Jump to content
3DXChat Community

The Art of Self-Moderation.


Tracer

Recommended Posts

Nearly two months in.. I have learned that the single best thing about this game is its community.

I enjoy my friendships more than the pixels. I enjoy meeting new people and exploring new and interesting things (only some of which are sexual) at an incredible and deeply personal level of intimacy. I came here because of Corona and the loneliness of isolation but I stayed for curiosity and fulfillment that can only be gained by interacting with a committed and sharing community.

I have also learned that the biggest liability of this game is also its community: There is so much here that could alienate a new player (I am still new enough that I can state this confidently). There is intrigue, politics, drama, and the cliquey tribalism of a playground of adolescent school children fighting over tennis balls. Emotions and libidos and tempers cause messy interactions that aren't always respectful or well thought out. So much in-fighting is distressing to see. I think this social drama is a direct threat to such a small community. Potentially fracturing it and reducing the shared experiences we have together. I want to try and address this here.

Why is toxicity such a problem for 3dxchat? Because intimacy and trust are everything here. Ultimately the intimacy that can be shared between trusting strangers will erode the less people have confidence in each other - and a toxic community is the quickest way to break that trust. I am sure everyone here can think of at least 1 extremely hostile experience they have had online - and then I would simply challenge them to consider if that is the sort of environment that could nurture intimacy and trust? Of course not. But now have that experience once a week. Once a day... The smaller our community the more exposed it is. It is a path to self destruction.

Alternatively, by nurturing a positive community it would definitely grow. Those intimate experiences are what we all hope for. What new people come here hoping to find. The community provides. Or it does not.

So how do we nurture a positive and mature community?

Some people cry "bring in the moderators!" at this point. But in principle, a decent community doesn't need moderators if its members can self-moderate. Ultimately that is the ideal community goal in any forum or online group: That regardless of our differences and disparate views we can all agree some basic forms of dialogue and behaviour. Moderators are like a police force and ultimately sadly will end up being hated - especially in an environment which tries to foster a feeling of "intimate lawlessness" where feelings are involved and our self-imposed boundaries are often broken. Cries of bias and favoritism will drown moderators out. They're humans too and will be hated for being robots whilst failing for not being robot enough.

Luckily I think the "laws" of 3dxchat are very human laws and don't need moderating. They don't need policing. Things like "Respect", "Self Discipline", "Patience" and perhaps the most important thing of all: Humility.

Therefore, at the risk of coming across as some moral harpy, and readily admitting that I don't have any easy path for how to get to that utopia of a perfect community, I would like to share what i have found to be the most important steps for me personally to contributing to online communities (I have been a member of several fanfic sites).

 

The most important improvement that can be made to this forum and community is MY own self improvement. How can I be better? What can I do? A few seconds of self reflection before jumping in to the argument. Restraining myself from having the last word. Wanting the best for others, strangers as well as friends. Assuming that if an argument happens it is because *I* am mistaken. Apologizing for that mistake and learning to walk away from it. Sometimes I can be right and still be wrong: The mistake is sometimes not in what you say, but the fact you had to say it.

Importantly: I have no ownership and can have no expectation towards the behaviour of others, as much as I would like to. The community we are can only prosper the more we as individuals aim to self improve, rather than ask others to improve themselves. No person should expect anything from anyone else that they do not expect from themselves.

In there is the realization that everyone here is a human being behind a keyboard. We are all flawed and capable of making mistakes. Of treating other people with cruelty and stupidity, regardless of our initial intent. Every negative thing we type can be a weapon and every time we respond in anger we can be doing harm. It is so easy to misunderstand or be misunderstood in a text box and written format, especially when considering cultural and language differences. By trying to win a point I might be breaking another human being to bits.

Its OK to know that I am right, and to want to be right. But If I NEED to be right at the expense of who another person is, then I am probably wrong at an entirely different and much more human level.

The second thing that I truly believe matters in a community is understanding the equality we all share: posting and playing 3dxchat is a privilege we all pay for, and we are all equal in that privilege. There is no *right to exist* here, nor the *right to be right* or most of all: *to be seen to be right*.

I never played Dungeons and Dragons but I love the idea of the dungeon master: the one who controls the game the others play. I think here we all take the role as Dungeon master to everyone else: Everyone that enters my room, even if its to cold me or hit me up with the "hru bb ;) wanna fk?" romance. They're seeking their own adventure for their own reasons. Maybe they need to learn a few of the rules I use in my game - but i should do my best to help them understand them before I kick them out of the game.

Lastly: Yes of course some people will go over the line. Some people are not here to make friends. Some people like drama and like to cause it. They exist in Overwatch and warcraft and everywhere else human beings get together on the internet. But they don't actually have any power apart from what we give them. So here is perhaps the hardest lesson i have to give myself: Don't engage. Don't respond. If I find that I have - back out from the room and then slap myself on the head for being stupid and feeding a troll. The single biggest contribution I can make to an online community is self discipline. 

I hope it works. Sincerely, I hope I can make this game a better experience for YOU. If I do that its a better experience for me too.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

57 minutes ago, Tracer said:

Nearly two months in.. I have learned that the single best thing about this game is its community.

I enjoy my friendships more than the pixels. I enjoy meeting new people and exploring new and interesting things (only some of which are sexual) at an incredible and deeply personal level of intimacy. I came here because of Corona and the loneliness of isolation but I stayed for curiosity and fulfillment that can only be gained by interacting with a committed and sharing community.

I have also learned that the biggest liability of this game is also its community: There is so much here that could alienate a new player (I am still new enough that I can state this confidently). There is intrigue, politics, drama, and the cliquey tribalism of a playground of adolescent school children fighting over tennis balls. Emotions and libidos and tempers cause messy interactions that aren't always respectful or well thought out. So much in-fighting is distressing to see. I think this social drama is a direct threat to such a small community. Potentially fracturing it and reducing the shared experiences we have together. I want to try and address this here.

Why is toxicity such a problem for 3dxchat? Because intimacy and trust are everything here. Ultimately the intimacy that can be shared between trusting strangers will erode the less people have confidence in each other - and a toxic community is the quickest way to break that trust. I am sure everyone here can think of at least 1 extremely hostile experience they have had online - and then I would simply challenge them to consider if that is the sort of environment that could nurture intimacy and trust? Of course not. But now have that experience once a week. Once a day... The smaller our community the more exposed it is. It is a path to self destruction.

Alternatively, by nurturing a positive community it would definitely grow. Those intimate experiences are what we all hope for. What new people come here hoping to find. The community provides. Or it does not.

So how do we nurture a positive and mature community?

Some people cry "bring in the moderators!" at this point. But in principle, a decent community doesn't need moderators if its members can self-moderate. Ultimately that is the ideal community goal in any forum or online group: That regardless of our differences and disparate views we can all agree some basic forms of dialogue and behaviour. Moderators are like a police force and ultimately sadly will end up being hated - especially in an environment which tries to foster a feeling of "intimate lawlessness" where feelings are involved and our self-imposed boundaries are often broken. Cries of bias and favoritism will drown moderators out. They're humans too and will be hated for being robots whilst failing for not being robot enough.

Luckily I think the "laws" of 3dxchat are very human laws and don't need moderating. They don't need policing. Things like "Respect", "Self Discipline", "Patience" and perhaps the most important thing of all: Humility.

Therefore, at the risk of coming across as some moral harpy, and readily admitting that I don't have any easy path for how to get to that utopia of a perfect community, I would like to share what i have found to be the most important steps for me personally to contributing to online communities (I have been a member of several fanfic sites).

 

The most important improvement that can be made to this forum and community is MY own self improvement. How can I be better? What can I do? A few seconds of self reflection before jumping in to the argument. Restraining myself from having the last word. Wanting the best for others, strangers as well as friends. Assuming that if an argument happens it is because *I* am mistaken. Apologizing for that mistake and learning to walk away from it. Sometimes I can be right and still be wrong: The mistake is sometimes not in what you say, but the fact you had to say it.

Importantly: I have no ownership and can have no expectation towards the behaviour of others, as much as I would like to. The community we are can only prosper the more we as individuals aim to self improve, rather than ask others to improve themselves. No person should expect anything from anyone else that they do not expect from themselves.

In there is the realization that everyone here is a human being behind a keyboard. We are all flawed and capable of making mistakes. Of treating other people with cruelty and stupidity, regardless of our initial intent. Every negative thing we type can be a weapon and every time we respond in anger we can be doing harm. It is so easy to misunderstand or be misunderstood in a text box and written format, especially when considering cultural and language differences. By trying to win a point I might be breaking another human being to bits.

Its OK to know that I am right, and to want to be right. But If I NEED to be right at the expense of who another person is, then I am probably wrong at an entirely different and much more human level.

The second thing that I truly believe matters in a community is understanding the equality we all share: posting and playing 3dxchat is a privilege we all pay for, and we are all equal in that privilege. There is no *right to exist* here, nor the *right to be right* or most of all: *to be seen to be right*.

I never played Dungeons and Dragons but I love the idea of the dungeon master: the one who controls the game the others play. I think here we all take the role as Dungeon master to everyone else: Everyone that enters my room, even if its to cold me or hit me up with the "hru bb ;) wanna fk?" romance. They're seeking their own adventure for their own reasons. Maybe they need to learn a few of the rules I use in my game - but i should do my best to help them understand them before I kick them out of the game.

Lastly: Yes of course some people will go over the line. Some people are not here to make friends. Some people like drama and like to cause it. They exist in Overwatch and warcraft and everywhere else human beings get together on the internet. But they don't actually have any power apart from what we give them. So here is perhaps the hardest lesson i have to give myself: Don't engage. Don't respond. If I find that I have - back out from the room and then slap myself on the head for being stupid and feeding a troll. The single biggest contribution I can make to an online community is self discipline. 

I hope it works. Sincerely, I hope I can make this game a better experience for YOU. If I do that its a better experience for me too.


I think I can narrow all that down to avoiding drama. In my case, I usually keep a tight lip on my political views and thoughts. Don't get me wrong, there's nothing wrong with being political. If that's what you want to talk about, then go ahead, but politics, by its very nature, tends to be divisive. Some people may feel attacked by your comments and it may lead to some backlash.

Also, like you've said there, don't feed the trolls. Avoid reacting to negative comments, as it can worsen the problem. It will give people the impression that you're insecure and that they can easily get under your skin. It also tells those after attention that you'll give them what they want. Besides, and at the end of the day, no one wins in an online argument and, let's face it, it's a complete waste of time. If some people's goal is to bring you down, usually your best option is to ignore them. The fact of the matter is, not everyone is going to like you, regardless of who you are or what you do in the world.

I see 3DX as an escape. There's tons of horrible stuff going on in the world, but this is where you come to talk about trivial and fun stuff, and hopefully have a good laugh here and there, so who needs drama, right?

Edited by Charlie Masterson
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well, it can be pretty entertaining and interesting to argue. And the truth is born in argument. Yes, people who take argues on forum/in game to their hearts maybe going to be hurt. But I don't see it as enough reason to stop arguing all together. If I think that I am right – in most cases I'll keep arguing till I have time or desire to do so.

About colders and "hru bb" types... Well, I just prefer to ignore them. And I mean not ingame block (tho of course I block the ones who spam one cold invite after another), I mean just not answering them anything. Conversation with them will give me nothing. Will it give anything to them? Well, maybe... but I always ask myself why should I even bother. To make 3dxchat community a better place? Well, it's already good enough for me. There are some things that I maybe would like to change, but there is no way to change it by being nice and kind to colders and "hru bb" types. I am not attacking or trolling them (like one my friend do, accepting cold invite and then not accepting a single pose, making them just stand confused ^_^) and I think that's already nice enough. 

And no, I am not having hurting or trolling others as a goal. Actually, most of the times I am nice and polite. But I just don't see being nice and kind to others as my main and foremost  priority. 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thank you for sharing these insights @Tracer

For me personally the way I approach this community is how I approach life. 
You get what you put in. 
Someone is rude to me, I diss them back. 
They interact with me in a ‘normal’ way, they get the same back. 
(Normal might differ from person to person)

In my almost three years here, I’ve seen this community be great and terrible. 
Touching memorials for members that where said to have passed away. 
Or month long feuds over petty things like who hugged who first. 
3DX’s community is Society in a Petri dish and on fast forward at times.

Or as a friend is known to say:

Welcome to 3DX, where a blowjob takes 3 hours, and a marriage 3 weeks. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, R0bT said:

Im pretty sure you helped hundreds if not thousands of people by saying "be nice"  although to be fair you could have condensed it by 975 words and still said what took 1000 words for you to convey

That's fair. To be honest though I think that the "why" of it is interesting - and important. I think a lot of people approach this place the way they approach Reddit or something: "I'll be nice to you when you're nice to me." Derai and Xizl's responses kind of exemplify that. I don't mean that as a judgement: Everyone has a right to play how they want to play and exist as they want to exist. Their ways of playing are as valid as my own.

What I'm trying to describe is to take a more altruistic and proactive approach for the sake of values that are important here in 3dx but maybe don't exist in other internet forums and spaces: In my opinion to build intimacy and trust in a community requires a more forgiving approach than I would personally take in other venues.

For example: It takes more self control to resist being baited by a troll than it does to simply go ballistic at them. And yeah they might be the world's worst troll and i might have the world's best argument - but the risk is that I make the space we are arguing in an argument space. Here, I believe this is detrimental to a wider purpose: To build a strong community that shares common values and promotes collaborative trust.

But I understand this comes across as preachy - and I won't try and make everyone sing Kumbyya. I guess I will just try to practice what I preach :)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Practice what you preach is a good way to say it. 
Or you reap what you sow. 
It all comes down as you said to how you react to others. And how they react to you. 
 

For me as you pointed out it’s ‘Be nice to me, and there’s no problem.’ 

But that applies to myself too. I’ll treat others how I’d like to be treated. 
How they respond to that defines how the rest of the interaction plays out. 
 

Do unto others how you yourself wish to be treated and all that. 
 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...