It is time for the community to rise up, cleanse our council, and fix the community.
- Toxicity in FAF is bad, as lots of people pointed out in my thread about why they would leave FAF. Toxicity repels new members of our community. At the moment we lose 21,000 newish players a year. Once we fix this and few other barriers to entry, we can start paid advertising to get more players and grow. But unfortunately on FAF .. toxicity goes all the way to the top.
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Look at the abusive names our councilors call people on reddit. Sure, the player he is talking to was problematic and was banned, and sure the post has since been moderated, thank god, although it's still there on reddit. But the point here is that our councilor that represents FAF, and a moderator of our reddit, is abusive.
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It doesnt stop there though. Go search for the c-word on discord and see who's name comes up over and over again. This is not a one off case, this is a system. Sadly, this makes FAF look childish, and it could be so much more.
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The council is toxic to the point of being disfunctional, the inner council conversations are contaminated with petty words and walls of text. We can't even converse in a sensible way about topics like elections or the association. Do you know I get called names in formal Council chat?
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Its gotten so bad that at least one councilor has left council chat already, at least two more are thinking about it, and most seem to just try and stay out of the conversations altogether.
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If the role-model Council members are not accountable for their toxicity, how can we expect the ordinary members of the community to have ANY form of respect for each other? FAF will stay like this forever, where people just shit on each other, and 20,000 players just leave.
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Many people share my views on toxicity. You won't see them speaking out too much around the place, but they know I am receptive and they message me. They tell me that they refuse to read a forum topic since some toxic person joined the debate. They say that they had to stay away from aeolus chat and make their own chat due to the toxic people there. They say they have had enough and think of quitting their positions. The reasonable people don't tell you they are exiting a conversation due to toxicity, they just quietly pack their bags and go elsewhere, and this will continue until one day, eventually only the toxic people remain, and FAF is dead. This has to stop.
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THESE BEHAVIOURS ARE NOT OK. Aside from the rudeness and hostility, it's like I said, it's disfunctional. Work is impeded.
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I believe FAF can GROW and THRIVE. We have so many cool people, we have new projects, a steady feed of new players and new maps and SO MUCH to work with. If we could just take steps towards limiting the hostility, FAF would grow even more.
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In this upcoming Player Councilor election we have a chance to fix this. Of the candidates, only one has made a point of taking a stand against toxicity. And for a position that is very much about talking to and representing players, it seems important to have someone who can communicate in a respectful fashion. To me, no amount of points like "but the current tournament organisation is so good" matters at all compared to the cost to the community. Lets fix toxicity first, THEN see how good we can get the tournaments.
If YOU care about toxicity, if YOU have ever had an issue with how hostile people are, now is your chance to fix it. Let's send a strong message that this is not ok. Let's clean up the council.
Vote NO to toxicity and YES to a candidate that respects his players.
If anyone wants to discuss this privately feel free to PM me on discord.
"But Nine, the work is so good - it's worth it"
I understand this point of view but don't agree. As we excise this poison from our community there will be some loss of productivity - but the productivity will return. In the meantime we will have a friendlier environment that doesn't drive our new players away.
"But Nine, there is no one else who can do this"
Would that be because we drove away the reasonable people? After we fix the toxicity, people who are both reasonable AND skilled will step up. I cannot accept the argument that only someone disrespectful can take care of business.
"But Nine, you are totally abusing your position of news editor"
There is nothing in my job description to say that I can't post news items for myself. I have posted every single news item for everyone else bar one, which was about a SCTA show match. I should get to talk as well. If someone wants to make some counter post to this they can ask me and I am very likely to put that on the news - just phrase it objectively like 'jerry said nine is dumb' and dont say 'nine is dumb'.
"But Nine, you cant post other peoples conversations like this"
You mean like the dossier biass published on morax to take him down and assume his position? I have no doubt there some takedown document about me somewhere.
"But Nine, you are totally overreacting and this doesn't matter"
Got it - that's your point of view and I understand that, and you are welcome to your point of view. I know I get more outraged about this than others. As I said people do reach out to me privately to tell me they share my point of view. I'm going to keep fighting for what I believe in - a better FAF.
"But Nine, you're not doing your job. Go post things on social media"
We get 130 new players a day. Getting new players is not the problem - retention is. Here is the official reply when I tried to work with the council on this issue.
"But Nine, not all the players leave because of toxicity"
Yeah I know. But this is what I want to address first. More will come later.
"But Nine, it's too hard - you will never win - it's not worth it"
Well I guess that all depends on the community doesn't it?