Staff complaint: Dea Tacita

[LetzShake]

BYOND Key: Letz Shake

Staff BYOND Key: Dea Tacita

Reason for complaint: Excessive/Disproportionate punishment

Evidence/logs/etc:

Someone mentioned tattoos and called them Tatas leading to this conversation

OOC: Aqy: the word Tattoo actually comes from Polynesian culture. Tata means repeated and oo means color. So Tattoo literally is repeated color.

OOC: Kingmatt9: in american culture, 'tata' means something completely differnt.

OOC: Sleepy Wolf: like

OOC: Sleepy Wolf: tatas

OOC: Kingmatt9: eh, melons.

OOC: NursieKitty: really.

OOC: Conspire2Ignite: Okay. Can we pretend that username faux pas never happened? Yes? Good? No one cares? Good!

OOC: Aqy: It's said tat-a not Ta-ta. You massive butt.

OOC: LeonMiguel: baps

OOC: Dea Tacita: Lets not talk about breasticles in OOC

OOC: Letz Shake: uptight levels reaching critical mass

Moderator PM from-Dea Tacita: Hiya! You'll be receiving a OOC mute for the round due to that.

You have been muted from OOC.

PM to-Dea Tacita: That is the most colossal overreaction.

Moderator PM from-Dea Tacita: If you feel as if it is an innappropriate level of action, please file a complaint on the forums.

Moderator PM from-Dea Tacita: inappropriate*

That was the extent of the interaction. I think Dea massively overreacted on both accounts to the faint nonexplicit mention of breasts in OOC, and then to me calling them out on it in what I admit was not the most tactful way. But still, jumping straight to an OOC mute from that is pretty ridiculous.

Additional remarks: It's not very serious. I'm not calling for any serious action. But I do think there should be a discussion about use of moderator power to silence any kind of disagreement instantly.

[TishinaStalker]

If anything, Dea doesn't deserve a complaint against her, you do. Why?

OOC: Letz Shake: uptight levels reaching critical mass

Let me start with the fact that you just disrespected a member of staff in an insulting way. If there's one thing that you don't ever, ever, ever, ever do, then it's insult staff members. We don't have to do anything we are simply here, giving the players our time that could be better spent on other things. We're doing this voluntarily. We don't get paid, we don't get given anything except for the community having a wonderful time. If there's absolutely one thing that carries a zero tolerance policy on Aurora, then it's insulting staff. You were in the wrong the very moment you decided to sass Dea when she politely said "Lets not talk about X". When staff tells you to do something, there's no ifs, ands or buts. You do it, and you especially do not sass the staff member for telling you to do something. Once you insult staff, you no longer have a leg to stand on when hoping for leniency. That being said, I'd say Dea's actions are perfectly justified, and more surprised she didn't take any further action against you for it aside from a miniscule OOC mute. If anything, you should be thanking Dea for not being even more harsh.

[Dea Tacita]

-Keep the OOC chat PG-13. Violence is expected in-game; this is SS13. However, avoid bringing up hateful or overly sexual topics.

This was the rule I was predominately attempting to enforce with what I said. Admittedly, what was said wasn't tremendously sexual in nature. Though It was still taken in a sexual direction. I saw it fit to act how I did due to a tendency for OOC to spiral rapidly, I simply asked the players to stop politely (As you can see in the logs)

I was greeted in-return by a rather rudely put comment by Letzshake. Who as you can see in the logs, didn't even have any place in the conversation, so it's not as-if he could've been offended by what I asked of the players.

It was rude. I think everyone agrees on this, a player even called you out on that.

I honestly did not even think I'd have to mute you, I expected you to apologize and say that the comment was inappropriate. At which point I would've happily dropped the insistence of a mute.

I firmly and wholeheartedly believe I did absolutely nothing wrong in these regards. I've not received a single complaint, character or staff in my many, many months of Playing on Aurora and as such believe myself to be a fair and even-tempered member of the moderation team's staff.

Edit: Perhaps it would've been better to allow another member of staff to handle this, which I would've had another member been online. As previously said, I believe myself temperate enough in my position as a member of the moderation team to have handled this fairly.

[LetzShake]

Like I said, I can admit I didn't handle my disagreement with more tact and I'm sorry for putting it that way. And I probably would've apologized if I'd had ten seconds to breathe before you went straight to "I'mmutingyou" which kind of shut down dialogue.

But if 'uptight' is that serious of an insult to you, I think maybe there's more to it than just the surface. And while I agree that the staff are volunteers and doing us a service, that doesn't put you above disagreement or criticism, either. I love the server and the staff, I just think this is a pretty hasty jump of force based on a pretty hasty jump to start with.

[Dea Tacita]

I probably would've apologized if I'd had ten seconds to breathe before you went straight to "I'mmutingyou" which kind of shut down dialogue.

 

The mute was not an Admin-help mute. It was strictly a OOC mute, which was revealed to you when the message appears saying "You have been muted from OOC". You had the opportunity to apologize, and you still refused to. Which either means you are lying when it comes to your sincerity of the apology here, or you simply aren't very observant (I in no way mean that as an insult, simply an observation).

 

But if 'uptight' is that serious of an insult to you, I think maybe there's more to it than just the surface.

 

Anything "Beneath the surface" is hardly your business in this regards. And if you're insinuating I have a dislike for you. There's no base for this, I have had literal -zero- interaction with you as a player or your characters.

 

And while I agree that the staff are volunteers and doing us a service, that doesn't put you above disagreement or criticism

 

We are not, that is why we are even having this conversation. If staff was "Above disagreement" then this whole board wouldn't exist.

 

I just think this is a pretty hasty jump of force based on a pretty hasty jump to start with.

 

Straight-forward. This is an objective analysis. What is "hasty" to you is not "hasty" to someone else. Mutes have literally no effect on your ability to play SS-13, communicate with other players ICly, LOOCly, adminhelping or anything else. I see it as a very minor punishment to be taken in cases such as this which do not require further administrative action.

[TishinaStalker]

But if 'uptight' is that serious of an insult to you, I think maybe there's more to it than just the surface.

 

There is no degrees of disrespecting staff. Heck, there's no degrees of disrespect in general. Disrespect is disrespect no matter what was said.

[LetzShake]

The mute was not an Admin-help mute. It was strictly a OOC mute, which was revealed to you when the message appears saying "You have been muted from OOC". You had the opportunity to apologize, and you still refused to. Which either means you are lying when it comes to your sincerity of the apology here, or you simply aren't very observant (I in no way mean that as an insult, simply an observation).

 

No, you didn't take away my ability to apologize. But when it just comes to "Now you're muted, k." rather than anything resembling dialogue, it kind of ruins the possibility of any sincere apology.

[Guest]

OOC: Letz Shake: uptight levels reaching critical mass

I'd like to ask, what was your reasoning to even say this? Considering the factor that a staff member asked for a topic to be stopped in a polite manner, which really had no reason to be spoken over OOC.

[Frances]

I have to agree with everyone else here - criticism is welcome, when expressed properly. The way you phrased your last message was disrespectful, and Dea was perfectly in the right to give you an OOC mute for it.

[Valkrae]

I'll have to play devils advocate here. I don't agree with what happened, on any account. Yes, Shake shouldn't have insulted Dea, and pretty much cemented Dea's right to mute him.

However.

I believe that the mute should not have been issued immediately. I believe that a warning should have been issued, in a Moderator PM. And even with that, a full round mute? That seems a tad excessive. Perhaps a twenty to thirty minute. /Maybe/ an hour, if they do it a lot. But a whole round mute? That's nearly three to four hours of being muted.

Shake was in the wrong, yes. But I believe that any Moderator that faces an insult, could possibly be emotionally compromised and should pass the situation onto another Staff member if one is available.

Staff should be impartial, and should have the reaction to pass situations onto another member if they are emotionally compromised by a situation.

Shake deserved what punishment he was given, but let's not be so quick to throw away what else could have gone wrong here.

[Chaznoodles]

Personally, I believe both parties were in the wrong. Shake for making the comments, and Dea for jumping the gun and issuing a ban mute, instead of asking the player to not make those comments.

[Frances]

I believe that the mute should not have been issued immediately. I believe that a warning should have been issued, in a Moderator PM. And even with that, a full round mute? That seems a tad excessive. Perhaps a twenty to thirty minute. /Maybe/ an hour, if they do it a lot. But a whole round mute? That's nearly three to four hours of being muted.

Not really - a mute carries the point across quite accurately. As for its duration, LetzShake could have easily apologized and asked for an unmute after a while. As for a warning, Dea had already given one to the OOC chat in general, to cease discussing a certain topic - LetzShake replied with sass, and at this point a second warning would've likely not served much use (like come on, a mod just said people should stop talking about a thing, the first thing you should reply with is probably not a sassy comment).

As for insults, having to pass on a case to another mod every time they come up is a silly waste of time. Moderators are selected for their ability to control their temper and work well under stress - if they start getting frustrated because of a user's actions, they should be able to recognize it themselves, and pass off the case to another member of staff on their own judgement.

 

Personally, I believe both parties were in the wrong. Shake for making the comments, and Dea for jumping the gun and issuing a ban, instead of asking the player to not make those comments.

I'm assuming you mean mute and not ban?

Anyway, the same thing I just told Valkrae applies here too. Dea had already made a request of the chat, the request was immediately opposed/criticized with a sassy comment. I understand perfectly muting the player rather than making a second request, especially when your first request was met with hostility.

[Valkrae]

I wasn't stating that I didn't agree with the mute. I was stating that I didn't agree with how fast the mute was issued, and how Dea replied to it.

It's something to watch out for. A lot of users have a history of sass, or so it appears to be in my eyes at least. Yet, they are allowed to continue speaking. I don't have any prime examples that are sticking out in my head, but from now on, I will keep a record of things that I notice.

[Rusty Shackleford]

I'm going to side Shake here. Dea's reaction was nothing short of overreaction. I'm surprised how something that could be seen as a light jab being punished with outright mutings could be supported amongst the rest of you. The talk of breasts, while lewd in that underhanded sort of way, was by no means graphic or otherwise, and the comment made does not appear to be anywhere near the level of an actual insult.

[Rechkalov]

I very much doubt that the violation of the OOC rules would continue after that remark; and I am convinced that the remark itself was meant to amuse, perhaps tease, but not to insult.

There is no hostility behind it.

I refuse to believe that you could actually not see that.

Matter of fact, I am quite horrified that so many of you would feel so strongly in favor of the mute in such trivial matter.

[LetzShake]

Well this blew up a little more than I expected. Or even wanted.

So I'll address first, again, that I recognize that I was out of line. I definitely could've and should've expressed my opinion in a less sass-filled way. I don't agree that it rises to the level of 'insult' but I didn't handle it right.

I just think when you go straight to threatening punishment like a mute as a first recourse instead of talking to someone, you're needlessly escalating things, when they could be handled with a much more civil "That was rude, you should apologize" or something similar instead of a "I'm going to mute you" before I can breathe.

[Guest]

We've had people say terribly rude things, and only manage to get ALL of OOC muted, which usually ends after 30 minutes. I don't see why such a little remark resulted in Letzshake being muted the entire round. And honestly Tishina, the complaints board is not for people to go "Why are you making a complaint? We should be complaining about you!"

Also, I have admittedly been rude with staff before, and they have been rude with me, you need to realize that we too as the players, are volunteers, we dont HAVE to be your player base, there are plenty of other servers to play, just because you volunteer to staff, doesn't automatically give you respect. Now, I'm not saying players should swear and directly call staff names or anything, but this is not what Letzshake was doing. I've said worse to my teachers at cool and gotten a laugh out of them.

I honestly think that the majority of the staff team, meaning the ones that are on daily, are too tightly knit, I have never once seen one of the staff who are on daily:

FFrances

Tishina

Pumpking

SoundScopes

Skull

Doomberg

Valkrae

Ever side with a player against a staff member, and I honestly think it's somewhat of a bias that's displayed here. Staff almost always side with staff, and it's truly unfair to players because we barely ever see action taken against administrators because they seem to be able to bend the rules as far as they want.

I've been playing here since about the end of august, and in all my time, I've only seen one complaint about a staff member go anywhere, and that's when Rusty was removed from staff.

[Frances]

1. Global OOC mutes happen when the whole chat is being an idiot. Yes, sometimes OOC gets globally muted for a single person being dumb - I've been trying to tell mods to stop doing that, and mute the person instead.

2. I still can't agree that the punishment was excessive. You made a sassy comment, as a direct response to a staffmember asking the chat to moderate themselves. The next step from that isn't to ask one more time - it's a mute. I can also guarantee that we would have gladly unmuted in this situation, had the player apologized in adminhelp after a bit of time.

3. @Xander, show me this "bending of the rules" you see take place. Staff that agrees with each other is not an example of circlejerking in itself - it can also demonstrate good coherency. Looking at our staff complaints, I actually see only two that are addressed directly at a staffmember's moderating style: this one, and the one against PumpkingSlice (which was dropped, as the user admitted their own faults.)

4. The one thing that bothers me in this is Dea's tone in her PMs. It's a bit... off. I feel like I'd just be frank when giving someone a punishment, but this feels fake, like, fake cheerful. Maybe it's the phrasing.

[Skull132]

I've been playing here since about the end of august, and in all my time, I've only seen one complaint about a staff member go anywhere, and that's when Rusty was removed from staff.

 

That's because we don't broadcast punitive action. Since August, I, personally, have been aware of a dozen cases where the leadership of staff has taken action against its own folks. To include demotions and dismissals. Purely from the development side, two individuals have been dismissed and a count reprimanded for actions they should not have undertaken.

However.

We do not broadcast this. So yes, sometimes it may feel like nothing was done.

 

Also, I have admittedly been rude with staff before, and they have been rude with me, you need to realize that we too as the players, are volunteers, we don't HAVE to be your player base, there are plenty of other servers to play, just because you volunteer to staff, doesn't automatically give you respect. Now, I'm not saying players should swear and directly call staff names or anything, but this is not what Letzshake was doing. I've said worse to my teachers at cool and gotten a laugh out of them.

 

No, being apart of staff does not automatically give us respect. But neither does being a player here. Here's a concept that was drilled into my head some time ago, someplace elsewhere: "Respect is a two way road." If you start being crass towards staff, which you admit to be, then we'll start being shorthanded with you. Tone yourself back, and we'll tone ourselves back. It's as simple as that: it's a two way relationship where both sides have the right to play both the reactionary and proactive role.

Speaking personally, and while this may have no bearing here, I respect the amount of work people put into any given topic. I have worked and sided with people whose personality and choices I cannot bring myself to respect, but I did respect them for the work they done, and leaned on that to get through. I don't expect this type of conduct on average, mind you.

 

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Now, on the subject of the actual complaint itself. It might have been one of those moments where just shrugging it off, by Dea, would have been the best action. Zip does not, as far as my knowledge serves, a history of being snide, problematic, offensive, etcetera. And as such, taking aggressive action against them, when what they said is, at most, a questionable attempt at calling out someone's authority, does seem like an overreaction (because the comment would have done no damage, what so ever).

Although, Zip could have also just ceased when asked to. There's little point in prodding after that request has been issued.

[Rechkalov]

2. I still can't agree that the punishment was excessive. You made a sassy comment, as a direct response to a staffmember asking the chat to moderate themselves. The next step from that isn't to ask one more time - it's a mute. I can also guarantee that we would have gladly unmuted in this situation, had the player apologized in adminhelp after a bit of time.

 

The sass present was not undermining Dea's authority. It was but a one, silly remark.

Demanding an apology for this is ridiculous. It is no longer about respect, it's about pride.

What Dea could be interpreted as unnecessary display of his "power" as a member of the staff.

The apology would have possibly been in place before Dea made his move, but certainly not after that.

Respect is earned, not demanded.

Good players are well known and respected for their outstanding RP. The respect comes from their ability. Good staff members have earned respect in very similar way.

It's rational authority. We are more likely to listen to somebody we respect as a person and look up to, than to somebody who just happens to have different font color in OOC.

Assuming the respect is tied to your position within Aurora's community divides us into casts and creates tension.

It is counterproductive - unless I am wrong in assuming that, above all, we are all people who came here with the same intention; to make the game interesting. While the amounts of energy put into that cause may vary from person the person, much like their influence over the general outcome, our aim is the same, and we -or so I thought- are here to have fun together.

Edited December 16, 2014 by Guest

[Guest]

I'd say that Dea was in the wrong for muting a person for one statement. LetzShake was also in the wrong for stating what he said in OOC. It wasn't likely he was going to continue, though.

Yeah, it was snide. Yeah, I imagine it was pretty annoying. The greatest weapon a person has against people who are snide is to just ignore them.

Still, I think people just need to ask themselves if the ends justify the means.

[Chaznoodles]

Can we just both apologise to each other and admit both were in the wrong, instead of turning this into a dig at players/staff from each side? It seems to be going a bit far now.

[Dea Tacita]

I believe that the mute should not have been issued immediately. I believe that a warning should have been issued, in a Moderator PM. And even with that, a full round mute? That seems a tad excessive. Perhaps a twenty to thirty minute. /Maybe/ an hour, if they do it a lot. But a whole round mute? That's nearly three to four hours of being muted.

 

Looking back at this situation, While I don't agree that I specifically needed to warn him again. I think I should've at least had a brief conversation before muting him. As for the duration, the round was 3ish hours in and I believe a transfer shuttle had been called. So it wouldn't have been very long honestly.

 

I very much doubt that the violation of the OOC rules would continue after that remark

 

I've moderated, administrated and otherwise worked on SS-13 servers for a very long time. More than most players on Aurora have even played the game. I've dealt with situations like this numerous times and I honestly believed that the situation would've continued had I not done what I did. I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm just saying that from what I've seen before, I believe it would've. I fully accept that it might not have however, I'm not omniscient

 

I just think when you go straight to threatening punishment like a mute as a first recourse instead of talking to someone, you're needlessly escalating things, when they could be handled with a much more civil "That was rude, you should apologize" or something similar instead of a "I'm going to mute you" before I can breathe.

 

Again, while I believe that the mute was justified. I should've at-least have a brief conversation with you before doing so. I may have jumped the gun on this regard, and I fully accept that. I also whole-heartedly appreciate how you've handled this in a semi-professional manner and not wildly accused me of being an asshole for muting you.

 

And honestly Tishina, the complaints board is not for people to go "Why are you making a complaint? We should be complaining about you!"

 

As much as I like Tish, and I appreciate him "Rushing to my defense" I'm inclined to side with you here. LetzShake did have a valid point in me being "rushed" in my handling of his situation. There's no need to yell him down for this.

 

The sass present was not undermining Dea's authority. It was but a one, silly remark.

 

I never thought he honestly meant to "Undermine" my authority. I simply thought it was disrespectful and rude

 

his

 

Unrelated, but I am a woman.

 

Respect is earned, not demanded.

 

I make no demands to be respected, though I thought I did have the respect of some players due to dealing with them in a courteous manner and having a (relatively) long-term friendly relationship with many of the players. I apologize sincerely if I gave off the air that I "Demanded" respect, I had no intent to do that and am saddened by the fact that you thought I was.

Overall, I do see the points that many of you have and I accept fully that I could've handled this better, although I still believe that the mute was justified. I think a conversation with him in-which he could've have the opportunity to explain himself would've been warranted. I'm sorry for not handling this the best way I could've and will endeavor to do so in the future

[Guest]

Can we just both apologise to each other and admit both were in the wrong, instead of turning this into a dig at players/staff from each side? It seems to be going a bit far now.

 

Yes, please. There is no other solution to this but to let it go.

[LetzShake]

I apologized in what, I guess, could be read as a half-assed way earlier in the thread, so I'll be more clear here. I apologize for my remark. I should've expressed myself in a way that wasn't... I can't quite think of a word for it. Sassy sounds nonserious for the situation. Snarky, I guess? In any case I definitely admit what I said was wrong, and I'm sorry.