My Reaction to the New Policy

[wewo]

Please dont troll, you have already been banned http://www.edge-gamers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=304371 so it should be no concern of yours.

 

[Daa]

Yes, I do have some concerns and problems with this new rule. Yes I could complain to leadership about it, but what's the point of going to leadership? You guys, the leadership, said it is a set rule and will not change. So there is no need to go to anyone or do anything about it. I will just get the same response.

I understand the rule completely, and wouldn't need to go to leadership about that, I'd go to leadership about getting the rule removed. However, since it is a set rule, it is my job as an admin to put it in place, even though I do not 100% agree with the change. If you guys think it is for the betterment of the community, I will follow it. But if it turns out it isn't, which I see a lot of people voicing there opinion about here, I think it needs to be rethought.

But I think we all just need to chill, and let it play out. Hell, it might bring more people into the community, you never know.

 

[DeeLuxxed]

We have a world class leadership team in place to discuss policy and the direction of EGO..

From what I've been taught a good leader generally consults all of his subordinates and garners their opinion before they make a change that affects their entire command. We like to call them climate surveys. I've seen many long time players on eGO servers outright quit and say they aren't coming back because of this change.

But I think we all just need to chill, and let it play out. Hell, it might bring more people into the community, you never know.

We're going to change our ways to bring in people we didn't want on our servers before and lose the people we spent years gaming with? I'm in the navy, I curse a lot, but I enjoy our servers because I don't have to hear some person shouting and cursing all the time. It makes game play toxic. If it was implemented at a slower pace I could see it working out better. Now admins are unsure of how to admin. A week ago I had a refresher for basic and advanced admining, now, an entire chunk of that course is basically moot.

"...we have the best Leadership staff on the internet to make sure our policies and rules are upheld at the highest standards."

We're effectively lowering our standards. It's easier to hold those standards high because of how low we're making them.

My brother is 10 and he plays on our servers. My mother was on the fence about letting him play the game outright because of videos she'd watched on youtube and the glimpses she'd see in chat. I let her watch a game of me playing, how I admined people and how we really were a punk-free environment. She let him play and he was going to go on and join when he turned 13. After this rule change he's most likely not going to be allowed on and I've lost a big connection I have with my brother 2,600 miles away.

I sincerely hope this doesn't turn out the way I see it turning out.

 

[Daa]

We're going to change our ways to bring in people we didn't want on our servers before and lose the people we spent years gaming with? I'm in the navy, I curse a lot, but I enjoy our servers because I don't have to hear some person shouting and cursing all the time. It makes game play toxic.

It is up to you who you bring into the community. I personally haven't changed the way I recruit because of this new rule. If you don't want a toxic player in the community, and you don't think they fit, then don't recruit them. Just because they swear every few hours doesn't mean they are a bad player or immature.

I've always looked at recruiting the same way.

• GameME Points
• Hours in the server
• How friendly they are
• Chat History

The only one that I'm going to lighten up on is Chat History. Of course you don't want to recruit a toxic player that says "Shit" every sentence, but strictly prohibiting any curse words in there chat history isn't right because they are still follow the rules that are posted. They aren't going above and beyond, being that toxic player in our server that says shit every sentence.

 

[Ezekiel]

Dee & Misterboy have already voiced my concerns eloquently so I won't typed them all out again. It seems to me that we're lowering our standards down to the level of the punks that complain "I'm an adult, I can use adult language!"

I disagree strongly with this change.

 

[Simon]

While I myself do not necessarily agree with this change, I have voiced my ideas in the Admin forums, but will bring it to this thread as well.

I think that even with the rule change, we can continue admining in such a way that will promote and keep eGO servers as very clean places. Our regular players are very established and know well enough what our expectations are. I've found that a lot of the time, a pub will even warn others of language before an admin needs to do anything.

At the end of the day, it comes down to the decisions of you, the admins, on what is deemed appropriate for our servers. Some factors we might consider before we take any action could be:

• Was it excessive?
• Are we aware of younger children currently playing online?
• Did it cause a fuss among players or issues ingame?
• Is this a player who should know better?
• Was it disrespectful or directed towards anyone?

I know that children on our servers is the biggest issue here, in this entire scenario. But I think that if we are aware of what is going on in the server, and are prepared to admin appropriately and to make every players experience the best possible, then in that moment where you see someone using vulgar language, you will be able to make a decision on wether or not admin action is needed.

While I don't think swearing and crude language should be a part of eGO's community, I think that we have a very strong group of admins in this community, who can take action as needed.

I see the points on both sides here, and hope maybe we can shift our focus from this and focus more on continuing to make eGO inclusive for as many people as possible, and let them have a good gaming experience.

 

[Steelbilly]

From the perspective of a father of five children this change is more serious than what words are allowed (or not allowed) on eGO servers. The change represents a shift in morals ? a core value of what is right and what is wrong ? driven by a desire to be more culturally accepted.

Quote from the announcement page for this rule change:

?? pop culture and the gaming world have faced steep changes. People play games much differently than ten years ago. People communicate much differently than ten years ago.?

I teach my kids that it is NOT okay to do X, Y, Z because their friends are doing it ? in my estimation, this is key to developing and perpetuating strong moral character in society. To compromise one?s character based on the influence of outside pressure is to be weak. If I stay in eGO and allow my children to game here now, I?ll be reversing one of the cornerstones of our family?s core beliefs: do the right thing, even when it is the hard thing to do.

While I may be in the minority when it comes to being an old gamer fart with kids on our servers, I would wager that many of our members are here because their parents allow them to be on servers that defy the cultural norm. I love the TF2 eGO community and the friends we have made here, but to stay under the new ruleset would be to surrender to a change in character to lukewarm ethics.

How about we put a poll up and take a vote on this? If the member base is overall in support of the change that might help leadership's position that the change was actually made for the betterment of the community. Conversely, if the majority of voters choose NOT to change the rules, perhaps the dissenters in this thread are correct and this change is getting crammed down existing member?s throats to the detriment of the community.

 

[rubato]

I would like to note the fact that, although admins will and have to follow within the guidelines of eGO's community, to each admin his own. Although rules are set in place, I know some admins may be more tolerant or less tolerant to certain curse words.

 

[USCG Hammer]

http://www.edge-gamers.com/forums/showthread.php?p=2898565#post2898565

I hope this helps!

 

[Steelbilly]

http://www.edge-gamers.com/forums/showthread.php?p=2898565#post2898565

As I've stated earlier, swearing has been happening in our community since our beginning. All we're doing now is relaxing the responsibility of our admins. Now our admins can play and enjoy their games without having to pause all the time to W/K/B.

So the admins that enjoy the game fully and are not bothered at all by admin enforcing no profanity can continue to do so? Otherwise, the re-re-announcement of the rule and repackaging it as for the benefit of the admins vs. changing with the times message doesn't really change a thing.

"There is no longer a speed limit on US Interstates."

*Officers Grumble*

"Wait wait wait..."

"What we meant to say was we want our officers to enjoy their patrols so they are no longer required to enforce a speed limit."

:blink:

If the change is truly for the admin benefit, how about putting this to a vote in the eG forum and seeing how many admins are so bothered with enforcing profanity rules that they want the rules changed?

 

[Vox]

I just joined to play games. EGO has been the first "Punk Free" gaming clan that I've seen. Honestly that's all that I care about. As long as people aren't allowed to ruin the fun, or be outlandishly crazy in chat, idc.

If my kids can hear those words in a movie, they can and will hear them in video games. Not to mention from their friends and family. This still is, and always has been a place free of racism, spam, and all around immaturity.​

 

[matt98]

Steel while i do understand where you are coming from its time to move on. We as a community are playing way more violent games ect. This doesn't mean u can't kindly ask someone not to swear if kids are on say minecraft. Thats a reasonable request and does not need to be handled by Warning them right off the back. Any reasonable person would stop and go oh a kids around sure ill be nice and try. Problems solved we keep them happy our kids are happy we stood up for them and they will probably respect our community more that we stuck up for kids yet let them have their fun as well.

 

[Derpy Monkey]

So the admins that enjoy the game fully and are not bothered at all by admin enforcing no profanity can continue to do so? Otherwise, the re-re-announcement of the rule and repackaging it as for the benefit of the admins vs. changing with the times message doesn't really change a thing.

"There is no longer a speed limit on US Interstates."

*Officers Grumble*

"Wait wait wait..."

"What we meant to say was we want our officers to enjoy their patrols so they are no longer required to enforce a speed limit."

:blink:

If the change is truly for the admin benefit, how about putting this to a vote in the eG forum and seeing how many admins are so bothered with enforcing profanity rules that they want the rules changed?

Exactly, Steelbilly. Forgive me for thumping up this thread, but I tried to give this new policy a chance, and I have already taken a major disliking to it. Just the other day, Turbine had F bombs dropping from left to right, but different people were saying it so... was it excessive? Like Steel pointed out, our job as admins is to administrate the people on our servers. The new policy claims to ease our job, but to me, this makes it harder to play on our servers. If someone says "sh**" I can only watch instead of warn them. This brings me to another point: with the old set of rules, (some) people who played on our servers knew it was wrong to swear. If potty mouths who were raised differently and think it is okay to go about polluting chat, truely are mature, then they will learn how to behave (thanks to our rules). Now, we are letting people drop the F bomb at least once with no consequence whatsoever! Also, why not start a poll? What is the harm in it?

 

[Adam]

You can make suggestions for a poll in this thread: Front Page Poll Questions

 

[Artimus]

Not trying to sound rude whatsoever, but I bet if a strawpoll was put up or a poll by Dr. Havok was put up asking if people agree with the new language rule set forth, over 75% of eGO's members would say they don't like it.

Great idea Luke.

 

[KelpTheGreat]

Misterboy and Deeluxxed and others have said most things perfectly. I'd like to throw in my opinion as well.

Steel while i do understand where you are coming from its time to move on.

One does not "move on" from the moral values that they consider core to their very being. I'll use an extreme example to illustrate my point: suppose our culture gradually shifted over the next couple of decades, so that sexually harassing women was considered appropriate, regardless of the woman's response. Our servers have always been very strictly against sexism and harassment. Would we, in an attempt to become more in line with the culture, start to allow harassment on our servers?
If we did, then the women who previously felt safe gaming on our servers would be upset, because the community that they joined and grew attached to had changed on a fundamental level.
And now, bringing it back to the current situation, there are many of us, myself included who felt safe on our servers because we knew that swearing was not permitted and would be dealt with. You can't honestly tell us "this is the way the culture is now, so get over it and just have fun".

This doesn't mean u can't kindly ask someone not to swear if kids are on say minecraft.

Yes, it DOES mean that you can't kindly ask someone not to swear! Read what Hammer wrote:

The OFFICIAL explanation of our NEW language rule!

Swearing is permitted on our servers and TeamSpeak.
The key to this policy is your common sense. You, as an admin get to decide when excessive is breached, or when a person has gone too far.

So now, if you ask someone politely not to swear, according to the rules, they have the right to politely decline your request, since it isn't against the rules to swear. What then? Do you give them an official warning; "Do what the admins politely suggest of you"? That just undermines our authority, if you ask me. And why should it be kids that get all the concessions? I'm an adult and I don't want to hear swearing either. Can I kindly ask someone "please don't swear in minecraft because there are adults online"?


We used to have a hard and fast rule (at least in the non-BF divisions): if someone used foul language of any sort, in any circumstances, it got a warning, then a kick for a repeat offense, then a ban. Simple, easy to understand, easy to enforce. Now? We've allowed individuals to decide what they consider excessive. This means that the server rules have changed from a clearly-defined barrier on what content is and is not allowed (which, as seen above and in other replies in this thread, was the #1 reason many people came to eGO at all), to "whatever the admins currently on at the time are comfortable with".

This invites argumentation between admins on the same server that have different ideas of "excessiveness."
Who gets the final say on whether or not Person A is being too explicit? Is it the guy who warns him right away, or the guy who thinks it's fine? Do G-ranked admins who have a low tolerance for swearing have the right to warn Person B to stop swearing, or will the O-ranked admins tell them that it's fine and to not admin Person B?
What happens if there is no admin on a server, and another player is uncomfortable with the language? They used to be able to call an admin to come deal with it, but what if the admin comes and doesn't think the language is excessive?
There's just too much variability. The more lenient the rules are, the easier they are to bend, find loopholes in, and otherwise flout.

 

[KelpTheGreat]

We have a world class leadership team in place to discuss policy and the direction of EGO. It is not the average member's responsibility to have to worry about those discussions.

I don't mean any offense, but I find this alarmingly short-sighted, and also moderately insulting. I hope I'm misunderstanding what you meant to say, because what I'm getting out of this is you're saying, "We few will do what we want regardless of the desires of the many," which sounds kind of like a dictatorship, to be frank.
I realize we're not a democracy; no voting was involved; but I'd certainly be alarmed if our American president suddenly said "I got together with the supreme court and we decided that stealing should be legal, but you regular citizens shouldn't worry about that."

 

[matt98]

Misterboy and Deeluxxed and others have said most things perfectly. I'd like to throw in my opinion as well.


One does not "move on" from the moral values that they consider core to their very being. I'll use an extreme example to illustrate my point: suppose our culture gradually shifted over the next couple of decades, so that sexually harassing women was considered appropriate, regardless of the woman's response. Our servers have always been very strictly against sexism and harassment. Would we, in an attempt to become more in line with the culture, start to allow harassment on our servers?
If we did, then the women who previously felt safe gaming on our servers would be upset, because the community that they joined and grew attached to had changed on a fundamental level.
And now, bringing it back to the current situation, there are many of us, myself included who felt safe on our servers because we knew that swearing was not permitted and would be dealt with. You can't honestly tell us "this is the way the culture is now, so get over it and just have fun".


Yes, it DOES mean that you can't kindly ask someone not to swear! Read what Hammer wrote:

So now, if you ask someone politely not to swear, according to the rules, they have the right to politely decline your request, since it isn't against the rules to swear. What then? Do you give them an official warning; "Do what the admins politely suggest of you"? That just undermines our authority, if you ask me. And why should it be kids that get all the concessions? I'm an adult and I don't want to hear swearing either. Can I kindly ask someone "please don't swear in minecraft because there are adults online"?


We used to have a hard and fast rule (at least in the non-BF divisions): if someone used foul language of any sort, in any circumstances, it got a warning, then a kick for a repeat offense, then a ban. Simple, easy to understand, easy to enforce. Now? We've allowed individuals to decide what they consider excessive. This means that the server rules have changed from a clearly-defined barrier on what content is and is not allowed (which, as seen above and in other replies in this thread, was the #1 reason many people came to eGO at all), to "whatever the admins currently on at the time are comfortable with".

This invites argumentation between admins on the same server that have different ideas of "excessiveness."
Who gets the final say on whether or not Person A is being too explicit? Is it the guy who warns him right away, or the guy who thinks it's fine? Do G-ranked admins who have a low tolerance for swearing have the right to warn Person B to stop swearing, or will the O-ranked admins tell them that it's fine and to not admin Person B?
What happens if there is no admin on a server, and another player is uncomfortable with the language? They used to be able to call an admin to come deal with it, but what if the admin comes and doesn't think the language is excessive?
There's just too much variability. The more lenient the rules are, the easier they are to bend, find loopholes in, and otherwise flout.

Kelp reread what i said. You can politely ask someone to watch the swearing as some kids are on. That is not a warning not an admining its just asking someone like you would on street. Hey mate my kids are around mind watching the language. 99% of people will say ya sorry and move on.

 

[Artimus]

Well said Matt.

 

[KelpTheGreat]

Kelp reread what i said. You can politely ask someone to watch the swearing as some kids are on. That is not a warning not an admining its just asking someone like you would on street. Hey mate my kids are around mind watching the language. 99% of people will say ya sorry and move on.

Your 99% must be different from my 99%... my 99% of people will say "f*** you, it's a free country and I can say whatever I want". :/