The Blockland Forums

[Dr Bling]

The Blockland Forums

Problems that need to be fixed.

        Before you call out the "tl:dr", this topic shows flaws about this forum that mostly everyone is or has been guilty of at some time, including my self. I am not leaving the Blockland Forums, and this isn't a goodbye post. I didn't make this topic for attention, but rather to call your attention to problems, that need to be fixed.

"It's not serious, its just the internet; we can do whatever!"

   A big problem about the Blockland Forums is the fact that people around here feel like they can do anything to each other. Do you guys treat people like this in real life? No, most of you would get your asses wooped. My main point here is that the lot of you think you can say and do whatever to whoever because its not serious/you will never see them in real life. Newsflash, there are people behind the forum aliases you so fondly and brutally abuse. Even if you are just typing your usual drama dialogue of the day, it's aimed at real people, and although not "serious" in your opinions, it is hurtful. Do not respond to this post and tell everyone that it isn't hurtful, because if it wasn't, the drama forum wouldn't be full of members lashing out against the ones that verbally assault them, and vice versa.

   Band-Wagoning

   As if isn't bad enough having members fight other members on a hourly basis, a lot of you will just join in for kicks. Whether to "get back" at a member for something they had done to you, to redish out the crap you deal with all the time, or to look cool, members are always band-wagoning onto fights intensifying them, and making the awful situation, worse. First, if you are in a bad mood because of something that happened to you, do not start fights/join in on arguments. Contrary to the oh-so popular belief of this forum, fighting doesn't make you cool, atleast not in the eyes of people whose oppinions are more then barbaric. If you participate in fights just because you think its fun, become a lawyer, do not polute this forum even more with this filth.

   Pretentiousness, Narcasism, and Bullying

   Every person has an ego, however, when people sign into the Blockland Forums, it tends to grow. A lot. What is the problem with this? Some people on this forum go around bullying the stuff out of others for whatever reason. They tend to think they are the best people in the world, and their word is law and other members' words are fiction. Everyone has an opinion; it is not your job to decide who is right and who is wrong. Arguing is fine, but outright bullying isn't. This topic is just an example, and I'm not just pointing fingers at the people in it. I too, am gilty of this.

   Here are some quick examples of unnecessary bullying.

http://forum.blockland.us/index.php?topic=68729.0
http://forum.blockland.us/index.php?topic=71205.0 - New, and most of us don't give a crap about this guy, I just don't see how it was necessary. Most of the bullying was in other threads.
http://forum.blockland.us/index.php?topic=68655.15
http://forum.blockland.us/index.php?topic=69410.0 - Not exactly bullying, but bragging about who you have banned is beyond pathetic.

        Perhaps statistics would shed some better light on the situation? Out of 124 pages of drama threads, about 97 pages are less then 1 year old. This forum has been around early 2005. So over 3/4ths of our drama has been in the last 1/4th of the time Blockland Forums has been up and running.

   Descrimination

   Seemingly every time I look a the forum, there is an example of descrimination. The usual offense takes place when a new person voices his/her opinion in an argument and is replied back to with statements similar to: "Who the hell are you..?" or "You're new here, and your opinion doesn't count." Once again, I hate to burst your bubble, but being in this forum longer then someone else doesn't give you authority over them, nor does it boost your standing in an argument against them. But due to the band-wagoning I mentioned earlier, it usually does help you in an argument due to the ganging up on newer members by the older ones. However, this doesn't make it ok to descriminate against new players or anyone that differs from what you feel like is "accepted". Similarily in game, many older players ban and think less of newer players. Then when the newer players meet even newer players, they follow suite, thus creating a snowball effect of descrimination towards the newer generations, thus propelling this community farther into a state of segregation.

   Debates --> Arguments --> Wars

   As stupid as this sounds, many times debates on this forum turn into arguments, which result in wars. Take all of our religion arguments for example. They start out with one key disagrement; Creationism vs Athiesm, for the most

part. As the debates get more heated, ideas are shot down and members say things such as

Now why don't you just shut the forget up and go cut yourself somewhere else.

Arguments between forum members often result in verbal wars and vendettas as a result of our good ol' Drama forum. For the benefit of the Blockland Community, do your part in stopping this stuff before it hits the fan, deepening the ruthlessness of this internet stuffhole.

         Responding to Trolls

   Before you call me a hypocrite due to this thread being response to similar things, read the full section. Responding to trolls by arguing with them will only make things worse, you can see a prime example of this on pages 8-9 of this very topic. We can't get mad at trolls if we argue just as much as them, otherwise we are almost as bad as them ourselves. Cursing at trolls is even worse. The best way to defeat a troll is by ignoring him/her, good luck with that though, as most of us find it very hard...


I'm hoping you got something out of this, and that some of you stopped and really thought about what really goes on in this community. Also, if you have anything helpful to add, just go ahead and post it.

[Ad Bot]

[Menen]

Wow.

[Slicksilver555]

tl;dr. loljk. I suspect no change in the forums.

[zz_tophat]

I've seen this thread before (several times). I should really keep links to these things.

Without reading it I can guess it has a lot of valid points, all have been made before and no one (at least not the ones causing the problems) will listen. In fact because you posted it some people will debate it, who knows why, after all proving what should "idyllic" as "wrong" does no one any good.

Not that I don't think there is a point, maybe if this kind of thing is said enough someone will listen. I once made a thread like this (talking points make these things easier to absorb), almost all the people agreed that the "starfish-ness" needed to stop but after I read through all those "good" post I came upon the one that says: "keep your opinion to yourself and STFU".

I really wish more people would post stuff like this, then at least we could debate how things should be rather than how crappy they are.

[General Omega]

All this coming from the drama lord himself people!

[tails]

Perhaps statistics would shed some better light on the situation? Out of 124 pages of drama threads, about 97 pages are less then 1 year old. This forum has been around early 2005. So over 3/4ths of our drama has been in the last 1/4th of the time Blockland Forums has been up and running.

Drama has not been here since the start of the forums.

[Dr Bling]

All this coming from the drama lord himself people!

Yes, as I stated in the topic title, I am just as guilty as everyone else is.

[Grampy]

I think the problem more is that you've let it get to you.

[Slicksilver555]

I think the problem more is that you've let it get to you.

All hail the wise one.

[Bisjac]

the first thread to be moved into the newly created drama section was about me and cookie lol

[TheChaosCarrier]

-abunch o' stuff-

I sir, agree with you 95% of the way.
But your rant on Band-Wagoning got to me...
I personally think it's straight bullstuff to hop on a band wagon just for stuffs and giggles, It pisses me off sometimes too.

But I have been guilty of this myself, and on other things fitting in with not only bandwagon, but everything else, just like everyone here has.

Anyway, you're point on this really got to me pretty hard. Therefore, I respect and agree with it.

If you participate in fights just because you think its fun, become a lawyer, do not polute this forum even more with this filth

I agree, but note, this will not stop many of our new members all that easy.
So I also agree with

tl;dr. loljk. I suspect no change in the forums.

I too suspect no change in these hellish forums, because more people keep on joining these forums for stuffs and gigles. And I have to say in my own opinion, that we cant really put Badspot to blame, nor anyone else for this crap.

And about your "it's the internet we can do whatever blah blah"
That also kinda got to me. I hate when people try to win arguments, or be the tough guy just because it's the internet. Thats bullstuff. But the smart ones tell the less smart ones, do they listen? No. Instead, they feed off the complaints like trolls and do it even more. And no I'm not agreeing with him to hop on the bandwagon, I'm simply stating my opinion and agreement for this.

We can bitch about this all we want, but I think Badspot will do one of the 3 things listed.

 - Will take note of this post, and try to do SOMETHING
 - Continue to ignore this
 - Not even notice this topics existance

[Regulith]

I almost made a topic about this once, about how Badspot must despise us for being flaming starfishs. I hit post, it said I already posted, I went back, and half of my topic was gone. I thought "whatever" and never thought about it again.

I agree everyone should be a little nicer here, but from what I've seen, all of the 12-year-olds who need to let off some of their anger and energy come here and just flame the stuff out of the new members who screw up. I doubt that's going to change.

I do it too, but lately I've been doing my best to help everyone.

Everyone here just needs to face the facts when it comes to all this religious debate and stuff; EVERYONE HAS THEIR OWN IDEAS. If we didn't, we'd all be god-damn robots.

Guys, just shut up.

[Grampy]

Everyone here just needs to face the facts when it comes to all this religious debate and stuff; EVERYONE HAS THEIR OWN IDEAS. If we didn't, we'd all be god-damn robots.

Guys, just shut up.

But without sharing/debating those ideas, we would be no better then robots anyway ;)

I rather like reading religious debates, it's nice to know what peoples opinions are.

[Duckmeister]

I agree with the OP.  I myself have been guilty of blatant verbal abuse when I so easily forgot that there are real people on the other side.

However, most of the time I was finding it hard to believe that a real person could say the things that they were saying to me, or to others, in the first place.

Guys, look at how other forums think of us.  Many folks have heard of us through casual/indie game sites, and given us a try.  This is the result:

No, don't go to the cesspit of stupidity that is the Blockland forums.
It makes me sad how that place has declined in quality.

No. The Blockland forums are and forever will be a black hole of filth and cookiemonsters.

I personally think that egos plus lack of consequences is the main reason why most folks are jerks.  I think the main reason why jerks don't get banned is because it's not "technically" in the rules, and Badspot thinks (correctly) that it's more important to ban the spamming roblox/nine-year-old users than it is to make a decision on a very subjective topic.  However, that's what an admin has to do.

Those who say "just don't let the drama get to you" are just avoiding the issue by saying "we can be jerks all we want, it's YOUR fault if you get hurt by us".  That's extremely pathetic.  You're the kind of person who needs to say what they say to a mirror first to see if it checks out.

And those who talk about the unnecessary religious debates by saying:

But without sharing/debating those ideas, we would be no better then robots anyway ;)

There has been no actual "debate/share" religious topics in the BL forums, only flame wars.  Your brown townogy doesn't work here.

I think Bling has hit in right on the head.  Good job.  I hope to see more of this attitude around here.

[Grampy]

There has been no actual "debate/share" religious topics in the BL forums, only flame wars.  Your brown townogy doesn't work here.

Well, I'll just put all cards on the table and say I enjoy reading religious flame wars ;P

Edit: Flame wars could be regarded as sharing, it just gets rather heated.
Edit2: Just read what you said in the middle. I'm not saying we can be jerks all we want. If you managed to get that out of what I said, there is something wrong with you. :3