I believe that a distinction can be made between sociopathic punks and ill-mannered twerps:

Sociopathic punks are anti-social, usually suffer from psychological/emotional damage which may be the result of either environmental abuse or a physiological abnormality, or both...and may not respond in a healthy way to courtesy or compassion.

Ill-mannered twerps, on the other hand, are often simply immature, unguided, socially under-developed adolescents who have the unfortunate distinction of suffering from bad parenting. Children who don't have good manners have never been taught good manners.

Showing consideration to kids who are annoying and have bad manners, might help them to grow into responsible, considerate people. Simply regarding them as adversaries who should be insulted and discarded pushes them in the wrong direction. I understand that, in this realm, it is not our job to teach anyone anything; I simply wonder how many insecure, impolite, kids would respond more favorably to compassion than to ostracism?

Last edited: Monday, October 17, 2005 at 8:40:31 PM

VGP nyar...i really don't know what to say. Besides my parents fighting most of the time, I live in a very good environment. Manners, respect... Computers!

I have no doubt that some trolls are sociopaths, others just twerps.

The question you bring up, Nyar, is how do we distinguish someone who will respond to rehabilitation from someone who will end up giving us all the finger in the end?

I think we should treat them with compassion and err on being too nice, but at some point, if they show they just don't get it, or choose not to improve, they get the consequences of their actions.

For example, yesterday I was playing an indie scrum game when a demo joined. I hadn't seen this demo for a while, but wasn't glad to see it. I decided to see what happened but it started in with the same tired old garbage. It decided to start BMing and camping and diving. (The trifecta!) I did not choose compassion. I have in the past, but instead decided to give it a hard time. (It was whining and moaning about it, too...)

This player has repeatedly joined games and ruined them. I chose not to put up with it. Maybe I should be more compassionate, but in this case, I wasn't. That demo knows better, but wants to get attention for its behavior. Maybe I was feeding it, but at the time, I didn't care.

So, what would you do? In the past, I tried to help this demo, but I hit my limit a while back with that one. I waited to see if there was a change, but when I saw there wasn't, the demo was punished. I wasn't being compassionate at all.

They just want to be cool.

^ Some people have a peculiar sense of what "cool" is...and no wonder.

^^ "So, what would you do?" As usual, LGM, I appreciate your thoughtful remarks. I can tell you that my first impulse is to shoot them a lot and then ban them. Lol. Unfortunately, that's the kind of response which contrasts with the kind of compassionate guidance that I'm suggesting. In theory, (if not in practice), I am advocating that offending players have some basics spelled out to them...Thereafter we can shoot them a lot and ban them.

Last edited: Tuesday, October 18, 2005 at 3:33:06 AM

LOL.... Now you know why he's in charge of my Admins. Good stuff Nyar as usual. ;)

@ Nyar- seems like we're on the same page. It is very tempting to just light them up at first, but I do try to give them the benefit of the doubt. I even suggest they could adapt and adopt more acceptable methods. (And I prefer to do it without lowering myself into a flame war...)

However, once they've established that they have no desire to reform, light their backsides up!!! ;)

Now if we could somehow manage to admin SW servers... They'd have nowhere to hide

I saw this on a shirt once and maybe our nooby friends have this attitude...
"Rehab is for quitters!"
give them a chance and tell them you are doing so... The good ones will clean up a bit, then work from there...
this worked for me in the good ole days for "Warfare's Server" with plenty of demos
I have only one person banned since, and it's chong...