find it questionable that the trait I would want to use as an insult towards elves would be their necks, however long they supposedly are.

I would be totally onboard with calling them Peggers except I wonder if clothes pins actually exist in Zalathans. Leggers would make the most sense to me as a replacement.

If staff had come out and said "Necker is now banned because not all elves are going to have that particular trait (longnecks)" then your argument of the line being drawn there makes some sense.  However "it doesn't make sense" wasn't the reason given, the reason given was "it comes with negative real world connotations."

So...why is the line drawn at necker and not all words that have negative real world connotations?  That's my issue, if you're going to start policing one negative word for whatever reason, then you really should be policing all the words that fall under the same reason.

Edit: I always thought sharp was sort of stupid.  If sharp is a variation of 'sharpear', which I believe it is, why are dwarves and muls not called sharps?  They both have pointed ears.

I think it's a two-part argumenet that Staff should be making.

1) "Necker" is a stupid insult because it makes little in-character sense for that trait to be used as its basis. At least 'that other word' can be etymologically traced back to a major identifying feature of its targets.
2) Because "Necker" is a nonsensical insult, it comes across as a forced attempt to get a close analogue to a real life pejorative word in to the game. This may well have had something to do with its popularity.

(I acknowledge that a lot of you didn't seem to realize any relationship, to which I can only assume I live a life cloaked more in hatred and malice as I picked up on the analogue almost immediately. Far quicker than I figured out what a Breed was.)

Incidentally, "Sharp" can have some archaic connotations of swindler or cheat in English. I could buy that being the source of the word more than Elven physiology. It's also possible Sharp became attached to elves because Elves are about 1000% more common (virtually) than muls or dwarves. Or some combination of the two. (Also insulting either dwarves or muls is a kind of dumb idea.)