As the song goes, "do you have the time to listen to me whine?"
So yeah, this post isn't about some grander world-wide issue, or politics, or anything, just a personal grievance that happened to me recently, which might come out as a bit whiny. Or a lot whiny. But heck, I created this blog to vent my frustrations.
Some months ago I was watching a Twitch stream. I'm not going to name any names, but this is one of the most prestigious, renowned and respected streamers on a particular field (which is where the "elitism" part comes in later), and I had been regularly following his streams for quite a long time (well over a year).
At one point people in the chat started talking about something related to American politics. Nothing too serious, heated or controversial, but a somewhat serious topic nevertheless. The streamer asked people to stop talking about politics. I was in the middle of writing something about the subject being talked about, and kind of sent it anyway, thinking that ok, the topic is going to stop now, but one more message wouldn't hurt. It was a very neutral and civil message explaining some situation, not even taking a stance or an opinion, and there was absolutely nothing inappropriate about the message (in terms of tone or being somehow controversial or provocative.)
A chat moderator gave me a 10-minute ban for that message. This annoyed me quite some, given how neutral my message had been. Sure, the streamer did ask for the politics topic to stop a few seconds prior, and I probably shouldn't have sent that message (and I was in fact fully intent to stop sending any more messages about that subject no matter what), but I still felt it was over-reaction from the part of that chat moderator.
I fully admit that I over-reacted a bit in return. Not in the sense that I would have written anything inappropriate, but I did make a small complaint about having received that 10-minute ban even though my message was completely civil and I said nothing inappropriate, and when the streamer supported the ban, I just left the stream and the chat (saying so). Yeah, it was quite a childish hissy-fit, but all I said before leaving was that I didn't say anything inappropriate.
Anyway, some months later I noticed that he was streaming again, and I discovered that I was permanently banned from the chat. Apparently I had been banned immediately after I had left. I sent a private message to one of the channel moderators (most probably not the same) asking why I was banned from the chat. This moderator contacted the streamer, and reported that the streamer's response was a simple "LOL". That both puzzled and annoyed me a bit. Could he really be so petty that not only does he ban me permanently from his chat due to my complaint, but he also just laughs at me when I ask for the reason?
Well, some months passed again (I think about six in total), and I was watching some other channel, when I noticed that he was also participating in that chat. (He was a channel moderator also there; which isn't surprising considering his status among that community.) I took the opportunity to tell him, in a completely civil manner, that "I have noticed that I'm permanently banned from your chat for some reason". He responded to me by simply writing "for some reason" in quotation marks (quite clearly denoting a degree of mockery.) I asked him, again in a completely civil manner, why. Was it because I complained about a temporary ban?
He said that the reason was because I had written "in all-caps" a whiny message about me "being an intelligent person", and said something about it having the same tone as incels.
That came completely out of the blue. I have never in my life written a single message in all-caps to any Twitch chat (much less to his channel), nothing of what I wrote to his chat had anything even remotely resembling what he claimed I had written, and I have no idea where that "incel" part came from, completely out of left field.
I told him that, and that he's probably confusing me with someone else. He repeatedly denied confusing me with someone else. I asked if he could quote exactly what I said. He claimed that he can't remember because it had been over a year. Once again I noted that he must be confusing me with somebody else because my ban didn't happen that long ago.
Apparently he has a log of all Twitch chat messages all the way back, and he went and checked it because I asked him what exactly I said. He said that he found the message... but only said that "it was 6 months ago; it felt longer than that." He also said "I'm still not unbanning you." He did not acknowledge in any way that he was completely mistaken about what I had exactly said (and about me using all-caps), either because of confusing me for somebody else, or completely misremembering what I had written.
Now, after that huge wall of text (I wonder if anybody is even reading this anymore), here's where the elitism part comes in:
As you might guess, this exchange had already been going on for quite a while, with quite many messages. On the chat of a streamer who had absolutely nothing to do with any of this. And there were also other channel moderators present.
When I once again asked him to explain precisely why I was banned, given that he had checked my messages and it had become clear that he was completely misremembering, he (as a channel moderator) deleted my message. And in Twitch chat, if a moderator deletes one message of some user, all of his previous messages get deleted too. Another moderator wrote to him something about he wanting to do that instead. Another moderator told me that "he already said he's not going to unban you" and told me to stop. Not surprisingly, all the other moderators were fully on his side, at least one of them even making light of me.
At this point the owner of this other stream we were watching (who, once again, had absolutely nothing to do with any of this) asked very politely if we could take this conversation somewhere else, and I immediately apologized to him, complied, and stopped.
Of course I couldn't help but to get a sour taste in my mouth. The respected, renowned, hugely famous streamer could just tell lies about me, didn't even have the guts to correct himself once he saw his own mistake, and everybody else obviously taking his side at all times, and I had absolutely no recourse. There's absolutely nothing I can do about it. (Sure, he can keep me banned from his personal chat all he wants, that's his prerogative, but I have absolutely no recourse against his distortions and incorrect claims. Nothing.) I couldn't even ask him to at least admit that I didn't write what he claimed I did, because the streamer we were watching had asked me to stop, and I didn't want to disrespect him any more, and I immediately complied.
And of course nobody of his fans and friends would probably ever believe of him being such a petty person (and even if they had all the details about this little incident, I'm 100% certain that they would still fully side with him, and mock me.) This is pure elitism, and there's no recourse against it.
So yeah, this post isn't about some grander world-wide issue, or politics, or anything, just a personal grievance that happened to me recently, which might come out as a bit whiny. Or a lot whiny. But heck, I created this blog to vent my frustrations.
Some months ago I was watching a Twitch stream. I'm not going to name any names, but this is one of the most prestigious, renowned and respected streamers on a particular field (which is where the "elitism" part comes in later), and I had been regularly following his streams for quite a long time (well over a year).
At one point people in the chat started talking about something related to American politics. Nothing too serious, heated or controversial, but a somewhat serious topic nevertheless. The streamer asked people to stop talking about politics. I was in the middle of writing something about the subject being talked about, and kind of sent it anyway, thinking that ok, the topic is going to stop now, but one more message wouldn't hurt. It was a very neutral and civil message explaining some situation, not even taking a stance or an opinion, and there was absolutely nothing inappropriate about the message (in terms of tone or being somehow controversial or provocative.)
A chat moderator gave me a 10-minute ban for that message. This annoyed me quite some, given how neutral my message had been. Sure, the streamer did ask for the politics topic to stop a few seconds prior, and I probably shouldn't have sent that message (and I was in fact fully intent to stop sending any more messages about that subject no matter what), but I still felt it was over-reaction from the part of that chat moderator.
I fully admit that I over-reacted a bit in return. Not in the sense that I would have written anything inappropriate, but I did make a small complaint about having received that 10-minute ban even though my message was completely civil and I said nothing inappropriate, and when the streamer supported the ban, I just left the stream and the chat (saying so). Yeah, it was quite a childish hissy-fit, but all I said before leaving was that I didn't say anything inappropriate.
Anyway, some months later I noticed that he was streaming again, and I discovered that I was permanently banned from the chat. Apparently I had been banned immediately after I had left. I sent a private message to one of the channel moderators (most probably not the same) asking why I was banned from the chat. This moderator contacted the streamer, and reported that the streamer's response was a simple "LOL". That both puzzled and annoyed me a bit. Could he really be so petty that not only does he ban me permanently from his chat due to my complaint, but he also just laughs at me when I ask for the reason?
Well, some months passed again (I think about six in total), and I was watching some other channel, when I noticed that he was also participating in that chat. (He was a channel moderator also there; which isn't surprising considering his status among that community.) I took the opportunity to tell him, in a completely civil manner, that "I have noticed that I'm permanently banned from your chat for some reason". He responded to me by simply writing "for some reason" in quotation marks (quite clearly denoting a degree of mockery.) I asked him, again in a completely civil manner, why. Was it because I complained about a temporary ban?
He said that the reason was because I had written "in all-caps" a whiny message about me "being an intelligent person", and said something about it having the same tone as incels.
That came completely out of the blue. I have never in my life written a single message in all-caps to any Twitch chat (much less to his channel), nothing of what I wrote to his chat had anything even remotely resembling what he claimed I had written, and I have no idea where that "incel" part came from, completely out of left field.
I told him that, and that he's probably confusing me with someone else. He repeatedly denied confusing me with someone else. I asked if he could quote exactly what I said. He claimed that he can't remember because it had been over a year. Once again I noted that he must be confusing me with somebody else because my ban didn't happen that long ago.
Apparently he has a log of all Twitch chat messages all the way back, and he went and checked it because I asked him what exactly I said. He said that he found the message... but only said that "it was 6 months ago; it felt longer than that." He also said "I'm still not unbanning you." He did not acknowledge in any way that he was completely mistaken about what I had exactly said (and about me using all-caps), either because of confusing me for somebody else, or completely misremembering what I had written.
Now, after that huge wall of text (I wonder if anybody is even reading this anymore), here's where the elitism part comes in:
As you might guess, this exchange had already been going on for quite a while, with quite many messages. On the chat of a streamer who had absolutely nothing to do with any of this. And there were also other channel moderators present.
When I once again asked him to explain precisely why I was banned, given that he had checked my messages and it had become clear that he was completely misremembering, he (as a channel moderator) deleted my message. And in Twitch chat, if a moderator deletes one message of some user, all of his previous messages get deleted too. Another moderator wrote to him something about he wanting to do that instead. Another moderator told me that "he already said he's not going to unban you" and told me to stop. Not surprisingly, all the other moderators were fully on his side, at least one of them even making light of me.
At this point the owner of this other stream we were watching (who, once again, had absolutely nothing to do with any of this) asked very politely if we could take this conversation somewhere else, and I immediately apologized to him, complied, and stopped.
Of course I couldn't help but to get a sour taste in my mouth. The respected, renowned, hugely famous streamer could just tell lies about me, didn't even have the guts to correct himself once he saw his own mistake, and everybody else obviously taking his side at all times, and I had absolutely no recourse. There's absolutely nothing I can do about it. (Sure, he can keep me banned from his personal chat all he wants, that's his prerogative, but I have absolutely no recourse against his distortions and incorrect claims. Nothing.) I couldn't even ask him to at least admit that I didn't write what he claimed I did, because the streamer we were watching had asked me to stop, and I didn't want to disrespect him any more, and I immediately complied.
And of course nobody of his fans and friends would probably ever believe of him being such a petty person (and even if they had all the details about this little incident, I'm 100% certain that they would still fully side with him, and mock me.) This is pure elitism, and there's no recourse against it.
I encountered a FAQ once. It was for a game I know a lot about. I noticed some mistakes in it. So I checked all of it and sent all corrections to him. He then said that he literally stole the information X being discussed in his FAQ from another FAQ entirely and said "[target times] which are off with only a few hundredths can't be wrong" and that it was because I used an emulator to quickly check them, claiming it's "an emulator glitch". (What.) It's like people haven't just documented them wrong under any circumstance? He only fixed them major mistakes and left the small ones be until "more proof". Damnit, the guy himself plays the VERY version those times in his FAQ are for (NTSC/U) so he could easily check them too. But nope. Some people.
ReplyDeleteTL;DR: Guy literally steals info from another FAQ which is partly wrong, refuses corrections due to an "emulator glitch" because corrector used one, also refuses to check them himself.