Cats In Command(?)

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

Currently there is a debate going on within the lore team, and with the other heads of administration (Scopes, Doom) about the role of Tajarans on the station.

Awhile ago (in terms of months) there was a reversal in the server policy on Tajarans. Previously, they were not allowed in command positions under any circumstances. This did well in overtly keeping Tajarans in an 'under' class, but sentiment at the time rallied against it. I, myself, argued against a total ban, saying it discouraged roleplay without any feasible reason. After heated debate, the policy changed, and the command channel began to meow.

An indefinite time after this happened, I became loremaster and Sue went on a haitus. My philosophy has always been to try to be as loosey goosey as I can be, and allow the race overseers to do their own thing, as long as everything can more or less come together consistently.

Unfortunately, Tajarans have been getting an exceedingly and progressively worsening reputation to the point that I regret their total equality with other races. There is an undeniable sense of entitlement in the Tajaran community. I have had a dozen at least complaints or stories about Tajarans that maul people over racist comments, or are generally disagreeable and argumentative individuals. Even when these incidents came to me, I elected to keep from using OOC means to combat it, since we have a functioning DO corps now.

But IC action has insofar been unable to punish misbehaviour by Tajaran players. In addition, the entire atmosphere of the species continues to be one of entitlement. The lore is being outright ignored, and any attempts to actually follow the lore (looking down on tajaran, not giving them equal opportunities) results in lynch mobs of meowing rage.

This is unacceptable. This has been unacceptable. We are now looking into the methods to combat it as all IC avenues have been exhausted.

Instead of liberally revoking whitelists, this is the first option we are considering. To reinforce the fact Tajarans are looked down on and kept as an underclass, we are debating on once again revoking them from command positions.

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The first stance - the one I argued for originally before abandoning in the face of justified fears from staff of accusations of 'meta-friendships' - is to open up whitelists for a player to play as a Tajaran in command slots. This would keep them rare, allow us to keep easy track on their numbers and involvement, and be easy to strip without jobbanning the player or permanently killing them off by firing them. This whitelist would be overseen by the lore team, and specifically myself.

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The second stance is to continue as we have, and keep command open without restriction to Tajarans. This has the undefined clause that we're going to get more firm on behaviour from Tajaran players irregardless.

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The third stance is to completely ban them from command positions. This is a tactical nuclear strike from orbit in terms of response, and it would be a reversion to the previous policy. This would very explicitly keep the Tajaran defined as an underclass.

[canon35]

I say let them have their own head whitelists, but if needed, I support revoking their full command privileges.

[Voyd2000]

Like I said in another Tajara related post, I can handle lore based IC hate, but the shit in OOC and peoples automatic hate / Linking with a certain subgroup of real life people and the hate that comes with it, Is getting old fucking fast.

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

I say let them have their own head whitelists, but if needed, I support revoking their full command privileges.

 

One of my main characters (My main character for awhile) is my Tajaran HoP, Houssam Jawdat. I want to disclose this because I feel that my following stance is legitimate but I don't want to come across as if I'm only trying to protect my Command cat. So while I think this stance is legitimate, you can know the possible context and make a judgement on it using that context.

I have noticed that a lot of the incidents with Tajarans involve them in under-command positions. Engineers, civilians, etc. There are a few good Tajarans players in command, which may be lumped together with the rest of the non-command cats in being considered a problem. Now, this would be great for IC mindsets, but this is the OOC view as well (hence the hilarious fact the total ban option already has 67% of the vote).

Making an additional whitelist would allow Tajarans into command, but allow them to be rare, and make it very clear IC and OOC that they have additional responsibilities and expectations that they need to follow. It allows tenuous employment for them; to where if they become a problem character, they can be booted from command without revoking the player's entire whitelist in either command or species, without punishing this other characters that are doing the role how they should and how the lore expects them to.

[spacevoidagent]

Cats have no rights to be in command.

Tajara filth are barely capable of processing the thoughts of science and true leadership. The leaders of Adhomai are rotten and smell of canned cat food and rotten sardine oil. They live lavishly with fancy robes and shit, while the other cats live in warstruck villages of death. Tajara obviously are natural-born shitheads and have no concept of fair leadership. NanoTrasen attempted to 'help' the Tajarans and introduced them to the wonders of humanity, and taught them the correct way to get shit done, and quick. We gave them a space program in ten years, fuck yeah, HUMANITY. NT gave the kittens of Ahdomai some shitty education to 'prepare them for the future.' which is just to make it look like they care. Meanwhile, millions of digusting, inbred cat fucks are out doing menial labor, like humanity and NT want's them to do. They mine rocks and shit, and cut down huge trees all day in hopes of becoming as advanced as #HumanMasterRace. This can never be accomplished as the Tajara cat race is inferior in everyway. They are hairy, smelly, borderline mentally handicapped, smelly, have useless tails, and have ugly looking fur. They can't even speak Common or Basic, and scream and purr all the time over the fucking radio.

Some lucky cats got selected to be aboard one of NT's so-called fancy (P.O.S Station tbh) Plasma Research Station. Somehow, some 28 year old cats got command positions, despite previous policies restricting the disgusting, lowly catbeasts from command positions. The People of the NSS Aurora Public Uplink are finally speaking of the outrage that is catbeasts. I myself demand that all Tajarans be restricted to simple civilian jobs, like cleaning shit from our toilets and making drinks for the useless lesbians and cargo workers aboard-station. The humanitarian efforts to rid the Tajaran of society are failing, as the disgusting catbeasts talk shit on humans all the time and threaten to kill us, even though we are like a third god to them. Messa and whatever the hell the other ones name aren't even real, and Tajarans should shut their smelly muzzles.

Thus ends this transcript. BAN TAJARAN FILTH FROM COMMAND, RESTORE HUMAN POWER. A PRODUCTIVE TEAM IS A HUMAN TEAM*.

-spacevoidagent

*Human studies have shown a positive correlation with the amount of human commanders and average work productivity in deep space. The study is in no way/shape or form affiliated with NanoTrasen or Sol.

Edited September 18, 2015 by Guest

[Eliot Clef]

I've voted, but I just want to throw my two cents in as more than just a vote.

I don't really think Option #1 should be Tajaran-specific. I think all "usually banned from command" player types should be able to, through activity on Aurora, eventually achieve a command post.

But, I think we've long established that I am far more permissive towards what people Want to play than most people around here are.

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

I've voted, but I just want to throw my two cents in as more than just a vote.

I don't really think Option #1 should be Tajaran-specific. I think all "usually banned from command" player types should be able to, through activity on Aurora, eventually achieve a command post.

But, I think we've long established that I am far more permissive towards what people Want to play than most people around here are.

 

To make a specific counter-example: Unathi, for whatever reason, haven't had the same level of problems as Tajarans in terms of behavior in command. It might be a symptom of them being my species to oversee and I'm active enough to spot issues and take action, but as far as I know the Unathi whitelisted players have more often than not validated my trust by acting as Unathi should more or less act when in positions of power.

If they ever reach the sheer volume of issues as Tajarans have, this would have to change.

Regular "banned from command" players already have to reapply with their whitelist.

IPC and dionae are a sticky subject that I'm not even going to touch in this thread because that's a derailing can of worms.

[Eliot Clef]

To make a specific counter-example: Unathi, for whatever reason, haven't had the same level of problems as Tajarans in terms of behavior in command. It might be a symptom of them being my species to oversee and I'm active enough to spot issues and take action, but as far as I know the Unathi whitelisted players have more often than not validated my trust by acting as Unathi should more or less act when in positions of power.

If they ever reach the sheer volume of issues as Tajarans have, this would have to change.

Regular "banned from command" players already have to reapply with their whitelist.

IPC and dionae are a sticky subject that I'm not even going to touch in this thread because that's a derailing can of worms.

 

The term "Dicklizard" is around for a reason. Back when I first started playing, we had some issues with security Unathi being really nasty, hyper-aggressive valid hunters who would beat people up at the drop of a hat. Pretty sure most of them from back then have moved on, though. I don't really disagree with any decision that keeps things pretty open, but I don't think it's true that Unathi are innocent of being rampantly shit within the last year or so.

Though, even back then, I noticed Tajarans being uppity little shits and clawing people horribly for little to nothing.

[Reyjakai]

Dicklizards have always sorta been a thing, and the Unathi are intentionally designed to revel in combat and bloodshed. It's how they're made, and it's how their culture is played out. The problem here isn't that Unathi aren't being dicks; they are, and that's what they're supposed to do. The problem is that the catbeasts aren't following the same lore. If a cat comes up and scratches a human, the reaction to that by all other people would be to beat that filthy cat down. The sense of entitlement is pretty high up there as well as being a problem. Cats feel like the world, or at least NanoTrasen, owes them something. This isn't the case. The cats owe NanoTrasen everything, since they're the only company shady enough to employ a bunch of filthy cats.

WHAT THAT ALL IN MIND.

I'm a big fan of the players who play cats in command. Jawdat especially is a fun character to bullshit with, but the thing that makes him unique is (what it seems like, at least) his attempt to rid himself of the constraints of their race. Most cats on the station should be timid, afraid cats that would be too afraid of getting beaten or fired to speak out. What we have instead is a large number of cats actively speaking out against NanoTrasen, command, and security.

As such, I'd rather vote to scrub all the cats in command than the alternative.

[NebulaFlare]

I feel inclined to agree, that some Tajara don't pan out to the proper lore. Tajarans are supposed to be very timid and submissive - and sometimes, a few act too cat-like, instead of an alien species.

Bottom line is, certain Tajara qualities would not make them fit for command. And trying to mold them to fit the command just betrays the lore. But that doesn't hold the case for all tajara. I've seen a few great tajara roleplay. We need extra guidelines to make it prominent that humanity still has speciesism to certain species. The blind acceptance is a great quality of ourselves, but it's unrealistic. And when someone is racist, even a little, it's just....plain out fruity.

I don't feel like the current issue of Tajara in command is the main problem though. The only two Tajara I recall that are often in command are Jawdat and the other Nasir in Engineering. Both do a very good job of it. NAsir manages to earn the respect of his entire department, and JAwdat changes his grammar to be more acceptable to humans. Most Tajara that are the ones that feel 'entitled' end up in high-paying job positions, like engineering, research, and security.

I'd suggest not only whitelisting command positions, but also certain department positions. Tajarans can be just as successful as other crewmembers, but they really should be the minority. They need to display the intense sacrifices they made to get to the positions they are in. Buuut....whitelisting command is a good start.

[Valkrae]

You want to know my honest opinion of this vote? I think if any option other than the second goes through, people will leave. Not immediately, but I feel as if they'll feel unwelcome playing their characters. People don't like making multiple apps to do things. To even be a Tajaran head, they have to go through two whitelist apps. Why make them go through a third? If it's for a character basis, make ALL characters go through another head app. Don't just focus on one minority of players.

Posted this ingame, and wanted to post ithere.

[Voyd2000]

but I feel as if they'll feel unwelcome playing their characters.

 

This is how I tend to feel as is. I no longer can tell if someones IC hate is lore related or just fueled from the constant slander and shit storm from OOC that seems to spark up at least once a round about how Tajara are so bad in one form or another.

Know what some peoples argument as to why they are bad? "Too many people play them we need more of [insert race]" at that point people seem to be grasping at anything and everything they can whether it makes sense or not, I don't know about others but crap like this certainly makes me feel unwelcome simply for choosing to play a Tajara.

I absolutely love to play Tajara and want to make more of'em, But right now? the way people shoot'em down in OOC with hate and slander,I feel that I will inadvertently fuel more shit storm when the groupies see /another/ Tajara on board, an Engineer even.

[Jboy2000000]

Im with Valk and Voyd here. If people want to betray lore and be little shits, punish them, don't punish every single person who plays Tajarans. To me, the votes look like every who don't like Tajarans are voting for this because they've had one of those bad cats ruin something for them, or don't like the stupid bad cats. If you want to talk about lore justification in job, we should cut Unathi from nearly every single job that isn't in civilian because right now theres a giant intergalactic political event going on and Unathi are raiding any human space they can, do you think Nanotrasen would risk getting political backlash from giving a lizard the power to rule over part of their stations, especially since Unathi have destroyed their telecomms satellites before, and actively worked against them thanks to great antag spy thing making Unathi antag actions canon on different stations.

[VoltageHero]

Im with Valk and Voyd here. If people want to betray lore and be little shits, punish them, don't punish every single person who plays Tajarans.

 

Slapping somebody on the wrist and saying "no, you can't do that" is not very useful, after a while. Sure, you could say that you could get Sue to remove their whitelist, but wouldn't that end up getting the same response as this (assuming people would leave)?

As Nebula stated, most of the entitled Tajaran aren't actually even in Command. I don't believe the players who have non-goofy Tajaran wouldn't have much problem with creating another whitelist (or I'd assume so), and it would prevent random players who suddenly want to be the CMO or whatever, as a Tajaran, to just jump in and do it.

[Jboy2000000]

If people are obviously breaking how a Tajaran should act, they didn't deserve their whitelist in the first place.

Why should Tajarans be the only race that requires a secondary whitelist? This is just a matter of people wanting to limit Tajarans solely because people don't like Tajarans, you're not going to see this kind of response if the thread was for Skrell, or Unathi, or any other race there is. Its unfair and completely biased.

[Xelnagahunter]

I think the Tajara players need to be treated the same as the other races and I don't even play one. If a person is fucking up a role they are playing badly enough to cause negative influences, then they should have their whitelists stripped. PLaying tajarans wrong? strip. PLaying bad heads? Strip. PLaying retarded and unseemly taj heads? Strip strip. Simple as that. It's more about moderating the lore than it is about altering it or making the system more complicated. You have writers that are in charge of this or that, what about people on the team who are dedicated to simply observing a round or so a day to watch taj players, or giving some lore team members aghost so they can spy on the fly. Also, people are less likely to fuck up when they know they are being moderated. If you see no staff online you are more likely to try and get away with stupid shit, it's human nature. Kinda like speeding when you see no cops. Not everyone will do it, but bad seeds will.

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

I think the Tajara players need to be treated the same as the other races and I don't even play one.

 

Their lore has them be 'less than' the other races. They aren't on equal terms. Players are meant to accept the fact they're gross minorities and have a homeland that's about as stable as Assad's Syria or Yugoslavia just before the break-up.

 

[12:45:05 PM] Sierra "KOMODO" Brown: I don't like playing a character with a backstory focused around discrimination.. Anfd then not being discriminated against

 

See here.

 

you're not going to see this kind of response if the thread was for Skrell, or Unathi, or any other race there is. Its unfair and completely biased.

 

The Skrell are on equal terms with humanity in terms of respect, power, and influence. It would make no sense to ban them from command roles because they're as trusted as humans are.

Unathi are already barred from the Captain role, and have the stereotype of being medieval bandits. They are barred from the Captain role, and it's frowned on them to enter into the non-security or non-engineering command roles. (I don't ban it; I rely a lot on just hoping something doesn't become a fad for the species and that has gone really well so far so A+ unathi players xoxo) If they ever reached the sheer level of problems, both IC and OOC, that Tajaran players have, and it goes on the for the same length of time, rest assured there would be a consideration to kick them down.

But, at the end, it's a matter of scale and time. The Tajaran players have been a big problem for a long time.

The Tajaran are meant to be an underclass and disenfranchised. They act like they're entitled to respect. There is widespread, systematic abuse of the lore to the point that I get a complaint about Tajaran shenanigans literally every other day and it's gone on for weeks without me doing anything more than encouraging and pleading with people to combat it IC, which has failed on both accounts.

I try extremely hard to be unbiased, but it's impossible to avoid it completely. That's why I made, as I usually do, another debatepoll for a major decision. I was just going to ban them from command completely, then I sat on the issue for a day to think on it, then decided to open this thread.

And wowzers the results have really subverted exceptions, people were predicting this would collapse into a flame war and dog-pile on banning them from command completely lmao

Allowing a hands-off approach on the Tajaran during Sue's extended hiatus allowed the situation to devolve into an embarrassment. This is, at the rate of this thread, going to be appropriately remedied in the first step of the Anti-Meow Purrtocol.

[Filthyfrankster]

If tajara players can force themselves to make an application for a catbeast in the first place, then they have no need to be afuraid.

It shouldn't be a hassle for them and is most likely pawssible for them to make anofur application to place the feline in command, Save they have the tailent for the job in the furst place.

It's not a purroblem, people. Just another another stop in the yellow brick of a heavy RP community.

[Jboy2000000]

This isn't only completely unfair and biased by you, its completely unfair just in general. Look at poll, and then look at every other thread of your's that has a poll. This has twice as many votes as either of them, and only have as many views and replies, the people who are voting to limit Tajarans aren't even defending their point of view, I doubt they even give a shite about the lore perspective of it and just want to put the finger up to people who play the race. The thread where you ask if people like, something thats very important to every dedicated player on the server, only has 23 votes. The votes to limit Tajaran players are almost double that. The poll about IPC's being people has 37 votes, which is just BARELY bigger than the number of only one of the third options, and thats important not only to the entire race, but to all of security. Yet in both threads, people from all sides defended why they voted what, more than once. Here you have two people "defending" their vote one by saying "I support it," the other by shitposting like a joke that even you said is shitposting, and literally only one person giving an argument. So, like I said, the vote and the community are completely biased against Tajarans, and this isn't going to be used because anyone cares about lore, or anything, they just want to limit the race because they can.

[SierraKomodo]

Alright, since people are making comments/complaints that they think the only people voting to revoke heads of staff access are non Tajaran players... I voted for option 3, to completely strip heads of staff from Tajaran. Here's a list of my characters, including those I no longer play for reference. Note the number of Tajaran, highlighted in bold:

 

• Ariana Eshlian (Human)
  
• Azaela Nejem (Tajaran)
  
• Haifa Ajam (Tajaran)
  
• Katana Alpha/Charlie/Delta/Silvers (IPC)
  
• Kylan Hadyara/Lo'Rah (Tajaran)
  
• Miraj Zi'Ad (Tajaran)
  
• Rasine Ha'kim (Tajaran)
  
• Sairis Helosi (Human)
  
• Saite Kesra (Unathi)
  
• Sarah Wolfe (Human)
  
• Seruati Uaekis (Unathi)
  
• Tali Mi'Hil (Tajaran)
  
• Ziva Mo'Taki (Tajaran)

 

So with that out of the way, why did I vote for the option to remove Tajaran characters from head of staff roles, despite the fact I play Tajaran - And even have two Tajaran characters that are heads of staff (Kylan is a HoS, Azaela is a HoP)? Because it makes the most sense to me based on the lore. My original Tajaran characters were built around the idea that Tajaran were discriminated against, and had to work harder to get to where they are. With the current common attitudes with Tajaran characters, from both sides, despite my best efforts to play each of my characters in a certain way to fit their personalities and the discriminated nature... It just doesn't exist. They're supposed to be lower class compared to humans and skrell, the ones taking and following the orders, not the ones giving these orders. They're supposed to be the targets of discrimination - And I don't mean the all-caps/annoying radio crap you see from everyone everyround where they shout catbeast, glass adhomai, and spout of racist jokes. I mean actual discrimination that you'd see in a corporate setting or workplace. Denying advancement of positions, lower pay grades, first to be looked at in a security situation, less effort put toward helping them over other crew, etc, and with maybe a snide comment here or there that only the Tajara heard or some coworkers that share the same sentiment heard.

I built my Tajaran characters around that concept of a lifetime of discrimination (With the exception of Azaela, but she exists for a specific purpose that I won't get into here and can be replaced by a non-Tajaran character). I expected the server to reflect this; The lore certainly said plenty about the Tajaran status in the galaxy when I studied it for my first whitelist application, but the community and the game just don't reflect this properly. A head of staff ban for Tajaran, or at the very least, a restriction requiring a separate whitelist (I can understand a few relatively uncommon/rare individuals making their way up, probably Njarir origins) is a step toward ensuring the lore is actually applicable to what happens in round.

So there, you've now heard the vote and reasonings for that vote from a Tajaran player that voted to remove Tajarans from heads of staff.

[Eliot Clef]

-snip-

 

I actually agree that these polls aren't the best way to be deciding these sort of things*, but what I personally would prefer is wholesale allowing everyone to be anything, and if there MUST be restrictions to allow exceptions to those restrictions.

This community, however, has (or so I was told) been founded on community consensus-based decisions, which means that "mob mentality" which can include all sorts of incredibly stupid opinions that shouldn't be validated by influencing major decisions, can count towards sweeping changes like this.

The will of the community, whether they state their reasons or no, whether those reasons or valid by reasonable measurements or no, is heavily on the side of curtailing Tajarans in some way. That is how this community works, and I don't think it's unfair at all insofar as the system is working as intended. But I do think that the "Tyranny of the Majority" is in effect here in a bad way, and I think a significant number of people are most likely voting for emotionally charged reasons related to a strong antipathy against furries.

In conclusion: I will say in fairness that I don't play a Tajaran, but my favored race (IPC) has been shafted a bit in an inconvenient and impractical way, so I can sympathize with feeling maligned concerning community decisions that have a negative impact on the player experience.

* Most of the roleplaying communities I've been involved with are essentially benevolent dictatorships. Determining things like this by vote is unthinkable in the communities I've been in, even if input is sought from the community to some measure.

[Reyjakai]

Look, the fact of the matter right now is that the vast majority of players on the server think that things have gone on too far with Tajaran. This isn't the case with the other races, and if it comes to that, it will be dealt with when it happens. Having cats follow their lore isn't some big bad overlord that wants to ruin your RP, you're already ruining your own RP by opting into playing a race that is intentionally designed in the lore to be lesser than the other races, and you're complaining about it and willfully ignoring that fact. As such, the beatstick is coming out, long overdue.

[Eliot Clef]

Look, the fact of the matter right now is that the vast majority of players on the server think that things have gone on too far with Tajaran.

 

In defense of his protest, a lot of people thinking something doesn't make that something right. That's a pretty big problem democratic processes have: As long as a bunch of people believe a stupid thing, it can become "law" no matter how lacking in merit it actually is.

As I said, I don't play a Tajaran, and I don't really have a personal stake in this. But I can see where he's coming from.

[Frances]

In defense of his protest, a lot of people thinking something doesn't make that something right. That's a pretty big problem democratic processes have: As long as a bunch of people believe a stupid thing, it can become "law" no matter how lacking in merit it actually is.

This happens when people are misinformed on an issue, or have poor knowledge/mastery of it.

I believe most people here have had some kind of experience encountering Tajarans while playing on the server, so I'm less worried about the possibility of the majority opinion being an ignorant one.

[Eliot Clef]

This happens when people are misinformed on an issue, or have poor knowledge/mastery of it.

I believe most people here have had some kind of experience encountering Tajarans while playing on the server, so I'm less worried about the possibility of the majority opinion being an ignorant one.

 

I actually agree with the consensus that Tajarans should be at least a little more restricted, buuuut I think I disagree with you that this isn't significantly supported by blind or heavily emotionally charged negative bias.

Tajarans are "furries" and are regarded negatively by the broader population involved in games like this (including myself before I got to know the people who played them) which will probably include newer players in general. Some of our players have expressed a belief that the in-character prejudices should not merely be in place, they should be completely true/accurate!

Sue thinks this about IPCs/Robots, or did the last time we discussed this (I think, apologies if I'm misremembering this), and spacevoidagent seems to think the racism towards Tajarans should be justified. (I can't tell how much he's actually like this and how much he's just being deliberately hyperbolic, he says some pretty inflammatory things in-game.)

So, I can't actually agree for certain that a lot of these opinions are actually reasonably founded. Some people seem to just want humans/organics/etc. to be truly special/elevated instead of merely at an advantage due to present circumstances.