JohnAdams1735

I use the default theme :3 But yea, talk to a tech about the formatting issues. See what can be done. I'm older than you Den :p

Toxicity in general or in this context? I meant that she knows what toxic is as she has seen it. No one I reference in what you quoted is being toxic...No, usually not. Whistleblowing is sometimes the only way to get things out in the public. While the logs are not me at my best, however, they are... perhaps 4 conversations I've engaged in in the past 9 months. You see only the bad because that's all Tharine leaked. What about all the other conversations I've engaged in where I was the players' advocate, agreed with Tharine on an issue, or conducted myself 100% professionally? Did she leak those? Of course not, it wouldn't serve her point. I am merely suggesting that even if disturbing, the leaked logs are isolated incidents in a much longer line of normal behavior. I'm not a power crazy, hate-the-player, fount of staff favortism some fancy me to be. If I was, I trust the other admins would have asked me to leave long ago. I'be been repramanded, though, for two of the incidents and talked down/out into correcting my actions myself in at least one of the others.

I tried to understand her mindset, sure, it's called empathy. I do it professionally quite a bit, but I don't think I tried putting words in her mouth. The learning that not everything is circle jerk material is totally seperate from my comment that she needs to age ten years. The latter is a reference to the fact she allowed a game to bother her so much. I'd just come off a rather rude awakening myself that MC is a speck of dust stacked against something slowly killing me from the inside. It was an on-the-fly comment that some people, including me, need to streighten out their priorities and calm down. Something I'm still working on. You conclude from one insident I never asked for help? How does that make sense? In this case, I'd been prepping so thrawn and steve didn't, and iirc Barlimore was brand new at the time. Any of them probably would have done a stellar job, even better than I fumbled through it, but despite my personal circumstances it was I who had taken responsibility and it was I who lead the staff meeting. For the servers' best interest, I thought. Perhaps I was just all ego and misguided. Lastly, at the risk of making it Tharine vs John, just because she's the more public and vocal about it doesn't mean she didn't make me feel uncomfortable, unwelcome, un-listened to, etc. I just didn't complain about it and she beat me to it - not that I'd ever post something like that publicly - no. If I have a problem with someone, I say it to their face and talk with them about it. I did read your other post and will try to find the time to reply "appropriately" as you so demandingly implore me to...

I mainly meant that the heads are not, nor have they ever been since I've been one, 100% agreeing on everything. We argue too, and several times call each other out when someone is overreacting. My most recent talk with Barlimore in Diplomacy in mumble is a good example. We're friendly, mature, courteious, and respectful to each other as human beings and yes, I've partied with steve on mumble. I've had intellectual conversations with Barlimore. But we are not "buddy buddy" as it were.

The point was yes, to apologize for my verbal flair up in irc. I've never pretended it to be anything more, though I did ramble... The fact you call the heads "the super best friends club" shows more about your personal bias than reality. Ditto applies to anything about staff favoritism. I can think of several examples where staff are more severely punished than their player counterpart in an incident - as well they often should be as they are entrusted with certain powers and do represent the servers to the playerbase. "Having a majority of the playerbase think that you're not only..." Without arguing what constitutes a majorty here and how we could ever measure it, I've not seen "a majority" who distrust me. Even the petition to remove cyotie and myself was downvoted into oblivion very quickly. The sense I get is people would rather us learn from this but move on. I'm not here for spite; do not put words in my mouth or ever to presume to speak for me or understand my mindset. I'm still around because I care about MCP. Recent major examples are that I lead the staff meeting in June the day after my step-Dad died. I kept up as best I could behind an irc/mumble/minecraft-blocking firewall from my hospital bed. I do what I do, as always, to offer what measly help I can. As far as the -admin log you linked is concerned, I think it's an example of how well the staff works. I do something, Tharine takes issue with it, we discuss and present our arguments, and the matter is resolved. I was stubborn, for sure, but heaven forbid someone have to work hard to do what they think is right! Tharine won the argument, by the way, as I removed my post. It was out of line, though it had felt good to vent after a long staff meeting I spent all day and then some working on to make it happen since Lude had recently quit and dropped it in my lap. I learned, though, that not everything should be circle-jerk material.

I'm not the only head. If you don't like me, take your comments/concerns etc. to another head. You can be sure they're not going to drop an issue you bring up to them just because of me (if you're concerned I have undue influence on the other heads). Those who do find me approachable can carry on as usual if they'd like. I'll listen and crusade as I always have.

My experience as a player in 2011 was actually nearly the opposite. Pilot scared me a lot back then, and I was very awed and intimated by tebok (who thor'd a lot of people on C when they deserved it). I hardly knew the tech staff at that time. I knew the mods better and they were friendly though. I know for a fact what Pilot and tebok did for the servers and I have no doubt they always kept the servers' best interests at heart. I guess I just always thought of myself as an approachable person.

Those plugins sound cool! Ignore would go a long way - it works wonders on another game I play where the gc is like S gc on depressants with a dash of vulgarity. Being able to more formally create groups (and stats!) goes hand-in-hand with the introduction and development of clanchat. It'll be interesting how that newer aspect of S culture continues to develop under the new plugins should you choose to use them. I'll be interested in following these developments, the plugins in particular. Thanks for being on the ball, SAdmins :-)

It is an apology. I'm not trying to share the blame with anyone, nor do I hold Tharine fully responsible for the community's reactions and words. But it would also be insulting her intelligence to say she had no idea what her post would do in the community. She's not stupid and has seen more than a fair share of toxicity and drama. The 'rage post' was a test intended just as I describe it. I'm sorry you cannot or do not believe me. I could call witnesses, but I doubt you'd believe them either if you don't believe me.

I will begin with a quote from Tharine: Jun 15 22:05:36 <Tharine> People are welcome to have their own personal opinions of other people, and express those in what they understand to be private areas. While our mods irc channel is still "public" in that it's in front of all the mods, it was never meant to be, nor should it have been, leaked to the true public of MCP. Still, in that channel, a Head Admin has no business bad-mouthing a former staff member (though some mods have engaged in such personal bashing of former staff in the past). It was a breech of decorum on my part. I am sorry if my outburst scared or worried anyone, either because it was out of character for me (another staff member brought it to my attention some mods thought my account had been taken over somehow because it was so out of the blue) or because of what it might mean if you ever came to me with a concern/complaint/idea/problem/etc., or what it might mean about the status of MCP's Admin/Head Admin team. I will try to clarify why I said what I did of Tharine and exactly what angered me so. I do not hate her, I do not hate her post or what it contains (by and large). What I hated about her exploding a drama bomb then bolting is that she's gone. She does not have to clean up the aftermath or even really deal with it. Whereas the people she left in her wake, especially Barlimore, steve, thrawn, and several others of the staff have to clean up her mess. Not to mention the stress, confusion, anger, hatred, etc. that her actions have provoked in and among the players and staff team. You all, players and staff alike, have spent countless hours collectively posting, arguing, getting your feelings hurt, getting angry, upset, etc. which isn't fair to you. I hate that it's cost you all so much of your time, effort, and emotional well-being and distracting you from... playing Minecraft. In addition and more specifically, the logs leaked show that where I referred to Tharine and then pasted a link to her post was, in fact, a mis-paste (one of the quoted sections shows me correcting the link after two more attempts at getting it right). I was far more upset that she posted a picture of the test post I made on the forums before they went live as a test and little more. There was no ill-intentions in the form of the post, only a convenient topic I could pretend to rage about to show jcll how potentially toxic such a section of the forums could be in the wrong hands - something I've been proven right over given recent posts on that picture. Moreover, the picture was picked up by barneygale, who I assumed got it directly from her (but it's possibly more likely he took it from her post), and who proceeded to make it look as if I had really fallen off the deep end. He took the picture out of time, out of context, and with total disregard of reality, aimed strictly at making me look bad, dangerous, off-balance, etc. Because I thought Tharine had had a hand in barney's post and the fiction it created, I called her toxic. For the record again, I apologized to her via a subreddit pm as a personal, private matter between us and no one else. This, however, is now my "formal public" apology, which I did not think was necessary at first, but because of subsequent events and conversations with other staff members, have changed my mind. I hope this clears up some things and perhaps, if I am lucky, shows that we have not swept this under the rug. I may not be stepping down or removed, but I can assure you it is a humbling experience to have people whose opinions you trust tell you you were out of line. Their words, intentionally or not, have cued me in to how badly I allowed my control to slip at that moment. I should have kept my knee-jerk reactions to myself and maintained my professional demeanor in the mods irc channel. Those individuals who have spoken to me are amazing people, I still believe, as it takes a lot of guts to have those sort of tough conversations with a peer. For that, I thank them. I hope this also goes a little ways in healing the breech, where there is one, between players and the Admins. I am but one of many, and my attitudes and opinions do not always reflect or agree with the other Admins, even the other Head Admins. You have little to fear from them (and maybe this helps dissuade some of the concerns about myself remaining a Head Admin, even in a reduced capacity). Before this gets much longer, I would also like to acknowledge that I have read the most recent posts on /r/barneygale and I do not take those comments lightly. I read them word-for-word and thought about each of them in turn. Rest assured those words will be rattling around in my head for months to come. Rather than going "unpunished" as some might think this is going, the drama on /r/barneygale as well as on MCP's subreddit and forums has been a learning experience for me and has occupied bits of my time with copious crying. I won't go on what I feel would be an ego trip here for now, but I would like to add that for every person who was quoted in barney's post, I have had random players and other staff tell me (unsolicited) that I am not a monster/bad person/asshole/bad admin/etc. I've seen incredible support from people who know what it's like to be a "public figure" and have your every move scrutinized and twisted. I logged into P yesterday and was greeted with a flurry of "Hello's!" So there is, as always, at least to sides to things. Sorry about the wall-o-text. Thank you for sticking with me through it.

Could ut down on beacon rreqs and make things for players. Deferring to the CAdmins, of course, I like it! The kits are awesome, too, I bet! Good luck with safe buckets :-)

Thank you! Sure, my dissertation is about a dispute between two towns and the people involved in Rhode Island in the mid 1660s :-)