RPG Writer Zak S Accused Of Abusive Behaviour

DQDesign · Feb 11, 2019

Jester David said:
Fair enough. I changed the offending word to the KKK.
Is that sufficient? Or would you be more comfortable with the removal of the entire example?

thanks, it is sufficient.

anyway I just read in another post that Nazis had amazing merits in science, so I surrender.

Steve Conan Trustrum · Feb 11, 2019

Yunru said:
Okay, let me rephrase: It shouldn't affect the merit of his work.

Lovecraft remains a poor example because he's not a skilled, engaging storyteller who just so happens to be a xenophobic racist in real life. He included those beliefs in his writing.

And this is me speaking as someone who absolutely loves some of his stories.

But how we look at an author's work evolves with the times and what we learn about that author. There are entire courses you take in a literature degree about that sort of thing.

Not everyone needs to (or should) burn everything Zak S has made if they've already paid for it. The damage is done in that regard. But it's how we move forward that matters. Stripping him of the award is not about the merit of what he created. It's about the merit of the creator himself and how he reflects on the community.

I don't bring Nazis into things lightly, but they basically a universally accepted evil, and yet that doesn't demerit their work on genetics, no matter how gruesome their methods of research.

Wow.

All I can say in response to this without earning a warning (at best) from a mod is:

Perspective, scale, and context matter.

billd91 · Feb 11, 2019

Celebrim said:
And I'm sad that most responses are likely to be voyeurism, gossiping, moral preening, wrath and outrage, and nothing that will ever do anyone any good. I am sad that I can't make anything better. I am sad I can't wash the wounds. I am sad that whatever I say will just goad someone on. I'm sad even that I care when none of my caring matters.

I'm not sad that I was skeptical of turning Zak into a celebrity - skepticism that no matter how mild I made it occasionally made people upset. There would be less need for people to publically walk back what they did or said before if they'd simply bought, or not bought, what he was selling and left it at that. Now we are going to make a big community wide issue of it? Count me out. I walked the other way the community was going when he became a star. I'll probably walk the other way they are walking now.

UPDATE: Please don't respond to this point if you are thinking to. My better judgment was almost certainly to stay silent, but grief has a way of boiling out and I made the mistake of reading further in the thread. The last thing I want is an excuse to drag myself to an argument.

Nope - I'm definitely going to respond and the point I'm going to highlight is where I started the quote. Aside from your comment about "moral preening" being just another term for virtue signaling, the point I'm going to make is that we need these discussions and we need them to be public because, whether you like it or not, they will help to define the bounds of appropriate behavior and they will help to define what we will tolerate as a community and personally. The lack of conversations about them is one of the reasons behaviors like this persist as long as they do.
Getting these issues out in the open and openly dealing with them are exactly some of the things we need to do in order to make our community and our world a better place.

Yunru · Feb 11, 2019

Steve Conan Trustrum said:
Lovecraft remains a poor example because he's not a skilled, engaging storyteller who just so happens to be a xenophobic racist in real life. He included those beliefs in his writing.

And this is me speaking as someone who absolutely loves some of his stories.

But how we look at an author's work evolves with the times and what we learn about that author. There are entire courses you take in a literature degree about that sort of thing.

Not everyone needs to (or should) burn everything Zak S has made if they've already paid for it. The damage is done in that regard. But it's how we move forward that matters. Stripping him of the award is not about the merit of what he created. It's about the merit of the creator himself and how he reflects on the community.

So you would censor the art because of the artist?
Is the integrity of an Ennie worth the political statement of retracting one?

Steve Conan Trustrum · Feb 11, 2019

Let's just end this right now re: the Nazis and science comparison, as it is a ridiculous (and highly inappropriate) grasping-at-straws defense of Zak S keeping an award.

Scientific discoveries do not function the same as an award. Science is something that exists regardless of whether or not we've discovered it yet. It's not someone's "creation." It's something that's already there that is discovered at some point and would have always still been there even if someone else discovered it.

An award for writing a game?

Doesn't work like that. At all. Science is something that exists and cannot be "put back in the bottle," whereas an award is something people decide on and, if they so choose, can decide to take away again. Especially when the award is voted on by fans who didn't know everything about the product's creator at the time.

So, if you really want to bring up the Nazis out of some need to defend not taking a community award away from a rapist, let's go with a better analogy:

If Hitler had been given a Nobel Peace Prize prior to WWII, would you be arguing about how, after the war, it shouldn't be stripped from him because, hey, he earned based on his "merit" at the time?

(Hint: yes, there is actually a correct answer to this question.)

Gradine · Feb 11, 2019

Yunru said:
So you would censor the art because of the artist?
Is the integrity of an Ennie worth the political statement of retracting one?

Do you really believe that "we don't think serial emotional, physical, and sexual abusers deserve our awards" is a statement that would harm one's integrity?

Yunru · Feb 11, 2019

Gradine said:
Do you really believe that "we don't think serial emotional, physical, and sexual abusers deserve our awards" is a statement that would harm one's integrity?

I think "our awards are not based on the content of the winner but on our view towards their author" would harm the integrity of an award that is supposed to be about the quality of content, yes.

Steve Conan Trustrum · Feb 11, 2019

Yunru said:
So you would censor the art because of the artist?

Removing an award is not "censoring the art."

The art still exists. It is still on people's shelves and in game stores. It is not being suppressed in any way whatsoever by removing the award. Not in the least.

Removing the award would simply be the community that the award represents saying that rapists don't get to keep their rewards.

Is the integrity of an Ennie worth the political statement of retracting one?

Two points:

The fact you think the awards' "integrity" is better served by acknowledging the merits of a rapist is rather telling.

Holding rapists to consequences is not political. Literally, no politics are involved unless you're the type of person who thinks that one sort of political leaning is "pro rape" and the other is "anti rape" and you have a problem with the latter.

Ghostwind · Feb 11, 2019

Really EN World? You have someone who has a history of abusive and narcissistic online behavior who has threatened individuals on multiple occasions. This same person now has multiple women coming forth with detailed stories of abuse and domestic violence. Where is your outrage?? Where is your anger?? Women have been hurt and abused for years!!

Is it because these women were porn stars? Are they less than deserving of any of your emotion? Oh wait, is it because he is one of your darlings you feel you must protect him? That is absolute bull!! If it was anyone else you would be on him like a pack of piranhas. I am ashamed to be a member of this community right now after reading many of the responses above.

Hell yes, strip him of his awards! If I were working in public relations at Wotc, I'd be doing what I could to get his name removed from any product he touched. Period. #Metoo carries some very hefty purse strings with it and companies are realizing it very quickly.

Right now, I can't help but be sickened by the lack of moral outage against Zak S here. I really thought better of you all.

Umbran · Feb 11, 2019

VengerSatanis said:
Please, let's not derail this thread with further discussion on the merits and flaws of either H.P. Lovecraft or the Cthulhu Mythos.

I'm going to support this. The issue at hand isn't Lovecraft. The digression would be rather disrespectful to the people here and now. If you want to discuss Lovecraft, please take it to another thread.