TSR Who's running the TSR3 social media accounts?

Ernie Gygax (before he and Stephen Dinehart accused the whole affair of being orchestrated by WotC and then deleted their Twitter accounts) indicated that Justin LaNasa was running the social media accounts for TSR3, Giantlands, and Dungeon Hobby Shop Museum.

After a full week of insults, barbed exchanges, and problematic statements from all three accounts, the following has been posted by somebody who identified themselves as "Michael", perhaps suggesting that Justin LaNasa is no longer with the company (which seems unlikely), leaving many on social media to question whether "Michael" exists. The new TSR3 was founded by LaNasa, Stephen Dinehart, and Ernie Gygax, and despite the acrinomious social media activity, the former two founders' names have largely escaped much of the criticism.

UPDATE -- the below tweets now appear to have been deleted.

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Around the same time, the header above the available events at the Dungeon Hobby Shop Museum website was altered to read: "Most role playing games will be played in old school fashion so if you're easliy offended or Rude ! DO NOT PLAY !" (sic)

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So who is TSR3 co-founder Justin LaNasa? He was an American politician who ran for office in 2014 and 2020, and who was involved in a minor scandal during the latter campaign.

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[Sacrosanct]

I haven't seen these rumored seasons. I take it that they are pretty bad.

They are quite clearly meant for older teen audiences, so maybe I'm just out of touch. But the show was nothing like the books. I knew there would be differences, of course, but they were way off. I think the most disappointing thing to me was how they handled Amberle. In the books, she was a strong personality, and in the show she was...not.

 

[Umbran]

Whether Ernie is guilty of another crime is irrelevant to him bring a target of network harassment.

It seems to me that his actions and choices are the direct cause of following events, so they can hardly be irrelevant. They provide a context. Surely, you aren't trying to prove a point out of context?

 

[bedir than]

The social media attacks that specifically singled out Ernie for attack through multiple retweets fit within the academic paper"s premise of network harassment.

You've been asked for evidence of "attacks" on EGGjr, and been unable to show a single one. At this point you're claiming that the sky is red.

 

[Sacrosanct]

So maybe it's just my perspective, and by no means am I trying to be a jerk. But I do think the reason they get so upset about all this and coin ridiculous terms like "virtue signaling" and "cancel culture" and blame the internet & social media for all the backlash is simply because they used to get away with it by being totally anonymous for the first twenty years on the internet and now they actually have to face repercussions for their actions.

That's part of it. The other part is that it seems cishet white men like them (not all cishet white men of course, but a lot) are so used to being catered to, so used to be the majority in any group, so used to having the most depictions and representations be about them, that it's become the expected norm. An entitlement. Any deviation from that, any consideration or inclusion of others into that sphere, feels like an attack or taking away their rights. So I think it's both these things. The fact that they can't handle the inclusion of others, and the fact they are no longer free to say or do whatever they want without repercussion.

I say this as a cishet white man myself. This isn't about me virtue signaling or any of that nonsense. It's looking at the facts. We have hard evidence we can point to to show how white men are overwhelmingly represented, and we see the reactions of these people any time you start including people who aren't cishet white men (just read the comments to my Chromatic Dungeons project). We (cishet white men) need to stop having thin skins and look the the facts, and acknowledge them.

 

[Umbran]

That last point IM(unprofessional)O seems pretty much like libel, which is actually pretty hard to prove.

As I understand it, in order to get action, you have to establish not just that they knowingly said something inaccurate. You have to establish that harm was done. Like, if WotC D&D suffered a notable drop in sales as a result, there's grounds for a suit.

I don't expect any notable or demonstrable harm has been done to WotC.

 

[Umbran]

Any deviation from that, any consideration or inclusion of others into that sphere, feels like an attack or taking away their rights.

When you are used to privilege, equality feels like oppression.

 

[Steampunkette]

So maybe it's just my perspective, and by no means am I trying to be a jerk. But I do think the reason they get so upset about all this and coin ridiculous terms like "virtue signaling" and "cancel culture" and blame the internet & social media for all the backlash is simply because they used to get away with it by being totally anonymous for the first twenty years on the internet and now they actually have to face repercussions for their actions.

You're not being a jerk at all. You've hit the nail on the head.

The article cites 37 people for evidence. They're people who have been harassed online who submitted themselves to the study on that basis. Here's how they defined Harassment in their advertisement to gather people together for the surveys:

being called offensive names, having someone try to embarrass you on purpose, being physically threatened online, having sensitive personal information exposed or your privacy invaded, having rumors spread about you online, being sexually harassed or cyberstalked, or being harassed over a long period of time.

Their super broad version of Networked Harassment is when a "Lot of people in a network" engage in this behavior.

So far, we've seen none of that aimed at Gygax and Company. Instead we've seen social shaming. We've seen people calling out his words, and the words of his coworkers and company, as wrong.

The article isn't applicable to this situation in the -best- of cases. And in the worst of cases it's a bad faith presentation of a work meant to discuss the cruelty aimed at members of minorities as equivocated to a "Both Sides" position.

 

[imagineGod]

You've been asked for evidence of "attacks" on EGGjr, and been unable to show a single one. At this point you're claiming that the sky is red.

Again, you mistake the court of public opinion versus rule of law. Twitter keeps evidence and that is forwarded for investigation of those users whose targeted harassment of Ernie may cause him harm. If that harm happens, the authorities have those Tweets, not you.

Civilized peoples do not pass judgements in the market place outside the law.

 

[Rob Kuntz]

Well free speech is not free of consequences. The internet is like a big street with many people walking down it. If you stand in the street and shout out your POV for everyone to hear, well, some may ignore you and move along, others may stop to answer in the positive or negative. Those are the consequences. In this case the people on the street mostly answered in the negative. If you did that on an actual street corner and received mostly a negative response from the surround, would that be harassment or rebuke? Is the crowd on the street then a network? I understand the difference between able to network and group, but the vast majority on all sides issued a rebuke. This is not swarming the consensus and bludgeoning but appears in my view a natural reaction and thus remains as a rebuke IMO and not harassment. Eventually Ernie retreated from the street. Consequences.

 

[Steampunkette]

Again, you mistake the court of public opinion versus rule of law. Twitter keeps evidence and that is forwarded for investigation of those users whose targeted harassment of Ernie may cause him harm. If that harm happens, the authorities have those Tweets, not you.

Civilized peoples do not pass judgements in the market place outside the law.

Bologna.

In any discussion in which one person makes a claim it falls to that person to provide evidence of their claim.

Russell's Teapot.

And literally every society and civilized person has passed judgment outside of law. In point of fact it is only through judgment outside of law that we create law.