May Contain Nuts

All this infighting and he-said-she-said and bitterness and anger and talking about other people behind their backs and grudges and intentional “innocent” rule-bending etc etc etc etc is really starting to piss me off. It may not be tearing the community apart, but it sure as fuck is starting to fray it around the edges. This shit has got to stop. Why do people think that this is an appropriate way to behave? Why do we let them get away with it?

Maybe it’s just because I’ve been around for so god-damned long that I just don’t care if I’m ostracized or made fun of or put on any particular group’s blacklist, but I am sick and fucking tired of dancing around issues and grudges and problems and arguments just so that nobody gets upset and leaves. It’s stupid. We keep talking about how Uru (and Myst) is something that can be this huge commercial success that appeals to a zillion different people, but at the same time, we get so paranoid over making someone mad and having them leave because it’s one more person gone from this tiny little community we have here. We can’t have it both ways. Personally, I think that while this community may not be huge enough not to miss the contributions of any one individual, it’s big enough to get over it, and small enough that keeping problem-causing people around is eventually going to make it fall apart. It’s not worth it.

I like the Myst games, and I like this community… but sometimes the people in it make me wonder if I’ll even make it to my 10-year anniversary. But if I give in and leave, who else would be willing to put up with it? How many good people are these two-faced back-stabbers going to drive out before there’s nobody left but them and the people who don’t know any better?

And just to be perfectly crystal-clear on this, I’m talking primarily about the Slackers and their self-righteous ivory tower we-know-best attitude. They show up in droves when the situation suits their purposes, and they utterly destroy those who stand against them, argue with them, moderate them, or even just cough while they’re talking. Of course, they don’t do it in public, they do it privately, plotting in their little forum about who’s going to take the brunt of their next round of ass-hattery, and playing all innocent whenever someone calls them on their bullshit. I’m sick of playing in the undercurrent of implication and vague suggestion. Flame on. But know that I’m not leaving, no matter what gets said about or against me. I spoke earlier about all of the ills that came out of UU, well, this is the worst of it. And it needs to stop.