[Kyratio]

I'll throw my hat in here because I had initially a lot of grievances with the whole ordeal and had intentions of making a thread on my own, but a thread like this is absolutely well written and I think it's something we can use to get to a lot of betterment between the community as a whole. There are very obvious problems that need addressing and I think that this is definitely a good start with addressing them.

Of course, I'll begin with the main conundrum that sparked this thread from what I can figure. The four-person ban that a lot of people seem to be in disagreement with.

I won't speak on the guilt of each party because there's a lot of things I have and don't have that can affect my point of view on things in terms of evidence. As much as I want to, I don't think I have the right perspective to speak on whether these four deserve anything they've been dealt out. What I do have to speak on is how the process was carried out. From the post that was made in address to each of the ban appeals, it was explained that there was an investigation that took the duration of several months prior to these bans, though it seems the most recent issue that was raised is what brought up the ban to begin with. I think that if there was such an investigation, there should have been more word towards the guilty parties DURING or even AFTER the investigation if there was one proceeding at the time.

I understand if there was word towards the parties prior to the ban and during these last few months, but the concept of a ban was furthest from their mind. If there was a warning, I don't think there was an appropriate or sufficient warning. Besides that, it's apparent that each party for the most part is confused about the nature of their ban. It's my belief that with the point of these bans being self-reflection, it's important that to have the players realize the error of any of their ways they need to understand what they did wrong to begin with. The "blanket reason" that was posted along their bans left people reeling and more begrudged than reflective.

This has formed as a kind of status quo with the way bans are handled, where there's a long period of time after an initial infraction followed by months of investigation. I'm not sure when this initiated but I know it happened with folks like Mother and TCBlade, and it lead to the four that were banned a few days ago. I haven't investigated any other bans in detail so I can't speak on whether the same has happened to others or at least people who haven't done anything easily considered an offense, but I can at least say that if someone was investigating me I'd rather know that a GM is looking into me over those months. Ultimately, my point is I'd rather not need to ask a GM if I might need to tone anything down if I'm not showing signs of taking it down a notch, I'd like a GM to tell me so and that it COULD lead to a ban if it continues. It can lead to a lot of saved headaches.

Now since I mentioned my issues, I also want to support a possible solution.

Things like Dezark's suggestion are perfect for such a thing. If people are kept in the loop in what feels like an inevitable issue of people making plans and pulling up ideas in private spaces or voice chats, GMs wouldn't be put in such an awkward position where someone has issue with another making plans without them to begin with. I won't ask that GMs start policing players nor will I ask players to push everything through to GMs for any decision they make. I think that it has to be a mutual effort. An ESTABLISHED effort, especially. Make it a whole thing. As a leadership role, or maybe even guild leaders in the first place, it should be imperative to make sure GMs know about any major meeting that is held if we want to avoid exclusion. It'll also be very useful for keeping track of politics which I will admit as a former leadership character was very hard to keep track of without people ever actually telling me about so and so.

Leader 1 wants to meet with Leader 2 because they want to talk about establishing borders. Leader 2 has an ambassador that should be present for the meeting because they have been involved with communications between Leader 1 and 2's nations. Not that I'm asking for either leader to dm a GM about it, but we have rank chats for a reason. Ideally, this shouldn't be discussed in dm'd letters between the players alone. If there is one, it'd be posted in the rank chat so everyone in that leader's cabinet would see it. It's an idea, expansion of the original suggestion made by the OP. The example here is just one way I figure we could do with. I just want to say that not only is it possible, it's pretty handy for all those involved so that exclusion isn't done inadvertently (or otherwise). It may seem like one of those things that might feel awkward to try, but as long as every party either actively discusses things in channels GMs can see or mentions it to a GM after said discussion hopefully no one can be left unaware.

Now, in regards to this "status quo" I mentioned...
There's not much I can ask for in regards to this besides the obvious. If there is going to be a ban following an investigation, there has to be a lot more transparency between the GM team and the offenders. I understand the feelings that might be traded between each party, but that shouldn't be relevant to what I want to see which is there being ZERO room for complaint in this regard. It's something I don't think exists at the current moment. If something like this happens to a person and they have no idea? It gives me the idea that such an investigation can happen to me. Have I done something ban worthy that I haven't seen as ban worthy a few months ago?

It's a kind of paranoia that kind of meshes poorly with the current state of the community. There's always been an us versus them feeling present, whether between players and GMs or players and players. I believe there's always a chance to break through the mold and improve as a community let alone as a person... I think if people make genuine efforts and actually try any of the suggestions with an open mind there will be a noticeable change. In the end, I can say that at least one of the people who were given a ban genuinely needs the break anyhow because they've been caught in that same ever-present feeling the community gives, of frustration and wariness. There's plenty more to be said about a few things about SL2's player base on top of that. I always hear people mention that there's this or that problem with the community, but rarely do I see threads willing to put it into perspective and try to get to some work on it. Maybe this could be a wake-up call for us.

I'm always open for speaking to, as well. I think it's always worth putting your thoughts out in the open, though I should specify OPEN. It's easy to trip into the pitfall of talking about someone when it's not in a place they can reply, so if there's any intent of talking trash about anyone I want to try and keep it from me. Thank you in advance for considering my thoughts and concerns.

I'll be honest, after everything that happened before (I'm sure at least some of you know what I'm talking about), I felt rather angry towards a lot of the community, admins and players alike. If my somewhat passive aggressive posts on Balthie's thread or my lack of existence up until recently hasn't shown that, well, yeah! I had pretty much decided that SL2 as a community was terrible and I didn't want to give it a chance again. 

With Balthie's post about the community, I got a little sprout of hope, but amidst it all there were still clear signs that spoke to me that the issue was still present as amidst the post, there was still targeting, there was still lack of realization and irony even from my point of view. So, I still kept my distance but started paying attention to the community again. With the recent happenings, I won't lie, seeing Croakie banned for basically every single thing I felt they did to me, made me relieved. No, I made no complaint to the admins as they didn't seem to show any concern or thought towards me or the others who felt the same way back when it was all happening. I posted the logs and everything in the past if you don't believe me. 

The reason I decided to speak up finally though is because in all honesty, Frost, I have a lot of issues with things that you've said about me to others in DMs, but, I agree with this post, as well as many of the things you're saying and I want to try and speak my mind on the matter in a honest but respectful way. I'm gonna try my best to do that. 

So, in my opinion, this problem as a whole has been happening for- well, a long time. Almost every ban is handled this exact same way, everyone knows this, and if you don't see it, that's because most people who are banned aren't usually involved largely within a big group like those who were banned this time. Or, if they are, they aren't loud, or important enough to the community for people to make a fuss over. I'm not saying all bans are wrong or right, or that this ban is wrong or right, as just like with every ban, I have no idea what actually caused it. It's expected for the player who is banned to know what they did was wrong and to be able to see the issue in their ways without any explanation. This is to try and force people to show restraint and regret for their actions. To prove they won't do it again. On paper, this makes sense. 

However, this also creates a large gap between the players and the admins, a sense of distrust, paranoia, and even just the overall feeling of, "I feel like I've done absolutely nothing wrong, but I made someone mad on accident recently... Am I going to get banned?". In a way, it's relatable to how many people feel when they see a police car. Up until they see it, or until they experience it, they're gleefully unaware. Yet, then they see someone get arrested, or they see a police car, or they hear about someone doing something similar to what they've done on the news. Suddenly, they're paranoid, they worry about every little thing they do, they feel like they have to tip toe around everything. Accidentally going 1 mph over the speed limit when you heard a friend got pulled over for speeding recently? Paranoia. Maybe that's not everyone, but I feel confident in saying that it's a pretty accurate feeling of the community right now.

However, on the opposite ends of things, I constantly see players talking bad about admins and their decisions even when they give good reason, even when they had absolutely every single reason in the book to make such a decision, simply because it wasn't a popular decision. So, even when the admins are transparent, they are getting flak. And yes, I've been on both ends of this, ultimately I have no room to talk, but I still plan to talk because maybe it'll get through to someone. Or help in some way to give perspective.

In the end, the only thing that can be done is for everyone to make a conscious effort in doing better. If the admins continue to treat and handle things as they are, it will lead to more and more events like this until it blows up in their face yet again, or, in the opposite effect, leads to too many people quitting out of frustration or distrust. 

In turn, if the community beyond the admins continue to do as they have, well, how can they ask the admins to be better? They're causing the same issues if not more. Be inclusive of people. Don't take things to heart. Don't go after people based on rumors or your personal feelings. Don't exclude people for these reasons either. Don't make exclusive groups where the main topic is SL2 and expect people to not get angry when you are using it to talk about people behind their backs or hide events happening. It's not about if their character should care about it, it's about if they decide to get involved. Don't metagame. Don't spread rumors. Don't spread hate. Treat people how you want to be treated.

Maybe things can get better with time. I hope everyone has a good day and feels better. Especially those who were banned. I know this has been stressful for you all.