WotC Is Mike Mearls still in WotC?

[the Jester]

But it's not. That's like saying that all atheists believe there is no God. That's simply not the case- many simply don't believe there is evidence that there is a God.

That’s literally what disbelief means.

 

[Bill Zebub]

If we start with the premise that any decision made by a corporation has the most insidious possible explanation, we are led to all kinds of interesting conclusions, huh?

 

[Bill Zebub]

Does general ageism exist? Yes.

Is it at all related to Mike Mearls career as a game designer? No

Black holes exist, too. Thus Mike must have been sucked into a black hole.

Any Twitter posts must be the result of a careful parsing of Hawking radiation.

 

[Aldarc]

Or you acknowledge that you don't know, or you wonder if she's wrong or operating based on an incorrect assumption, or you suspect Mearls forwarded the emails to someone else who passed the info on to Zak, or...

This isn't as black and white as you make it out to be.

Did Mike Mearls publicly defend Zak S against accusations made against him? Did Mike Mearls investigate those accusations others made against Zak S and then brush them off? Did Mearls publicly drag the names of accusers against Zak S through the mud? Did the toxic behavior and abusive patterns that they warned Mearls about turn out to be well-founded? It may not be black and white, but let's not pretend that everything is so murky that nothing bad can be said against Mearls for what he did in connection to Zak S.

 

[Justice and Rule]

Or you acknowledge that you don't know, or you wonder if she's wrong or operating based on an incorrect assumption, or you suspect Mearls forwarded the emails to someone else who passed the info on to Zak, or...

This isn't as black and white as you make it out to be.

Given the actual situation, wherein she was right from the beginning about Zak and this whole thing despite it being a fairly contentious and unpopular thing that lead to a lot of harassment against the people who promoted it (and still is, by all accounts, if you look at how it looked when it first popped up back in February 2019), we have more than just speculation. It's credibility, and Hill has it on this topic because they've stayed consistent and were proven right. You talk about atheists who don't believe in God because there is no proof, but this has actions and events we can draw reasonable inferences to the point that I think it's more reasonable to give Hill the benefit of the doubt than blindly start from scratch regarding trust and credibility.

 

[Justice and Rule]

Did Mike Mearls publicly defend Zak S against accusations made against him? Did Mike Mearls investigate those accusations others made against Zak S and then brush them off? Did Mearls publicly drag the names of accusers against Zak S through the mud? Did the toxic behavior and abusive patterns that they warned Mearls about turn out to be well-founded? It may not be black and white, but let's not pretend that everything is so murky that nothing bad can be said against Mearls for what he did in connection to Zak S.

Yeah, this is not a white-box event completely devoid of context. The context here is that we see how Mike carried himself through this whole situation, as well as the fact that Hill was right about the whole situation and I think it's not unreasonable to take these claims as credulous.

 

[Ulorian - Agent of Chaos]

Yeah, this is not a white-box event completely devoid of context. The context here is that we see how Mike carried himself through this whole situation, as well as the fact that Hill was right about the whole situation and I think it's not unreasonable to take these claims as credulous.

Easy there, little man. More proof, less hyperventilating.

Edit: A little over the top on my part. Sorry! But come on...

 

[Aldarc]

Yeah, this is not a white-box event completely devoid of context. The context here is that we see how Mike carried himself through this whole situation, as well as the fact that Hill was right about the whole situation and I think it's not unreasonable to take these claims as credulous.

Yeah, I don't think that any of this rests entirely on Olivia Hill. She was not alone in warning Mike Mearls about Zak S. Mearls did not take these warnings seriously. Mearls chose to go to bat for Zak S against the accusations that others made against him. When the Zak S controversy erupted, there was a chorus of "we told you so" from people who were there at that time.

 

[Ulorian - Agent of Chaos]

Yeah, I don't think that any of this rests entirely on Olivia Hill. She was not alone in warning Mike Mearls about Zak S. Mearls did not take these warnings seriously. Mearls chose to go to bat for Zak S against the accusations that others made against him. When the Zak S controversy erupted, there was a chorus of "we told you so" from people who were there at that time.

@Aldarc @Justice and Rule Is it possible for you two to actually quote things? Vague histrionics doesn't help anyone's cause.

 

[Sorcerers Apprentice]

If we start with the premise that any decision made by a corporation has the most insidious possible explanation, we are led to all kinds of interesting conclusions, huh?

And you'd be right more often than wrong!

 

[Justice and Rule]

Easy there, little man. More proof, less hyperventilating.

Not really a "little man" to believe people who claimed something and ended up being right despite a huge amount of public sentiment being against them. Feels kind of big, to be honest.

And these sorts of "We need absolute proof!" sorts of arguments ring hollow when put into the context of the situation.Mearls did not take these claims seriously, and I find it harder to believe that he actually took the care and cautiousness to properly conceal the identities of these people from Zak rather than incidentally exposing them by giving him too much information. There is a ton of room for reasonable inference based on Mike's own behavior in this very event that supports this.

If you don't want to believe, fine. But I think it's dishonest to act like there aren't good reasons to believe Hill's view of things given the entirety of the situation.

@Aldarc @Justice and Rule Is it possible for you two to actually quote things? Vague histrionics doesn't help anyone's cause.

You could actually read my posts and follow the link I posted in one of my previous ones, which was a contemporanous accounting of the events from Mearls' own deleted G+ thread.

 

[Justice and Rule]

And you'd be right more often than wrong!

 

[Umbran]

Easy there, little man. More proof, less hyperventilating.

Edit: A little over the top on my part. Sorry! But come on...

Mod note:
That was really condescending.

And, when you say "A little over the top. Sorry! But come on..." you do a great job of non-apologizing. So, hint - don't try to minimize what you did in the same breath as giving the apology for it. Doesn't really look terribly sincere when you do that.

EVERYONE: This is a touchy subject. Treat folks in the discussion with respect. If they don't deserve your respect, they also don't deserve a response from you.

 

[Aldarc]

@Aldarc @Justice and Rule Is it possible for you two to actually quote things? Vague histrionics doesn't help anyone's cause.

An image with a post by Mearls defending Zak S and making accusations against his accusers was already posted in this thread. Beyond that, you can do a Google search for the Zak S controversy and Mike Mearls, as some people have collected this elsewhere. Other parts of the story are scattered around the web, with some requiring some deeper digging since they were done on Something Awful forums, assorted blogs, the now defunct Google+, and Twitter.

 

[Justice and Rule]

An image with a post by Mearls defending Zak S and making accusations against his accusers was already posted in this thread. Beyond that, you can do a Google search for the Zak S controversy and Mike Mearls, as some people have collected this elsewhere. Other parts of the story are scattered around the web, with some requiring some deeper digging since they were done on Something Awful forums, the now defunct Google+, and Twitter.

It's very difficult. There are tweets that are gone, Facebook posts that are hidden or deleted, and in the case of G+, an entire platform gone (though admittedly I believe Mearls deleted that thread pretty quickly). The blog I got the post from is gone, and it took me going to the Wayback Machine to find it.

And these are the problems with asking for more evidence in these cases: as time goes on, it's easy for them to disappear unless people are actively gathering it or putting it in safe places. If Hill didn't save that screenshot, or if the Wayback Machine had not saved that blog post, I'd have a lot fewer specifics to work off of. But the thing is a lot of us (myself included) remember hearing about these things when they happened or after they did. However, I'm sure people would not take these memories of something happening as proof.

People say that nothing disappears on the internet, but that's not really true: a lot of things disappear on the internet all the time. It can be very easy to save things, but if you didn't realize you needed to save something, it can be gone forever before you even realize it.

 

[Charlaquin]

Or you acknowledge that you don't know,

You should acknowledge that you don’t know whether you believe her or not, because it’s just a fact that none of us know.

or you wonder if she's wrong or operating based on an incorrect assumption, or you suspect Mearls forwarded the emails to someone else who passed the info on to Zak, or...

You’re talking about disagreeing with her interpretation of what happened, not about believing or disbelieving her account of what happened.

This isn't as black and white as you make it out to be.

The claim I’m making is pretty black and white. A lot of people seem to be misunderstanding the claim I’m making. Which probably means I didn’t communicate it well, but I have been trying to clarify and people keep raising the exact same objections.

 

[Ulorian - Agent of Chaos]

@Aldarc @Justice and Rule I really just can't with you two. Sorry, carry on this discussion with yourselves. Apologies for the earlier harshness.

 

[Charlaquin]

But it's not. That's like saying that all atheists believe there is no God. That's simply not the case- many simply don't believe there is evidence that there is a God.

That there is no empirical evidence of a god isn’t a belief, it’s just a fact. In light of that fact, one can either believe in the existence of a god despite the lack of empirical evidence, or disbelieve (which may be motivated by many factors including but not limited to there being no empirical evidence).

 

[Ulorian - Agent of Chaos]

It's very difficult. There are tweets that are gone, Facebook posts that are hidden or deleted, and in the case of G+, an entire platform gone (though admittedly I believe Mearls deleted that thread pretty quickly). The blog I got the post from is gone, and it took me going to the Wayback Machine to find it.

And these are the problems with asking for more evidence in these cases: as time goes on, it's easy for them to disappear unless people are actively gathering it or putting it in safe places. If Hill didn't save that screenshot, or if the Wayback Machine had not saved that blog post, I'd have a lot fewer specifics to work off of. But the thing is a lot of us (myself included) remember hearing about these things when they happened or after they did. However, I'm sure people would not take these memories of something happening as proof.

People say that nothing disappears on the internet, but that's not really true: a lot of things disappear on the internet all the time. It can be very easy to save things, but if you didn't realize you needed to save something, it can be gone forever before you even realize it.

Then save the proof if you're going to make a claim against someone?

 

[Morrus]

OK if this thread is literally just a couple of people arguing endlessly with each over about the definition of belief, I think it’s done. Thread closed.