In Praise of NCI that was

That wound up being a grid wide griefing that was done by one avatar who even gained access to and crashed Zindra sims. I was getting word from numerous groups including NCI and Mentors that many sims were being attacked at that moment. I was able to capture the name and AR along with many other people and that person's account was almost immediately terminated.

Sorry, I'm obviously not making myself very clear.

Of course there is no way to guarantee that students won't get griefed, even at the Shelter or NCI. (Or, maybe, even on the Woodbury University campus?) And I probably should have made it clearer that I am not really referring to last night's fun and games, but rather to the issue of NCI's backtracking on WU.

This is not about providing absolute safeguards for students: it is about taking clear and prudent measures to protect them. A teacher has to be able to say the she or he made every effort to find a place where students would be at least relatively safer.

My ultimate point here is that, given NCI's current unwillingness to dissociate itself from a group that has a pretty odious reputation, and that seems to be utterly unwilling to take public steps to either clear its name, or effect real safeguards against rogue members, it would be both irresponsible and unwise to send students there. There are other help areas that HAVE publicly distanced themselves from WU; I would use these instead.

And actually, because I would feel to some degree responsible for anyone I was sending to a help area, this applies to ANY noob I would be helping.

Incidentally, this is not a merely academic argument for me. I'm the author of the SLLUFN's Newbie Woman's SL Survival Guide, which DOES refer people, currently, to NCI. I am in the midst of revising it and, unless I see some indication that NCI is going to take a more aggressive anti-griefing stance, I will be removing that referral.

It is human nature to make this type of error in logic (non sequitur). Me and my lady friend were griping about some LL stuff when we got hit with the blue box of death. I had actually referred to the creepy guy in LL's basement who I always pictured looking at my dirty IM's. Then we got hit.

Now, for a minute, I actually thought I HAD angered the creepy guy in LL's basement.

The problem here is that this is not a valid argument. NCI had nothing to do with it and it no more or less likely to be targeted than anywhere else.

When you refer to students....are you talking about adults or children?

You have no evidence that they are not doing so.

NCI is not associated with the group. One member of NCI has been repeatedly harassed for being a member of that group, by a person who is notorious for disruptive behavior. As far as I'm concerned the "name clearing" needs to start with Prok, not NCI. I am more concerned with NCI's relationship with him than WU.

What rogue members? Have you any evidence that any members of NCI have been engaging in griefing, either at NCI or in any other location?

What the weasel said.

/me softly reminds folks that this thread is not about responding to grid-wide grief attacks. And most definitely not about the controversy that resulted in Carl leaving.

NCI still has a group of citizen volunteers teaching classes and helping folks get started. I first encountered NCI early in 2007. A friend became nearly unreachable because she began taking classes. She progressed rapidly from taking classes to teaching classes to opening a small SL business ... then she disappeared. I later learned that her SL experience had given her the confidence to work on opening a small RL business. That, to me, is NCI at its best, and I hope it goes on.

*sadness* Maybe he had just had enough. As you say, if he had stuck it out he could simply have rebuilt with folks who agreed with his policy.

It will be sad if NCI's referral network shrinks. Maklin and Scylla's responses both give early warning. However, there's a lot of content that refers NCI; I'm sure no-one is yanking all those newbie boxes and notecards anytime soon. Long-term, the only way for NCI to stay relevant to keep its collective nose to the grindstone and do good work.

If NCI instead takes the route of publicizing and defending this particular internal policy until it meets with wide acceptance, then I say: Knock, knock, reality calling. It will never happen. People's affiliations are litmus tests for their legitimacy. Every time NCI members blog or post about WU and "guilt by association", another person or two will revise their referral notecards. Look at RL politics around abortion or gun control issues.

As for Carl ... I hope that now he moves on to something that gives him compensation for his very good work. He's put in his time.
.

I haven't posted on this thread so far because I didn't feel the need to kick up even more dust, as some of this stuff obviously had to do with Caledon. But at some point it would be just plain callous to an old friend if I didn't say something. So here it is.


Carl has my support 110%.

He had it before and he still has it now.


* * * * *

There has been a lot of misinformation out there. Let's set it straight.


a) "Des, has *any* group been barred entry to Caledon?"

Answer: No.


b) "Des, on your big community projects, are *you* going to invite in members of groups like this one to help: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patriotic_Nigras ?"

Answer: "LOL!"


c) "Des, have you ever maintained a different set of community standards from Linden Research?"

Answer: Historically, yes.

In detail:
~ Sexual ageplay was flagged as inappropriate in Caledon first (Linden Research did the same later).
~ Gambling was flagged as against US law in Caledon first (Linden Research did the same later).
~ Scam banking was outlawed in Caledon first (Linden Research did the same later).
~ Adfarming and parcel extortion was outlawed in Caledon first (Linden Research did the same later)
~ Avatar Rights were granted in Caledon 26 Feb 2007 (Linden Research uses "any reason or no reason".


* * * * *


Carl, it's an honour to be your friend.

Regarding the rest, I think there has been enough said for now.

Sincerely,

Des

QFT

As I see it, it's a non-issue. If someone in NCI actually *does* something bad, then kick em out. Otherwise, don't get up in people's business.



And why would a person waste their time helping noobs in NCI if he or she wasn't legitimate?



This doesn't neatly compare to RL. For the most part, RL affiliations are private and one can be a member of many disparate groups without answering to each one about their other affiliations.

Even with not liking his new rule, I too wish Carl had stood his ground, but I can't say I blame him, when this kind of crap starts, sometimes you can be-bothered and sometimes ya can't.

It's like a dirty virus, nasty. It can't let up. Even if you beat it, it still keeps going, this is all it knows.

If this guy made what he did of this school, he'll be ok, he'll be more than capable to move on to do something else creative and worth while if he so chooses.

I'm not an NCI member.

I'm just a weasel who thinks that litmus tests based on "guilt by association" tell you more about the people applying the tests than the people or groups they're applied to.

I'm not an NCI member either. And I totally agree.

And... I thought you were a ferret!!

I agree. In some cases, it shows their integrity, as long as the litmus test is used in a non-fallacious way.

I agree with what Polo said over in the SLU forums:

http://www.sluniverse.com/php/vb/general-sl-discussion/33422-we-human-we-griefer-23.html#post776101

Mustelidae or Mustelids (from Latin mustela, weasel), commonly referred to as the weasel family, is a family of carnivorous mammals. The Mustelidae is a diverse family and the largest in the order Carnivora, at least partly because it has in the past been a catch-all category for many early or poorly differentiated taxa.

Zoological Taxonomy is a bit of a mess, but ferrets are basically laid-back weasels.

The comment you referenced, is itself fallacious. The term "guilt by association" is more broadly applicable than Polo claims. The example of Hitler and vegetarianism is an extreme case, used to provide an example of association without causation that is obvious to the most biased observer. It is illustrative, not definitive.

I believe simple membership in any group, unless membership in that group requires some kind of substantial commitment to inappropriate behavior (e.g., if you get kicked out of WU if you don't engage in griefing), is meaningless. In some cases, where there is a significant undertow of irrational sentiment, even membership in groups with more stringent standards should be considered secondary. Consider, for example, the circumstances surrounding the Red Scare in the middle of the last century.

Ahh, but I didn't say that they were. I said that they had failed to dissociate themselves from it.

What I mean is this: Carl instituted a new policy that was clearly and explicitly aimed at what was assumed to be a griefer group. He faced an impossible amount of internal opposition, and resigned; the new leadership then withdrew the new policy.

In other words, it's not that NCI has failed to take an aggressive anti-griefer stance (and whatever the truth about the WU group, this WAS explicitly an anti-griefer policy), it is that they DID take an aggressive stance, and then REPUDIATED it. That's not a sin of omission: it's one of commission. And whatever the new leadership's motives for doing so (and I am certainly NOT suggesting that they are "pro griefer", it looks bad.

As for WU, for whatever reason, they carry with them a stench associated with griefing. I have been very careful, here and elsewhere, to point out that I have not seen evidence that they ARE a griefing group: I hold to that. But there is enough past history, enough current evidence, and enough fingerpointing from reputable SL citizens to suggest that they need to clear the air on this question. What is required is a public and transparent indication from WU that they repudiate griefing and griefers, as well as some indication of the steps that they will take to exclude griefers from the group. They have had every opportunity to do so -- Tizzers posted a flippant contentless post on SLU last night that was obviously a response for a similar call from me there -- and have remained utterly silent. What are we to make of such silence in the face of accusations coming in from a number of influential and reputable sources? That too looks bad.

Frankly, a lot of this is about public image. Public image (apart from being a kind of cool late-70s early 80s band) is how an individual, group, or organization chooses to present itself to the world: it is a conscious statement about their own values and nature. Both the "new" NCI and WU have flopped badly in this regard, sending, frankly, very negative messages to the public sphere. And because NCI has consciously chosen to withdraw what was, initially, a strong anti-griefer statement about themselves, I will not be sending people there.

NCI helped me get started in SL and I will always be grateful for the classes, the free stuff and all the helpful people at Kuula, not to mention a nice place to set as home. I am really sorry to hear about what's happened and I wish both NCI and Carl the very best for all their future plans.

There have always been occasional griefers at NCI, as elsewhere on the grid. In my first week inworld, I was picked on by a griefer at NCI and I found it tremendously helpful to be around people who took the time to show me how to TP out of a cage (yes, it was a very lame griefing attack!), advise me to sit on something, explain how to send an AR, and reassure me that nothing very bad could really happen.

Looking back, I think it's one of the most valuable few minutes of learning I had in my early days. While NCI is still there, and still operating as it always has done, I will continue to refer newbies.

If they're not associated with it, then they can't disassociate themselves from it. They can make a meaningless public gesture that will no doubt meet the approval of the lunatic fringe who are trying to drive their agenda. I can see the arguments for doing so, and accept that people of good will may find them more convincing than I do, but I don't accept those arguments and remain suspicious of people who are actively promoting them.

But it isn't a "meaningless public gesture"; that's precisely my point. Public gestures may mean different things, based on whether they correspond to a reality or not, but they are, by definition, NEVER "meaningless."

More importantly, NCI has made exactly the WRONG public gesture by backing off on what was clearly flagged as an aggressively anti-griefer policy.

Except me, right???

If an action does not achieve the goal it is supposed to achieve, it is meaningless, worthless, useless, even destructive. If you want to fight over the word "meaningless" then substitute "useless", "ineffective", or "worthless" and come back from the top.

An aggressively anti-griefer policy that does not, in fact, do anything to deter griefers or prevent griefing? Backing off that kind of policy is EXACTLY the right thing to do. A lesson that I wish the US government (among others) would learn.

The action DOES achieve its goal: it makes a public statement about values. Whether or not these correspond to the reality is neither here nor there, in a sense. If public gestures, even untruthful ones, weren't meaningful, we wouldn't have politicians and companies making them all the time.

I have no idea whether or not Carl's policy would have made a "real" difference in the chances of getting griefed at or on account of NCI. I do know that, again, as an assertion of VALUES, it was an important statement. And that the decision to rescind this statement is an equally negative assertion.

And you didn't answer my real question.

Isn't helping newbies a public statement of values?

Isn't that enough? Isn't doing good enough of a statement? Do they also have to swear some sort of creed?

I don't understand why some of you are so eager to throw NCI away.

.

And how many griefers does that keep out of NCI's facilities?