Before I begin, let me say that yes, it was a rude, crass joke. But so's the entirety of our forum humor. Our oldest in joke, which has been repeated since this drama began, is that our owner and admin will tentacle rape you. Asking for noodz is the forum passtime. Ours is a forum where slipups are routinely called out and given a friendly or not so friendly ribbing. A forum where we regularly slag each other in good nature, and shoot the shit in ways we know would never fly anywhere else. Even outside of this incident, there's shit I say on TLS I'd never say on any other forum or even in real life, and stuff you lot say that would rightly weird me the fuck out.
I saw in the thread, a series of masturbation jokes in a row, and someone complaining that a pic was taken down. I see the pic is still quoted in someone's post. I figure I'd make a note of this, make a joke at the expense of the folks making masturbation jokes, the pic would be taken down at the source, we'd laugh, move on, and deal with it. That was the entirety of the process. I figured Bex would say 'oh shit, yes, take them down' or something of the like and I'd do it, but I wouldn't edit it out of anyone's post until I had the go ahead from Bex, because I figured that would be a violaton of powers just to forestall potential drama. Did I really think folks would actually save or 'do unspeakable things with' the picture? No. Same as I didn't think anyone making masturbation jokes was actually jacking off to it. If I thought you folks were actually that sick I'd never have done it. Might have never allowed nudes posts to begin with.
So mumble comes in and, well, I can never tell when Mumble is being serious, just having the shit with me, or both, so I tend to assume he's having the shit with me, and he tells me not to make jokes about Bex. His only reason 'she's my cousin.' That's the long and the short of his reasoning. Shit gets shot, I figure we're just having fun. I see bex is on the forum. She wants the posts gone. This is all I need to hear. I remove my post and Alexx's post haste. And inform Bex this is done via the thread.
TLS dies right about here AFAIK. I get back to work. Mako contacts me, tells me of the escalating situation, and that Bex is upset. He suggests an apology, I immediately agree, since I realize my comment has caused her consternation I did not intend. TLS is still dead. I write an apology. Once TLS is up, I PM it to Bex as quickly as my laptop allows. She seems to genuinely accept the apology. I figure we can move on. TLS dies again.
I get told L is making a big deal of what had seemed to be a settled thing. Shit happens, I'm told I should probably studiously avoid the thread, since people wouldn't listen to me until tempers had had a chance to cool. It comes out Bex thinks my apology wasn't sincere, and I'll admit, that was kind of insulting to me. I feel a bit bitter about this and well, an old wound opens. I bite my tongue and try not to let the past get the best of the present.
Still, shit seems to blow over and I hope we can forgive and forget.
Yop, he of the tentacle rape, makes a joke about giving nudes is how you get Admin privileges on FFOF. I joke that I'll go take some. Octo says 'what have we learned.' I decide I'll try and mock myself by repeating an obviously wrong aesop and contrast it with a complete non sequitor aesop. I thought folks would see it as a slightly more clever 'herp derp', but it was timed too soon, or not obvious enough, or something, and seen as a dig against Bex when I had wanted to try and use it to defuse tensions by playing up stupid for humor. I begin using Yop as my mediator around here.
I will say, I do feel bad about your embarrasment, Bex. I feel sorry for making everyone feel uncomfortable. I honestly don't want people feeling uncomfortable on my account, I just figure it's inevitable. Hell, you lot make me uncomfortable too at times. Especially Mumble. That's not an excuse, that's just how it is. I typically think 'eh forget it, it's TLS, we've been doing this shit since day one, hell, we were even worse back then, but we just let it flow like water off a duck's back.' And well, that's what I thought, that things were moving along well enough, that we'd managed to recapture that essence of 'oh what the hell' that we used to have. Guess I was wrong.
But I also want to say, everyone who's felt uncomfortable with me, none of you have tried to sort it out with me. None of you have tried an honest conversation. That includes people I was talking do during this time. Not a one of you even thought to say 'Hey dude, not cool,' and that honestly bugs the fuck out of me, because THIS is where I am learning of it. In public. Amidst a storm of drama.
And what I wanna know is why. You all have issues with me. Fine. I can dig that. What I want to know is, if these issues are problematic, why did none of you even try and sort it out with me?
I have no problems being told I'm a dumbass who screwed up. I love a woman who will never hesistate to tell me just that. I'm just wondering why none of you thought to come to me before this. Why you've gone to the world before coming to me, the man whose actions have aggrieved you. Have you written me off from the start?
My issue with Shademp has been brought up here. Yes, I vaguely repeated the contents of a message he deleted. This has been going on since the start of the forum. It is common behavior to refer to things folks deleted in a later post- and no, I did not use my mod powers to do so- and in this case, I thought it might be better to reveal nothing than let speculation run wild- a la the streisand effect. This upset Shademp. He contacted me about it. I apologized, explained why I did what I did. AFAIK, he's cool with me.
It just feels like I'm being tossed under a bus here. On the one hand, I can see where many of your points have merit, on the other, I feel betrayed because no one ever thought to actually, y'know, talk with me.
Amongst yourselves in public and private, about me, maybe at me. Not to me. Not with me.
Idk, man. That's sort of half my defense and half my emotional state right now.
Because guess what, I agree with you lot that people should have a say over their intellectual property despite the common maxim. It's why I deleted the shit when Bex got back on and said 'yes, take care of those quoted posts,' I just figured that, Idunno, it would be taken in good humor after a series of masturbation jokes and the file would be deleted at source in short order.
No malice, no venom, no hurt was intended. Just a gentle ribbing over 'you missed one' and 'you're all acting like perverts'
I can understand not thinking it's funny. Our humor does not match up all the time. Sometimes, the shit you find hilarious I find dull, tedious, even borderline or over the line offensive.
I just can't understand not talking to me about it first.
Months ago, I expressed a genuine happiness that even though I was being punished for a rule I did not and do not agree with, at least it was bringing forth what seemed to be genuine discussion rather than cliqueish side taking or defensive posturing.
If we are to survive as a forum, we need to talk to each other. ABOUT THINGS. About our problems. Somehow, I feel we lost that. Maybe we're getting it back now. I thought we were getting it back earlier, and we're here now.
Just, actually talk to me, alright?
