Staff Complaint - Lordfowl

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

BYOND Key: Senpai Jackboot
Staff BYOND Key: LordFowl
Game ID: github and discord
Reason for complaint: Is conduct is unbecoming of a staff member. His behavior is not at all different from the previous complaint last November. His submitted PR is openly admitted to have no other consideration than a persona vendetta. When his comment on his own PR was posted in his feedback thread, he hid the posts to make them unreadable. Assuming he deleted them I asked him, and he said he didn't. He did not clarify, and when I asked them if he hid them he ignored me, so I asked administration who confirmed the posts were hidden for being off topic.

The only other acceptable medium given to me is a staff complaint.

This is not the first time Lordfowl has made contentious PR's in a passive aggressive manner. He has another one where he titled it a deletion of the playable species.This was reported to Arrow. He just wants to be provocative.
Evidence/logs/etc:

The attached images.
Additional remarks:
Every time I have brought up complaints about Fowl I am given vague remarks about him being talked to about his behavior. There has never been any visible punishment.

Edited March 2, 2019 by Marlon Phoenix

[LordFowl]

I was not replying to you. I was replying to Zelm, who you so conveniently edited out of that discourse. Just as you ignore me, I also ignore you. It is an equitable arrangement.

Saying that "I will delete any posts that do not agree with me" is obviously facetious, considering that I haven't. I uphold the rules of the subforum objectively, and the only posts that were hidden were ones that violated those rules.

You immediately posted an image of me making an offhand comment (despite allegedly having me blocked, indicating at least to me that you were explicitly looking for something juicy to screenshot) as grand-proof of the idea that this PR is some passive aggressive GOTCHA to the lore team. It isn't.

And as for your first image, I was replying to Amory's position of "I disagree with this PR but I will support it if it revives the union arc" by posting the inverse. As I made quite clear on the OP of the feedback thread, this PR was not made in bad faith, and it was not designed to dunk on the lore team. Whether it is your own insecurities speaking through, or simply the fact that you do not like me and need to validate this opinion every so often, is simply irrelevant to me. What you claim is false.

Regarding my "previous incident", we discussed this somewhat indepth on the last go in november. I do not consider my Delete Skrell PR to be a mistake, nor in violation of any rules, nor passive aggressive. I consider it the reason why we have a skrell loredev at this time. You are free to disagree, and I expect you to do so because the lack of a Skrell loredev for over 70 consecutive days reflects poorly on your department, but please stop trying to drag up old dirt.

[AmoryBlaine]

 

Is this relevant?

[Scheveningen]

It's a bit questionable that someone would doctor an image's context to push a point separate from the actual intent of someone else's statement, I will say that much.

[LordFowl]

As relevant as this and any other statements of exasperation I've made in the past regarding Jackboot's many antics;

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

Responding to either of us answers the same question.  The image is not doctored. He either answered both of us or ignored me. He then ignored me when i asked a follow up.

Edited March 2, 2019 by Marlon Phoenix

[LordFowl]

But it nullifies the rest of the statement which paints me in a bad light,

Quote

"Assuming he deleted them I asked him, and he said he didn't. He did not clarify, and when I asked them if he hid them he ignored me, so I asked administration who confirmed the posts were hidden for being off topic.".

I did not start ignoring you after responding to your question. I never stopped ignoring you.

Edited March 2, 2019 by LordFowl

[MoondancerPony]

This is not the first bad-faith PR that Fowl has made. This is also not the first time something specifically like this has happened. We were far too lenient in dealing with Nanako when something like this happened and it led to her choosing to resign when we did too little to correct her behaviour, too late. I think a strong decision needs to be made regarding this kind of behaviour before we have a repeat of that.

This also highlights an issue with Fowl I've noticed quite a lot, which is smug rules-lawyering. "No, I didn't delete any posts. I merely hid them." "I didn't ignore you because you said something I didn't like, I just wasn't listening in the first place." This is not conducive to a functioning staff team.

[LordFowl]

A bit of a double standard that Jackboot blocking me is fine, but me blocking Jackboot is not conducive to a functioning staff team? Am I not allowed to become exasperated also by one too many "cuz im the boss"es? Jackboot and his ever-escalating antics of false indignation are the precipice for that, but I suppose susceptibility to such a thing is a demerit on my end.

I don't know what this situation has to do with Nanako, but I guess since Burger's gone the position of "Developer most easily compared to Nanako" falls to me? Perhaps your memory is anxious, but Nanako's problem was not the so-called "bad-faith" PR, (and the "I don't like this developer so they must be Nanako reborn!" theatrics were old in 2017). And regarding "strong rulings", the rulings are clear. Meme PRs, and by extension PRs made in "bad faith", or not allowed on the GitHub. But this PR, and indeed none of my PRs, have ever been made in "bad faith". You can disagree with my PR, but please stop trying to find malicious motivations where none exist.

And to lightly address the spurious topic of "smug rules-lawyering", I am not beholden to inform Zelm the specifics of where the "I do not like this project, voting for dismissal" comments go after daddy developer devours them. If this makes me smug, so be it, but he would not need to ask if they never broke the rules in the first place.

[Scheveningen]

27 minutes ago, MoondancerPony said:

This also highlights an issue with Fowl I've noticed quite a lot, which is smug rules-lawyering. "No, I didn't delete any posts. I merely hid them." "I didn't ignore you because you said something I didn't like, I just wasn't listening in the first place." This is not conducive to a functioning staff team.

The problem was, with that specific case, people were actively breaking the subforum rules by changing the subject matter of justifying the changes into it being an all-out character assassination attempt on Fowl to undermine the validity of the PR. If I might break the tone of this being a wholesome Christian server for a moment, but the transition of a 'debate the relevant topic matter' into a 'character-assassinate Fowl as fast and hard as possible' is a hecking silly thing.

Perhaps fowl should've deferred to someone else in that case to moderate the forum, but Fowl is perfectly within his rights to semi-moderate the board by removing offensive posts from public view and asking an administrator/mod to deal with it. Such as JB is perfectly within his rights to moderate lore applications or etc.

The closest indicator to the truth is that everyone is at fault for behaving the way they have. If you are caught up about someone moderating a thread in a subforum they have access to, perhaps consider not shitposting the thread to death if you care enough about the issue. It's a very funny way to show how much you care about development if you choose to insult the developer and make grandiose accusations about them as a substitute for actually discussing the merit of the changes.

[Coalf]

Schev would be right about moderation.
I just think it's very unwholesome to make commits with names such as these to avoid the "Don't shitpost in the comments" rule.
 

Spoiler

 

 

[Skull132]

1 minute ago, Coalf said:

Schev would be right about moderation.
I just think it's very unwholesome to make commits with names such as these to avoid the "Don't shitpost in the comments" rule.
 

  Reveal hidden contents

 

 

Commit names are largely exempt from this rule, as long as the commit itself is justified to exist. It is relatively common for commit names to be absolutely silly, stupid, unhelpful, or sometimes shitpost-ey. They are not considered a part of feedback, either.

[Coalf]

Just now, Skull132 said:

Commit names are largely exempt from this rule, as long as the commit itself is justified to exist. It is relatively common for commit names to be absolutely silly, stupid, unhelpful, or sometimes shitpost-ey. They are not considered a part of feedback, either.

Well isn't that a bit hypocritical to ask people to act civil yet letting developers respond with however aggressive comments they want in their commit names?
I think this is a case-by-case thing and it should certainly be taken care of in this instance.

[Skull132]

3 minutes ago, Coalf said:

Well isn't that a bit hypocritical to ask people to act civil yet letting developers respond with however aggressive comments they want in their commit names?
I think this is a case-by-case thing and it should certainly be taken care of in this instance.

Sure, however, the commits are literally making fun of reddit. I would see the argument if the commit names were universally derogatory or aimed at people within this community, but this is just a general meme commit shouting out into the void. Which, again, is common and fine.

[Coalf]

3 minutes ago, Skull132 said:

Sure, however, the commits are literally making fun of reddit. I would see the argument if the commit names were universally derogatory or aimed at people within this community, but this is just a general meme commit shouting out into the void. Which, again, is common and fine.

Well alright, it just seems a bit inconsistent to berate people for the same thing in the comments. But I'll keep the guideline in mind for later when it pops up.

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

The commits are not the source of the complaint, but thank you for providing testimony. They are not particularly offensive to me, though I do not see them that often. The behavioral issues I am specifically pointing out stem from his PR's as they are, the names of the PR's, and how he conducts himself on the github, the forum, and on the discord. There is no behavioral improvement. I've had him blocked specifically to avoid interacting with him, but he seems intent on baiting me into interacting with him by virtue of his PR's intentionally being attention-seeking or bombastic. He openly admits this in the images provided. He's being provocative for his own amusement, and to "get" me/the lore. It's super annoying.

He has escaped any form of punishment or reprimand every single time I or others have complained. In this very thread he shows a lack of goodwill and is just trying to put me on blast. I am rapidly losing faith in anyone having any ability in actually managing him and his behavior. Why would we ever want to ask someone to work in our team when they have to work with this kind of behavior, and seeing him repeatedly get away with it?

Like in my previous staff complaint, I really suggest he be removed from the discord or from the development team and kept as a contributor until the behavior improves. Another talking to and a reprimand will be tantamount to doing nothing at all because it never works. It didn't work in the last staff complaint in November, and it won't work now. There needs to be an actual punishment or this behavior is never going to stop.

 

Edited March 2, 2019 by Marlon Phoenix

[VTCobaltblood]

I'm also wondering if a developer is allowed to close someone else's PR and then reopen it as a joke. 

[Lady Fowl]

26 minutes ago, VTCobaltblood said:

I'm also wondering if a developer is allowed to close someone else's PR and then reopen it as a joke. 

I mean at most those were joking around as he was asking for reviews for that pr, however to the point about git comments, normaly as long as the actual content of the commit is valid, the commit msg really doesnt have a offical standard for what it must go by, as @PoZe mine are ambigious as hell

[VTCobaltblood]

Yes. I have stated that is made as a joke. I'm still unsure if it's allowed or not.

[LordFowl]

Is there any harm in such a joke? Admins sometimes kick friends, loredevs sneak memes into maps, DOs do... something... The point being that that’s harmless behavior, nor particularly vindictive.

The core of this complaint is that I make PRs in bad faith. This is untrue. Jackboot seems to think that I’ve personally confessed to making PRs just to entrap the loredevs. This is also untrue. You can link any PR and I can explain to you the motivations. You’ll find that no PR has ever been created to dunk on someone.

To be frank, I’m quite tired of Jackboot’s behavior. I find it very amusing that he says “in this very thread he shows a lack of goodwill and is just trying to put me on blast” considering that that is Jackboot’s own modus operandi, at least regarding me. The last complaint at least had actual issues interspersed with the Jackboot brand of grand indignation, but this complaint is just the latter amped to 100, the special brand of “take as many images out of context and try to make a grand statement out of them” that he specializes in. I sympathize with Delta when he highlights the idiocy in pretending to be invested in the development process but then going and shitting up feedback threads, forcing moderation. Moondancer says that my behavior regarding Jackboot is “ill-conducive”, but Jackboot’s behavior regarding me borders on a vendetta. But this complaint isn’t about Jackboot, so here we go;

“buthe seems intent on baiting me into interacting with him by virtue of his PR's intentionally being attention-seeking or bombastic.”

False. What’s that quote go? “I don’t think poorly of you. I don’t think of you at all.” This quote highlights perfectly the unstable kernel at the source of this complaint. Jackboot thinks I’m as out to get him as I think he’s out to get me. But I’m not. Rest assured that Jackboot is the last person on my mind when I post a PR.

“He openly admits this in the images provided. He’s being provocative for his own amusement. He’s out to “get” me/lore”

Again, no. What image do I confess doing this? I’ll be frank and say that no, I don’t particularly like the lore, but as a mature adult I’ve never created a PR purely to manifest this spite. You’ve made the accusations - the burden of proof rests on you. But for every screenshot, every quote that your hurredly collect out of context, there is valuable context I am all too willing to provide.

”Another talking to and a reprimand will be tantamount to doing nothing at all because it never works. It didn't work in the last staff complaint in November, and it won't work now.“

On the contrary. Skull is free to disagree, but from my perspective I have upheld the ruling established in the previous complaint.

 

“Perhaps fowl should've deferred to someone else in that case to moderate the forum,”.

As it so happens, and the forum report logs will verify this, I originally deferred Jackboot’s comment to external arbitration, as I foresaw that Jackboot would just use this as more ammo against me. However as it started sprouting further off-topic complaints I saw it was likely to derail the thread, I took action. As is not only my privilege to do so, but my responsibility.

Edited March 2, 2019 by LordFowl

[BurgerBB]

Since I was mentioned in this thread I am legally required to respond.

I've interacted with Lord Fowl many times. His only issue is that his jokes are pretty mean but let's be entirely honest; it's absolutely nothing compared to the stupid drama that the Lore Team and some of the players have constantly exhibited.

Armory was clearly trying to provoke Lord Fowl. He was constantly complaining in discord in a rude, unconstructive way. Many other players, including staff members, were doing the same thing. Lord Fowl responded by shitposting him, and instead of everyone being a reasonable and going "Yeah that's the response Armory should get." everyone is losing their mind and complaining about Lord Fowl. The fact that everyone are posting screenshots with JUST LordFowl's jokes and without ANY prior context should be the smoking gun in this case that Jackboot is not acting in good faith.

Also the Nanako comparisons. Nanako was a racist who caused several issues including throwing serious bigoted insults at other staff members. If a dev so much as sneezes anymore, they're compared to Nanako and it's honestly really degrading. Anyone who goes "They're just like Nanako" and then then argues for unity via "correcting their behavior" then they're not acting in good faith.

And for generally everyone else, if you look at all of Lord Fowl's PRs, notice the sheer amount of work he's put in, and go "Obviously he's trying to ruin the server" or "Obviously he's trying to undermine the lore team." then good lord you're not acting in good faith.

I don't mean to be an enlightened centrist but there are problems on both sides, but I genuinely believe that most of the problem lies on the people who shit on Lord Fowl. for no real reason. Shit on him for the right reasons, get mad when he calls people autistic or retarded, but this is just stupid. It really depresses me to see how far people will go just to remove someone from the community.

 

 

 

Edited March 2, 2019 by BurgerBB

[Coalf]

I don't think Fowl should be held to a different standard.

As is a popular saying, two wrongs don't make a right. And if he was being hackled by staff members, well look where we are, in a place to solve those issues.
Simply put I don't believe someone should be held to a different standard then rest of staff just because we've come to expect bare minimum courtesy from them.

Also, it's a bit strange to defend intent and that it wasn't done as a troll. While in the Reddit thread about it you call it a shitpost and an epic troll.

Addendum: I think both parties were partially at fault, one for assuming the intent of the PR and the other for reacting inappropriately.

Edited March 2, 2019 by Coalf

[BurgerBB]

4 minutes ago, Coalf said:

I don't think Fowl should be held to a different standard.

As is a popular saying, two wrongs don't make a right. And if he was being hackled by staff members, well look where we are, in a place to solve those issues.
Simply put I don't believe someone should be held to a different standard then rest of staff just because we've come to expect bare minimum courtesy from them.

Also, it's a bit strange to defend intent and that it wasn't done as a troll. While in the Reddit thread about it you call it a shitpost and an epic troll.

Addendum: I think both parties were partially at fault, one for assuming the intent of the PR and the other for reacting inappropriately.

never take anything i say seriously if i type it in all lowercase, especially on reddit

Further down the thread you can see me defending it, and you can also see me defending it on the forums. My posts on reddit should not reflect my opinion on anything.

I'm not asking Lord Fowl to be held to a different standard. I don't know where you got that from so you're going to have to clarify.

 

[Coalf]

Actually, you typed the last response in lowercase
Here is your initial one, proper punctuation.

Spoiler

The "legitimate one" in lowercase.

Spoiler

 

[BurgerBB]

2 minutes ago, Coalf said:

Actually, you typed the last response in lowercase
Here is your initial one, proper punctuation.

  Hide contents

The "legitimate one" in lowercase.

  Hide contents

 

Me telling you not to take anything seriously in lowercase was all lowercase.

But no really you shouldn't take anything I say seriously on reddit.