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https://www.nationstates.net/page=dispatch/id=1841726

With respect to all involved, I simply fail to see why this spiraled out the way it did. Thinking that furries are discriminated against to the same extent as Jews is a really bad opinion not backed up by any fact, but it's still an opinion. I also don't see how it's far-right, unless that is referring to completely separate context.

With respect to all involved, I simply fail to see why this spiraled out the way it did. Thinking that furries are discriminated against to the same extent as Jews is a really bad opinion not backed up by any fact, but it's still an opinion. I also don't see how it's far-right, unless that is referring to completely separate context.

Also, according to Michi, that was not even an opinion they had. It was never said that they were equal. I see how there was a misunderstanding, but both sides dealt with it way too aggressively. That's how it spiraled out the way it did. The lack of ability to calm down a situation and talk things out.

Unfortunately that was never in the cards.  Had I been directly approached about it from the person who was upset about it, it could have gone different.  Unfortunately, what I instead got was a public callout and demands of an apology as well as being demeaned and called immature for my response which actually I did apologize twice (once for how they read my post, the second for how it was interpreted), an argument over optics on something I didn't even actually say, and more demands for an apology via an indirect DM through Wintermoot from someone else.  Not once during that entire time did the offended party reach out to me directly to talk it through versus having other folks do it for them or making the forum posts that they did...even accusing me at one point of closing one of the threads until Moot had to explain that it was a decision of the Ops, which I wasn't even around for that discussion (I was at work at the time iirc).

So honestly, it was never going to work.  The only thing that would have been accepted would have been me bending over backwards and apologizing for having an opinion that they misinterpreted, as well as being reprimanded by Wintermoot...more than likely in the form of me losing my Discord Operator position.

Unfortunately that was never in the cards.  Had I been directly approached about it from the person who was upset about it, it could have gone different.  Unfortunately, what I instead got was a public callout and demands of an apology as well as being demeaned and called immature for my response which actually I did apologize twice (once for how they read my post, the second for how it was interpreted), an argument over optics on something I didn't even actually say, and more demands for an apology via an indirect DM through Wintermoot from someone else.  Not once during that entire time did the offended party reach out to me directly to talk it through versus having other folks do it for them or making the forum posts that they did...even accusing me at one point of closing one of the threads until Moot had to explain that it was a decision of the Ops, which I wasn't even around for that discussion (I was at work at the time iirc).

So honestly, it was never going to work.  The only thing that would have been accepted would have been me bending over backwards and apologizing for having an opinion that they misinterpreted, as well as being reprimanded by Wintermoot...more than likely in the form of me losing my Discord Operator position.

Also, trader's opinion was pretty clear when he singled you out as someone that should never have been an Op. 

Also, trader's opinion was pretty clear when he singled you out as someone that should never have been an Op.

Except trader actually approved Michi as an op again at the same time Mars became an op.

Actually, now that I think about it, and I'll have to go back to the logs, but I think that was entirely trader's decision (not that I would have opposed it, of course).

Also, trader's opinion was pretty clear when he singled you out as someone that should never have been an Op.

Except trader actually approved Michi as an op again at the same time Mars became an op.

Actually, now that I think about it, and I'll have to go back to the logs, but I think that was entirely trader's decision (not that I would have opposed it, of course).

Yes, he pretty much welcomed me back and gave me powers before you popped in, though he'd probably argue that he knew you would have done it instantly if you were on.

I am probably gonna piss off a bunch of people on all sides of this debacle with this post, but I must do what I believe is right. Anyway

It is certainly true that Wintermoot has flaws as a leader, as does the rest of Wintreath's leadership past and present. Wintreath is led by people and all people are flawed. As I said last month, senior individuals in Wintreath have history of doing what at first was a minor misstep, but which then blows completely out of proportion because they refused to acknowledge any wrongdoing. As leaders, the impact of our actions often matter far more than the intent, and it can be hard to recognize that. Meanwhile, due to the Fundamental Attribution Error, others' intent and context are often ignored. I will point to two recent examples.

First, the circumstances leading to Neon Abigail's departure in August. This conflict not only led to the departure of a valued member of our community, but severed what I understand to have been a close friendship. To recap, Abi had left the Discord server, which iirc is something she had a history of doing previously as well in order to cool off after heated discussions. She was still actively posting on the forums and participating in Werewolf, but Mars assumed for some reason that she was no longer hosting Summersend Spyfall, and thus unilaterally announced the cancellation of her game. Abi reacted confused, but instead of just apologizing, Mars doubled down and made excuses, refusing to acknowledge any wrongdoing. They also appeared to snarkily drag up private interpersonal relationship drama, which felt inappropriate given that Mars was acting in an official capacity as Thane. Michi then also shifted the blame to Abi by placing the onus on her to reach out to still confirm that she was still hosting. This was incredibly odd to me, and Abi expressed confusion as well when I reached out to her. From her perspective, she had left the Discord to deescalate tensions quietly, and instead, Mars had used her completely unrelated role as Thane of Culture to drag this out into the open. Even though I know it was not intended as such, it probably felt like she was being punished by someone in an unequal power dynamic for things done in a completely separate context.

Michi had locked the relevant forum thread (which I believe created a chilling effect on helping to resolve and learn from this drama - several people were using likes to show support for Abi, but nothing could be easily said), so I reached out Wintermoot privately, as I know he tends to prefer this. As he typically does, Wintermoot wholly defended Mars (and Michi), claiming that the validity of their actions was a matter of debate and that they certainly did not intend to do this. By contrast, Abi's feelings (which were very understandable given the context, imo) were being misinterpreted as as an accusation that Wintrean leadership was conspiring to punish her. Both publicly and privately, and both out of earshot and to her face, a narrative was being told that Abi was the one to blame, that she was the one being unreasonable, etc. Every consideration was being made to the intent of the leadership, but not to Abi's. Furthermore, by keeping so much of this in DMs, these narratives could form unchecked. As I said last month, we need to try to understand the other side and apologize for misunderstanding, instead of doubling down on our mistakes and misinterpretations. It's very human to do this - I certainly have in the past - but community leaders must strive to be better than that.

After that, I did not have the energy to speak out about my concerns publicly. I was moving to a new city and starting a full-time job for the first time - other things took priority, and I ended up taking a break from Wintreath. I'm sorry that we couldn't resolve this at the time - there was so much we should have learned as a community but did not.

Second, the furry bigotry incident. Much has already been said about this, so I will just share my two cents. I understand where Michi was coming from - furries are the target of bigotry, the most notable incident probably being a tear gas attack by a right-wing terrorist in 2014, which was largely laughed at by mainstream media and government authorities instead of taken seriously. However, we can sometimes misspeak and then be misinterpreted as a result. What we meant to say or do is different from what we actually said or did. Michi had a very reasonable opinion that was worded very poorly. Instead of recognizing this mistake, and apologizing for the accidental harm caused by his poor choice of wording, he doubled down based on what he intended to say. But again, impact is what matters here, not intent. Refusal to acknowledge this has led to repeated blowings-up of what should have been minor issues.

(I will also point out that during this incident, trader muted people who were airing their grievances on Discord, thereby further inflaming tensions.)

With all this said, I think it should be clear to anyone reading that the letter in the OP does resonate with me (even if the facts presented ore rather one-sided). As trader said in his letter, and as I said last month, all that people really needed in these situations was an acknowledgement of the mistake, an apology. Instead, the pattern has been one of doubling down and escalation. It's important to note though that these issues are not exclusive to any one person, but to many key community leaders in general, including those on both sides of this split. We are all human and we can only strive to be better than we were before.

Finally, I must say that the community's treatment of Wintermoot last night in #wintreath was completely unwarranted and uncalled for. The continuous mockery and public shaming was utterly unnecessary, unproductive, and self-serving.

I'll be around on the forums as always. Campfire has taken the Minecraft server with them, so I'll be over there too (Pond and I are finally building actual Nether infrastructure, complete with blue ice boat roads). I wish all community leaders the best of luck and hope that you can take the important lessons necessary from everything that has happened. Your jobs are not enviable but I hope they are fulfilling.

Edit: minor phrasing

What I disagree with is the idea that the onus is always on the misunderstood party. Svipjoth's tone and demeanour was hella aggressive, and was never going to do anything but make Michi defensive. 

What @Laurentus says is true...in this case, I don't think the way that these grievances were presented helped matters, but at the same time I can't say with certainty that a less aggressive tone would have led to a different conclusion. For me personally, it didn't click until the Discord chat when things were the most heated.

As trader said in his letter, and as I said last month, all that people really needed in these situations was an acknowledgement of the mistake, an apology.

I can't speak for Michi, but for me personally until the Discord chat I thought Michi was being demanded to apologize for what he actually intended to say, which I just didn't understand at all. At this point I've read the forum topic multiple times, and the logs in the departure statement that supposedly show that the situation was clear to me, and I just don't see it. I don't see anything that clarifies that Svip was misunderstanding what Michi was saying and that it was that misunderstanding that Michi was being asked to apologize for. In the logs trader repeatedly says "a take that's not great around the edges", but I took that to also mean what Michi intended to say. And it's clear that's how I'm taking it when I said "I'm just flabergasted that somebody would go out of their way to comment on a post in a forum they don't have access to suggest that groups' discrimination isn't as valid as other groups."

So how can Michi acknowledge a mistake that nobody has made him aware of?

Even worse, the whole thing came off as a huge dogpile on Michi on the forums and then within the ops team itself, with what appears to me as a blanket insistence that Michi was in the wrong and should apologize without any context for what it was that he was actually supposed to be apologizing for. Even if he had apologized, it wouldn't have meant anything because what he would have thought he was apologizing for wouldn't have been the same as what Svip and others were actually offended about.

Maybe it was that obvious to most everybody else, but it wasn't obvious to me, and I don't think it was obvious to Michi either.

And maybe on our part it may have been as simple as asking Svip why she believed that comparing how bigots try to tie the actions of extremists to the main group was equating the actual discrimination that each group faces. Maybe that would have triggered something that would have made it more obvious that we weren't even on the same page. But it never came to mind, because at least to me it seemed obvious that she was offended by what Michi was actually intending to say. And I didn't understand why anyone would be offended by that, because it's just factually true.

But because the topic was already so hostile, and I didn't understand why what Michi said had created such hostility right off the bat, I decided to try to cool the temperature by reminding everybody that we're all friends here who have helped make Wintreath what it is, because I didn't want the situation to turn out exactly as it did: with people villainizing each other, hyping each other up in private spaces, and creating a lot of conflict and strife out of it. But you told me that was taken as condescending...it wasn't meant to be at all, and after the response that post got I just didn't know what to do, and I felt I had nobody to really consult with because by then everybody had taken Svip's side, even within the ops team. It seemed like the only advice I would get is that Michi should apologize, which still just didn't make sense to me.

I did apologize for the misunderstanding at the end of it, once I did realize that it was such...but I just don't understand where I could have realized it any sooner than I did. And again, I understand that most everybody else realized that, but I'm having trouble figuring out where it would have been obvious to me.

In hindsight, I feel like everybody involved has some responsibility here...the misunderstood party should make a good faith attempt to understand why the offended party is offended, and the offended party should clearly communicate what it is about what was said that offended them. But it seems like in this case everyone felt they were doing that, and it just didn't occur to anyone that things were being misunderstood until it was too late. I'm not sure how things could have been different and we realize that earlier on, and would honestly appreciate some help in figuring that out.

Bluntly, you don't get it because you're a white dude in a majority-white country, and not merely a majority-white country, but one which also happens to be the global hegemon that has been prosecuting a two-decade long 'war on terror' that is fundamentally a 'right to bomb brown people who we want the mineral rights of' (the other variety of brown people, 'ones who give us their mineral rights and consequently get us hella profits' is fundamentally okay in this equation).
There's nothing fundamentally wrong with being in that position. But it does mean that very often, you will not automatically understand what it is like from the perspective of the minority in question (which basically is something that anybody who's spent much time being a minority grasps pretty quickly).

For all that furries are consistently the victims of online abuse and vitriol for basically completely unfounded reasons, they are in no way demonized to nearly the same extent as Arab-Americans (or Pakistani-Americans, or for a completely unrelated bonus stemming purely from racist portrayals, Sikhs, because turbans are a fundamental part of their cultural/religious identity) were and have been for the last two solid decades of drone strikes in the Middle East. They are in no way victimized in the same way that the Palestinian people are, for the very real and factual evidence that there is no concerted effort by a state entity (i.e. one that has a lot of guns) to kill them en masse and deprive them of rights.
In essence, to make the equivalency Michi did is rather like walking up to someone with a gunshot wound and saying 'yeah, I know how that feels bro, I had a migraine yesterday'. They're comparable, right? I mean, in both cases the person feels pain! It shouldn't matter that the degree of pain differs, or that there are more lasting consequences to one than the other; pain is pain, discrimination and disparagement is discrimination and disparagement.
And if that analogy suddenly helps make things comprehensible to you, great! And the fact that the problem was not immediately comprehensible to you isn't the end of the world, but it does seem to be precisely what trader was going off about. And if it doesn't, then this split is for the best because the worldviews of the two sides seem to be fundamentally incompatible.

I don't really have a horse in this race. I left the community a while ago and only decided to start checking in when I first heard the rumblings about Something Having Happened. And I don't really intend on getting re-involved with Wintreath or involved with Campfire to any real extent. But when I saw the makeup of your Stability Squad in today's mass telegram, I felt the need to come in here and point out that a fundamental part of the problem is every single one of y'all is a white dude and part of the fundamental fucking problem being invisible to you is that you're all white (although for maximum fairness, Lau, at least, gets points for being a minority in his home country, which may help with grasping the issue, although it doesn't seem to have happened in this case) (Yes, I understand that two members of the RSS are gay, and that is a sexual minority, but the ways in which racial discrimination happen differ from anti-LGBT bigotry or gender discrimination or ageism or literally any other form of -ism and that's kind of why you want a diverse group of people in your team so they can catch shit before it becomes a problem).
But yeah, like, literally the only POC member of the Op team left over what is fundamentally an issue about perceptions/understandings of racial discrimination and you don't immediately respond by finding more POC perspectives for your transition team? Either find y'all some fresh blood (some with different perspectives that will call you on shit in private, and then listen to them from time to time, instead of making people air this shit out in public cause you won't listen otherwise), or accept that the community is going to become an increasingly incestuous, constantly shrinking one entirely composed of all the same old faces all the time.

Last point: stop being so conflict-averse. It is one thing to avoid serious conflict, but the need to constantly present that everybody is universally conflict-averse in all respects in the interests of civility just means that a bunch of minor disagreements, shoved into a closet and unaired, wind up festering until all that built-up pressure violently explodes into what is yet another fucking schism.
Minor fights about perspectives are inevitable if you truly are trying to create an inclusive community that encompasses all points of view - trying to wallpaper over them in the interests of 'oh we're just a big happy family here, we never fight' does not solve the underlying issues that a lack of a decent outlet for them causes. A big part of why I left in the first place was the constant sense of walking on eggshells because half the time when some good discussion would finally get going in CW it'd be muted; I joined some other servers towards the end of my tenure in Wintreath and the lack of a constant impetus towards some false obligation of civility has arguably led to a much greater sense of camaraderie, even if I catch a lot more shit for it.
I've had some rip-roaring arguments with Lau and still consider us chill because reasonable people can stridently disagree with each other about things and not hold a grudge about it, provided they're allowed to actually have those strident disagreements instead of plastering a smile on their face and pretending everybody is one big happy Stepford family.

@Doc: Thanks for taking the time to give your insights on what's going on. I know you're not really involved in anything at this point, and it was nice of you to take the time. I'm going to reflect on what you said and reply back later, maybe tonight if I have a chance.

But I did want to say that the current membership of the RSS is mostly based on who is still around, has knowledge of and insight what's been going on, and has the time to commit to the activity that this undertaking is going to require. We haven't reached out yet to everybody we would like to have, and some people that we've reached out to are still considering whether they'll have the time to commit. I wanted to make the announcement anyways though because I know there's a lot of uncertainty about Wintreath's future, and I wanted people to know that something is at least going on.

I'll see what I can do with your general suggestions with the people we still have in Wintreath, but if there's specific people you'd like to suggest I'm open to those suggestions as well.

Bluntly, you don't get it because you're a white dude in a majority-white country, and not merely a majority-white country, but one which also happens to be the global hegemon that has been prosecuting a two-decade long 'war on terror' that is fundamentally a 'right to bomb brown people who we want the mineral rights of' (the other variety of brown people, 'ones who give us their mineral rights and consequently get us hella profits' is fundamentally okay in this equation).
There's nothing fundamentally wrong with being in that position. But it does mean that very often, you will not automatically understand what it is like from the perspective of the minority in question (which basically is something that anybody who's spent much time being a minority grasps pretty quickly).

For all that furries are consistently the victims of online abuse and vitriol for basically completely unfounded reasons, they are in no way demonized to nearly the same extent as Arab-Americans (or Pakistani-Americans, or for a completely unrelated bonus stemming purely from racist portrayals, Sikhs, because turbans are a fundamental part of their cultural/religious identity) were and have been for the last two solid decades of drone strikes in the Middle East. They are in no way victimized in the same way that the Palestinian people are, for the very real and factual evidence that there is no concerted effort by a state entity (i.e. one that has a lot of guns) to kill them en masse and deprive them of rights.
In essence, to make the equivalency Michi did is rather like walking up to someone with a gunshot wound and saying 'yeah, I know how that feels bro, I had a migraine yesterday'. They're comparable, right? I mean, in both cases the person feels pain! It shouldn't matter that the degree of pain differs, or that there are more lasting consequences to one than the other; pain is pain, discrimination and disparagement is discrimination and disparagement.
And if that analogy suddenly helps make things comprehensible to you, great! And the fact that the problem was not immediately comprehensible to you isn't the end of the world, but it does seem to be precisely what trader was going off about. And if it doesn't, then this split is for the best because the worldviews of the two sides seem to be fundamentally incompatible.

I don't really have a horse in this race. I left the community a while ago and only decided to start checking in when I first heard the rumblings about Something Having Happened. And I don't really intend on getting re-involved with Wintreath or involved with Campfire to any real extent. But when I saw the makeup of your Stability Squad in today's mass telegram, I felt the need to come in here and point out that a fundamental part of the problem is every single one of y'all is a white dude and part of the fundamental fucking problem being invisible to you is that you're all white (although for maximum fairness, Lau, at least, gets points for being a minority in his home country, which may help with grasping the issue, although it doesn't seem to have happened in this case) (Yes, I understand that two members of the RSS are gay, and that is a sexual minority, but the ways in which racial discrimination happen differ from anti-LGBT bigotry or gender discrimination or ageism or literally any other form of -ism and that's kind of why you want a diverse group of people in your team so they can catch shit before it becomes a problem).
But yeah, like, literally the only POC member of the Op team left over what is fundamentally an issue about perceptions/understandings of racial discrimination and you don't immediately respond by finding more POC perspectives for your transition team? Either find y'all some fresh blood (some with different perspectives that will call you on shit in private, and then listen to them from time to time, instead of making people air this shit out in public cause you won't listen otherwise), or accept that the community is going to become an increasingly incestuous, constantly shrinking one entirely composed of all the same old faces all the time.

Last point: stop being so conflict-averse. It is one thing to avoid serious conflict, but the need to constantly present that everybody is universally conflict-averse in all respects in the interests of civility just means that a bunch of minor disagreements, shoved into a closet and unaired, wind up festering until all that built-up pressure violently explodes into what is yet another fucking schism.
Minor fights about perspectives are inevitable if you truly are trying to create an inclusive community that encompasses all points of view - trying to wallpaper over them in the interests of 'oh we're just a big happy family here, we never fight' does not solve the underlying issues that a lack of a decent outlet for them causes. A big part of why I left in the first place was the constant sense of walking on eggshells because half the time when some good discussion would finally get going in CW it'd be muted; I joined some other servers towards the end of my tenure in Wintreath and the lack of a constant impetus towards some false obligation of civility has arguably led to a much greater sense of camaraderie, even if I catch a lot more shit for it.
I've had some rip-roaring arguments with Lau and still consider us chill because reasonable people can stridently disagree with each other about things and not hold a grudge about it, provided they're allowed to actually have those strident disagreements instead of plastering a smile on their face and pretending everybody is one big happy Stepford family.

Fair on all counts. I'm a minority, but I've certainly never had it nearly as rough as Muslims in America. I've also never been in America. 

Also, I'm down for some more rip-roaring debates if you're ever in the neighbourhood again. 

After Doc's post yesterday, Laurentus ran us through some of the op chat logs that have been published, giving Michi and I a push to figure out what we had missed at the time...we missed the fact that trader was sharing his feelings as somebody who experiences discrimination and can't hide the reason that he's discriminated against. I can't speak for Michi, but I thought he was just giving an example of how Michi's intended statement was wrong, but in doing so we completely dismissed his own feelings as someone who experiences discrimination, and that had to be incredibly hurtful. It's not that I ever intended to hurt him or anybody else...he was someone I thought of as one of my closest friends, but I'm sure I did regardless.

Afterwards, I starting looking up and going through sensitivity training. I was dismayed to feel like I maybe needed that...I always thought it was for hate-filled bigots who have to have it to keep themselves barely in line enough to keep their jobs. I'm a liberal, I despise discrimination of any kind, and beyond that I proudly think of myself as a compassionate and loving person who tries to bring those aspects of myself in leading Wintreath. But obviously in this and other cases, that wasn't enough. My actions, though made with the best of intentions at the time, had the opposite effect and hurt people I considered to be friends even more.

Through that, I came to realize the pattern of dismissiveness that's strung through all the incidents over the years. We focused on the fact that the person who did what they did in each incident didn't intend to hurt anyone, and in doing so dismissed the people who were hurt regardless. Even if it wasn't consciously intended, the message we put out was that people didn't have the right to feel what they felt, or that we just didn't care that they were hurt.

• In the bob incident, we focused on the fact that AJ was just joking and didn't mean to hurt anybody. I failed to understand that people were hurt regardless of AJ's intentions, and in the process dismissed their feelings. The result was a very technical solution (disallowing ops to change people's names) that treated a symptom rather than the real cause of the incident.
• In the furry incident, I focused on my assumption that Svip was offended at what Michi intended to say, and again in the process dismissed that she and then others were obviously offended and hurt regardless of intent. When I apologized for the misunderstanding, I thought the matter was resolved, but I failed to even recognize the very real hurt that was caused by the initial incident and made worse by the ignorant way I handled the matter, much less address it.

And I think that's the key to what I've been asking. Maybe I couldn't have recognized why Svip was offended any earlier than I did, but I could have and should have recognized that she was offended and started from there. I could apologized that our discussion offended her, then when things were less heated worked with her and anybody else to figure out the why. I could have done that at any point, but I didn't...because I believed the intent was what matters, on some level I think I thought they were wrong to feel angry over something that wasn't intended. And while I was very aware of the anger people felt, I completely failed to realize that they were hurt, too, even though I think it was directly stated to me at least once.

The statement that was made assumes that I should have just gotten it as soon as things were explained to me, and maybe a better man would have. But I'm sorry to say I really struggled to get this. Even after Lau brought it up, it took a lot of discussion, probing, and even roleplay for me to start to get it. And I know there's more for me to get, but this is what I've realized so far. I don't expect or want anything to come out of this...I don't expect a medal for finally starting to get what seems to have been obvious to everyone else all along. But I realize that I was wrong...in each incident over the last few years, my inept, ignorant, and dismissive handling of those situations repeatedly hurt people that I cared about and caused harm to our community.

I can only vow to become a better leader and better person in the future, but I know the damage is already done. I'm sorry to Svip, trader, and everybody else that was offended and hurt over my mishandling of this incident and the numerous others over the past few years. And I'm sorry to our entire community that my mishandling made Wintreath, something many of us have poured our hearts and souls into, into something less than what it should have been.

Just caught up on forum posts. Doc makes an excellent point about the need for POC/racial minority voices in the transition team. IRL, I have some experience in community and solidarity building in Asian American political circles, and I hope I can help provide that perspective in discussions going forward.

I was hesitant to join the Regional Stability Squad when invited, for a variety of reasons, but Doc's post, as well as Wintermoot's willingness to learn, has swayed me. I am impressed by the progress that Wintermoot has made in educating himself and understanding the root causes of our community's conflicts. And I am hopeful that this progress can continue so that we can remake Wintreath into a place of safety, support, and allyship for all in our community and their identities.