11-15-2020, 04:48 PM
(This post was last modified: 11-15-2020, 07:33 PM by La Flama Blanca. Edited 1 time in total.)
Hello everyone,
My name is Nicky and I am a moderator on the TTT server and this post is related to TTT. I have been a staff member on the TTT server on-and-off since April 2014. Of that time, I have actively served as a staff member on TTT for nearly 4 years. As you can imagine, I’ve seen a lot over this long tenure.
With my introduction out of the way, let me get to the point of my post.
Staff and Player Communication
I didn’t want to make this thread about one person, but I think that might be the best way to make sure people understand why I’m writing this. There’s no point in trying to dance around the reason I’m writing this.
I am writing this in direct response to the situation with Captain Price.
Communication Amongst Staff Members
On October 31st, I made the staff members aware of Captain Price’s problem with sending creepy messages to female players and targeting female players in the voice chat by reporting him in the watchlist in our staff discord. I included evidence of such. This was acknowledged by a couple of staff members. This was after I added the first warning to him for such behavior.
On November 2nd, two other staff members reported that Captain Price was still being weird to females. One staff member noted that they had received two private messages from female players regarding his behavior. An admin also noted that they had spoken to Captain Price regarding his behavior towards female players that day.
On November 5th, I added a second warning (for harassing female players, technically the third warning overall) to Captain Price based on further behavior that I witnessed while on the server that day involving being a creep to female players. This was, in part, influenced by the reports of the other staff members regarding his behavior.
Burb also posted video clips in the staff Discord on November 5th (recorded that day) which showed clear proof of the unwanted attention that Captain Price was directing towards female players.
This sounds great, right? Communication between staff members regarding a problematic player.
No.
Apparently, some staff members were not being so forthcoming with their observations about Captain Price. They too had witnessed his creepiness and the unwanted attention he was giving to female players, yet they chose to idly say nothing to the rest of the staff team.
This is wholly unacceptable.
In order to actually deal with problematic players like Captain Price, there needs to be a united front. And that means that you let the other staff know about that player, no matter how little evidence you have. Even if you don’t have evidence at the time, letting the other staff know to be on the lookout (the whole point of a watchlist) means that they can themselves gather further evidence on the player. It’s much easier to ignore or brush off a one-time incident than one where you have read that several staff members have had noticed something about someone.
Nothing is too small to let the rest of the staff team know about, especially when it comes down to creepy or harassing behavior. This is exactly the type of behavior that makes people avoid the server, whether that be only when that player is on or completely avoid the server.
Female players (and all players in general) make a brave decision when they decide to report someone to a staff member for harassment/unwanted attention. I don’t need to go into the details of why it’s such a big decision for them, you can read up on the #MeToo movement if you are interested. Just remember, TTT is a male-centric game with upwards of 90% of the players on our server being male.
When a player chooses to make that report, they should never have to feel like they are being ignored. And while that individual staff member may not be trying to actively ignore them, when they choose not to pass that information onto the other staff members, the implication is that they are indeed ignoring the player’s report. Obviously, there’s no need to state who the reporter is, just who the person being reported is.
We should never be ignoring the reports of our players. All reports, save for the rare extreme situations, need to be shared with the greater staff team.
I don’t wish to attack the admins because I don’t know what they may or may not have known regarding this situation in particular, but this extends to them as well. If there are reports on a player for things like harassment, the staff team needs to be aware of these. I understand that the admins may not want to share the evidence of harassment each time someone reports a player, but we don’t need to see the gritty details. We just need to know to be on the lookout. A name and a one-sentence summary of what they did and what to watch for. Otherwise, there is the risk the behavior is observed by other staff members and either dealt with one-on-one, ignored, or brushed off.
I resent that I felt like I was the only staff member actively dealing with the Captain Price situation. I resent that the female players being harassed by Captain Price had to deal with his unwanted attention for any amount of time longer than they should have had to, an estimated two weeks longer than necessary. I resent that at least one players have been repelled from the server because of this.
Again, this is unacceptable. No player, or staff member, should feel like they have to bear the burden of reporting on a problematic player for the benefit of themselves and other players being harassed.
This situation was horribly mismanaged. I take partial responsibility for this as a staff member. Maybe I should have been more active in asking around our female community to see if other people felt like they were being harassed by Captain Price. I was told to not ban Captain Price for his behavior by the admins. Maybe I should have gone ahead and taken unilateral action and banning Captain Price anyways for the biggest problem he was presenting our community - the harassment. Maybe it would have been better to ask for forgiveness than to allow the situation to continue deteriorating.
Communication Between Players and Staff
My main focus on this post is that of the failure of staff to effectively communicate with each other regarding Captain Price’s harassing behavior. But I’d also like to discuss communication between players and staff.
Players should feel comfortable reporting situations like this to staff members. They shouldn’t have to worry that their message will reach everyone, including upper staff.
I can assure you that I will always take reports of player harassment seriously and will pass this along the line, whether that be directly to the admins or to the full staff team (with your name omitted, of course).
I think that the best option going forward would be for players to report concerns and harassment to both an admin and a trusted staff member directly. I know that you may not wish to share a sensitive topic with an admin that you may barely know, but this is the best way of ensuring that the people in charge are aware of your concerns. The staff member you trust may be able to offer immediate advice, and that’s great, but it’s also important that the admins know of the situation. Chances are high that if you feel like you’re being harassed, someone else feels the same way about that same player. The admins are in the best position to collect the reports and note if a player is a recurring offender.
My Point
My point here wasn’t to simply lament a lack of action and communication regarding the Captain Price situation.
My point was to demand that each and every staff member make sure that the observations that you make regarding a player or situation are transmitted to the rest of the staff team.
Each one of us staff members has our own methods of staffing, but that doesn’t mean we exist in our own independent continuum. To effectively staff this server, we need to communicate with each other.
No matter how small something appears at the time, make sure you report it to the rest of the staff team.
This is the only way we can take care of situations before they worsen to the point where players no longer feel welcome on our server.
My name is Nicky and I am a moderator on the TTT server and this post is related to TTT. I have been a staff member on the TTT server on-and-off since April 2014. Of that time, I have actively served as a staff member on TTT for nearly 4 years. As you can imagine, I’ve seen a lot over this long tenure.
With my introduction out of the way, let me get to the point of my post.
Staff and Player Communication
I didn’t want to make this thread about one person, but I think that might be the best way to make sure people understand why I’m writing this. There’s no point in trying to dance around the reason I’m writing this.
I am writing this in direct response to the situation with Captain Price.
Communication Amongst Staff Members
On October 31st, I made the staff members aware of Captain Price’s problem with sending creepy messages to female players and targeting female players in the voice chat by reporting him in the watchlist in our staff discord. I included evidence of such. This was acknowledged by a couple of staff members. This was after I added the first warning to him for such behavior.
On November 2nd, two other staff members reported that Captain Price was still being weird to females. One staff member noted that they had received two private messages from female players regarding his behavior. An admin also noted that they had spoken to Captain Price regarding his behavior towards female players that day.
On November 5th, I added a second warning (for harassing female players, technically the third warning overall) to Captain Price based on further behavior that I witnessed while on the server that day involving being a creep to female players. This was, in part, influenced by the reports of the other staff members regarding his behavior.
Burb also posted video clips in the staff Discord on November 5th (recorded that day) which showed clear proof of the unwanted attention that Captain Price was directing towards female players.
This sounds great, right? Communication between staff members regarding a problematic player.
No.
Apparently, some staff members were not being so forthcoming with their observations about Captain Price. They too had witnessed his creepiness and the unwanted attention he was giving to female players, yet they chose to idly say nothing to the rest of the staff team.
This is wholly unacceptable.
In order to actually deal with problematic players like Captain Price, there needs to be a united front. And that means that you let the other staff know about that player, no matter how little evidence you have. Even if you don’t have evidence at the time, letting the other staff know to be on the lookout (the whole point of a watchlist) means that they can themselves gather further evidence on the player. It’s much easier to ignore or brush off a one-time incident than one where you have read that several staff members have had noticed something about someone.
Nothing is too small to let the rest of the staff team know about, especially when it comes down to creepy or harassing behavior. This is exactly the type of behavior that makes people avoid the server, whether that be only when that player is on or completely avoid the server.
Female players (and all players in general) make a brave decision when they decide to report someone to a staff member for harassment/unwanted attention. I don’t need to go into the details of why it’s such a big decision for them, you can read up on the #MeToo movement if you are interested. Just remember, TTT is a male-centric game with upwards of 90% of the players on our server being male.
When a player chooses to make that report, they should never have to feel like they are being ignored. And while that individual staff member may not be trying to actively ignore them, when they choose not to pass that information onto the other staff members, the implication is that they are indeed ignoring the player’s report. Obviously, there’s no need to state who the reporter is, just who the person being reported is.
We should never be ignoring the reports of our players. All reports, save for the rare extreme situations, need to be shared with the greater staff team.
I don’t wish to attack the admins because I don’t know what they may or may not have known regarding this situation in particular, but this extends to them as well. If there are reports on a player for things like harassment, the staff team needs to be aware of these. I understand that the admins may not want to share the evidence of harassment each time someone reports a player, but we don’t need to see the gritty details. We just need to know to be on the lookout. A name and a one-sentence summary of what they did and what to watch for. Otherwise, there is the risk the behavior is observed by other staff members and either dealt with one-on-one, ignored, or brushed off.
I resent that I felt like I was the only staff member actively dealing with the Captain Price situation. I resent that the female players being harassed by Captain Price had to deal with his unwanted attention for any amount of time longer than they should have had to, an estimated two weeks longer than necessary. I resent that at least one players have been repelled from the server because of this.
Again, this is unacceptable. No player, or staff member, should feel like they have to bear the burden of reporting on a problematic player for the benefit of themselves and other players being harassed.
This situation was horribly mismanaged. I take partial responsibility for this as a staff member. Maybe I should have been more active in asking around our female community to see if other people felt like they were being harassed by Captain Price. I was told to not ban Captain Price for his behavior by the admins. Maybe I should have gone ahead and taken unilateral action and banning Captain Price anyways for the biggest problem he was presenting our community - the harassment. Maybe it would have been better to ask for forgiveness than to allow the situation to continue deteriorating.
Communication Between Players and Staff
My main focus on this post is that of the failure of staff to effectively communicate with each other regarding Captain Price’s harassing behavior. But I’d also like to discuss communication between players and staff.
Players should feel comfortable reporting situations like this to staff members. They shouldn’t have to worry that their message will reach everyone, including upper staff.
I can assure you that I will always take reports of player harassment seriously and will pass this along the line, whether that be directly to the admins or to the full staff team (with your name omitted, of course).
I think that the best option going forward would be for players to report concerns and harassment to both an admin and a trusted staff member directly. I know that you may not wish to share a sensitive topic with an admin that you may barely know, but this is the best way of ensuring that the people in charge are aware of your concerns. The staff member you trust may be able to offer immediate advice, and that’s great, but it’s also important that the admins know of the situation. Chances are high that if you feel like you’re being harassed, someone else feels the same way about that same player. The admins are in the best position to collect the reports and note if a player is a recurring offender.
My Point
My point here wasn’t to simply lament a lack of action and communication regarding the Captain Price situation.
My point was to demand that each and every staff member make sure that the observations that you make regarding a player or situation are transmitted to the rest of the staff team.
Each one of us staff members has our own methods of staffing, but that doesn’t mean we exist in our own independent continuum. To effectively staff this server, we need to communicate with each other.
No matter how small something appears at the time, make sure you report it to the rest of the staff team.
This is the only way we can take care of situations before they worsen to the point where players no longer feel welcome on our server.
![[Image: TWQlDjL.png]](https://i.imgur.com/TWQlDjL.png)
![[Image: t2X0SiD.png]](https://i.imgur.com/t2X0SiD.png)
