Generalized vs Formalized Rules

#1

This is probably going to be uncomfortable for some but I think it needs to be breached now, given a line was crossed recently, to my knowledge…

I was talking to some people yesterday and they mentioned there was a user earlier who was “fetishizing nazis”. Said incident was reported to Riverrynn, but no actual details about what the user was actually saying or doing were disclosed to me.

While I understand a very broad amount of topics and themes are allowed in Wolfery, I firmly believe there are some that cannot be given space no matter what, and this is one of them.

I beleive we should have a formal list of content that is explicitly prohibited here. What do you think?

#2

I think that generalized rules are preferable to formalized lists for a number of reasons: brevity, positivity, and obviating the need to go back and add yet another bullet every time somebody finds a new way to be awful, to name three.

The first paragraph of Sinder’s area rules covers the situation you described adequately, I feel:

No extreme roleplay
No ‘setting the stage for’, ‘taking part in’, or ‘arguably provoking’ roleplay themes involving: conflict/violence, abuse, sexualized minors, or other roleplay generally considered offensive. Keep things to lighter-hearted themes and set these heavier scenes types up privately or elsewhere.

Cosplaying a Nazi absolutely fails this rule, and players violating it should face the same consequences as those who break it due to any other reason.

1 Like
#3

I agree with generalized rules as you described. Truth is people can be horribly creative when devising new ways to be harmful just to skirt poorly defined rules, we can’t reasonably expect to cover all bases with specific listing of cases…

I only wish that what showed up yesterday will still be shut down adequately and leave no space for misinterpretation!

#4

I’ll one up the area rules with the site rules

I would definitely rule playing around a real life hate group as inflammatory and would encourage users who see such imagery to file reports using the in-game tools to let us on the mod team handle such characters appropriately.

2 Likes
#5

I totally second this.
The inflammatory topics rule cannot be bypassed by making it part of your character. They are still inflammatory OOC topics that you just brought into your roleplay.

If you want to play a hateful character that belongs to a faction, make up your own faction!
Eg. you can create a political group that despise all the reptiles, letting your character have a bad reptile-related childhood, and having your character strongly hate all reptiles. This is totally fine, as long as you stick to the rules:

  • You are respectful and nice to all players, including those with reptilian characters
  • You only include players of reptilian characters if they agree to this sort of roleplay
  • You understand that hateful RP is surely not everyone’s cup of tea, and you tone it down in public places (once again, be respectful).

But a formal list…?
Do we really need that? I felt it was rather easy to know what sort of RL things that may be inflammatory.
If you want politics, don’t include real political parties or people.
If you want religion, don’t create a character with a real world religion.

#6

I agree that we need to stick with generalized rules, but there WILL be folks who get upset by ‘subjective rules’. The other day I arrived in the Station Park to find several people leaving because of a RP involving a pair of 7’ dicks gaping one of the participants and their claim was ‘But it’s not violating the explicitly listed things!’ When I pointed to the line about keeping things light-hearted and with so many folks complaining it obviously wasn’t meeting that requirement, they got upset and took the whole thing elsewhere while complaining about how subjective the rules were and how we need more objective list-based rules.

#7

So what you’re saying is, the rules worked. :slight_smile:

1 Like
#8

So: I think a discussion of what kinks are and are not appropriate for public areas in Sinder and the Park in particular is a very different one from whether hateful content is permissible on the game, and these conversations should probably not be happening in the same thread.

#9

I think that generalized rules is a reasonable approach!

Its tricky but I believe its possible to achieve a better middle ground, overall? Too much objectivity or subjectivity can make things hard to interpret and enforce as well

I think Xetem brought up a very nice addition to the existing rules, and I guess roleplaying as something more extreme is… valid? I don’t really think I’d ever participate on something like this so I’ll abstain from commenting.

Either way I think Accipiter summed it up nicely in regards to politics and religion, not including real life ones seems like a nice approach!

#10

I was a part of a related discussion recently, around an entirely unrelated topic, which I think suggests that it is definitely time to start talking about it.

One of the issues that came up, pursuant to the issue of judgement (vis-a-vis general rules versus specific content blacklists) is how to determine where the line goes.

Personally, I am very much in favor of @Xetem’s reference to precedent in the site rules, but I also agree with @Vernon_Otter’s point on subjectivity. I’d like to offer up a suggestion of a ‘legal test’ to resolve ambiguity:

“If such topic, either in discussion or roleplay, upon discovery by a reasonable party lacking the generative context to the discussion or roleplay, would describe the content of the interaction as ‘extreme’, ‘inflammatory’, ‘discriminatory’, or ‘In bad faith’, then the topic is, in the context of environment, inappropriate”

Obviously this is a draft, but I think it’s a solid base for bridging the subjectivity gap between general rules and specific ones- at least with regards to this topic.

#11

I agree (or seem to) that this is 100% covered by normal rules.

We (IMO) do not want a formal list. We want this to be subjective and vague, quite frankly because making it hard and explicit encourages rules lawyering around it. We use the reasonable person test already, making that explicit isn’t something I think would be bad but the wording here might be a little difficult for some of our non-English-native users to get the meaning of.

Aura, I’d encourage you to use the report mechanism, too. Rynn’s not a mod (though she’s staff and I wouldn’t object to her being a mod!) and any of the moderator team would’ve taken care of this right quick.

2 Likes
#12

Thank you! I’d have reported it to a mod if I saw it happening, all that I have here is second hand information from other people after the incident.

#13

A quick question, then… I’ve been asking people this because I’m wondering how obvious the tools are. Call it a bit of a user survey. :smiley:

Do you know how to make a report? Again, I’m asking because I’ve gotten the impression lately that it hasn’t been obvious how to use the formal system.

Do you know how to make a report?
  • Yes, I know where to click
  • Yes, I know the command
  • Yes, I know both where to click and the command
  • No. Can you make reports?

0 voters

(Poll added by Accipiter. Sorry Talon for messing with your post!)

(I will never forgive you, wolf. NEVER. :smiley: )

(What if I gave you a nice massage? Can you at least consider it? :kissing_heart:)

(M…maybe…)

2 Likes
#14

A side note: I’ve investigated the incident that precipitated this fairly extensively since obviously this seems bad. I currently believe it to have been something of a misunderstanding. I would encourage people involved to submit logs with the report function if they have further data challenging that.

2 Likes
#15

It’s not a political group, I just rkk-tkk at the snakes.

#16

We want this to be subjective and vague, quite frankly because making it hard and explicit encourages rules lawyering around it.

Yes. This. My gold standard for this is Luskwood on Second Life. They have only one written rule, and if memory serves, it’s just, “Don’t be a ass,” or something like that. Everything else followed from that, including the unwritten but oft-cited rules against discussing politics or religion. Subjectivity is messy and it varies from person to person, but rules lawyering is much more aggravating for people having to put up with the armchair lawyers in question.

#17

Despite not having been there in some time, Luskwood is just the sort of thing I’m thinking of. Everyone knows just to be nice, or get informed what nice is, or they don’t get to stay there. Which doesn’t happen often.

#18

I am wary of any system that goes too far down the “just don’t be an ass!” style of rules.

I agree that it’s not that useful to try to list out every possible violation, but it’s important to have some clarity about what sorts of things are okay or not.

Otherwise, well… is the “ass” the person having sex in the park, or the person complaining about them doing so? Without some guidance of what’s expected, the rules become a matter of whoever can complain first and loudest.

#19

imo I don’t think the “don’t be an ass” blanket rule works for anything more than just a closed group of friends, which is not the case of Wolfery… just speaking from my own personal experience.

#20

I think we’re actually in the good middle position between “Don’t be a jerk” and a foot-thick volume of rules.

It’s absolutely possible to have someone be rules-correct and still a jerk - say the person telling the scene to stop is right, and they’re still a complete ass about it. That’s actually why you need the loose rules and good mods. Which we have.

(A situation described by Mr. Lebowski: You’re not wrong man, you’re just an asshole. )

(In Luskwood’s case it’s easier for them, it is a non-adult sim so things are a tad simpler.)

1 Like