Beketov

And if there’s an issue like that we’ll talk to the offender privately but I don’t think we need to go into the etymology of most words to establish their meaning. I have to assume our members have enough common sense to recognize when their words could come off as harmful.

As I said in the OP context will be taken into consideration. We’re not going to immediately punish someone for uttering a word but we are obviously going to look at the context it was used in to help decide. For example, a GM saying “well that’s gay” after they lost the cup final clearly does not mean “that’s cheery” and everyone involved knows it. Just as saying gay when discussing homosexuality isn’t automatically a bad thing because obviously the context of the conversation calls for it. We aren’t censoring words and saying “these ones can be used, these ones can’t” but we all understand context so the argument that a word could have different meanings when 1 particular meaning was obviously meant doesn’t hold a lot of weight.

You’re a member like anyone else, you’re more than welcome to voice your opinion and offer examples, even if they don’t come from here.

Obviously you are supposed to be keep an eye on your players to not have them go to FA on you though. In any case I already said it’s fine so there’s no need for us to get into anything over this.

You’ve got the banked so if you’d rather I just revoke that and you earn no more this week that’s fine.

We both know you’re being ridiculous to prove a point and it’s not working so this conversation is over.

Stupid means stupid, that’s literally the definitely of the word. Using gay as a synonym for stupid is basically saying all homosexuals are stupid because what they are is a synonym for stupid. You see the issue?

I mean yeah but someone’s gotta try haha

Everyone was told to stand down and let us handle things, instead some members decided to throw fuel into the fire. It’s not for comments made in the SBA, it’s for ignoring warnings that pushing the subject with them, which would only make things harder for us, would be punished. There are people who made comments over there and were not punished because it isn’t about simply making comments. People were welcome to voice their displeasure in a respectful way and have a conversation about this but running in guns blazing and “raiding” the place with comments intentionally designed to be attacking (combined with making light of the situation here) did nothing to help ease the situation. All it did was prove the point people were apparently trying to fight against. These punishments are minor ones. Hopefully everyone can learn from them and we won’t need anything more major.

Pretending everything is the same doesn’t help solve any problem. If someone calling you thick actually upsets you that’s fine, bring it up, but let’s be clear that this is far more trying to prove your point than anything is it not? Acting like any personal insult is the same as a slur that marginalizes an entire group of people won’t fix the problem. Not everything is equal. Maybe I’m reading it wrong though, maybe that actually bothered you (would be surprising since I’ve seen you shrug off far worse) and if so then you can come talk to me about it. Even if you did not see my multiple warnings in the discord I repeatedly told members in the very thread that you commented in to stand down. I know you like to voice your opinion but there was no reason to add fuel to an already volatile. situation.

Embrace your job as Thompson 2.0

VHL Draft date added!

We actually did allow @Higgins to do it once given special circumstances. This is fine to fall under the same since Bush was away for a death in the family. Though given that the rule does exist I would have preferred if he clarified that he could with us first.

Stick to that second paragraph and you’ll be fine, just don’t push your luck with that first one. You said yourself the VHL of old was vile and pushed people away. If it takes some formalizes rules to fix that then I have no issue writing them. This also is not all about a single comment. As others have said the problem runs much deeper than that.

Pasted that part from our other discussion and forgot to fix the formatting, oh well.

Welcome to the VHL, NotAlexF! We're happy to have you. You should have received a PM with some more detailed information, but to get started quickly you will want to head over to the "How to Create a Player" topic. That topic will offer you detailed information about how to use the VHL Portal to create your player and get you started. We also highly recommend joining the VHL Discord where there is a channel dedicated to helping new members with any questions that they may have about the league or improving their player. Once your player is made VHLM General Managers will be in touch with you about joining their teams. In the meantime, please feel free to ask any questions you have here or in your create-a-player thread. We're happy to have you in the community and we hope you stick around!

The 12 wasn’t specifically discussed but in the meantime while we look at it specifically I’ll say that it falls under the rest of it and it’s fine. We’ll formally accept all old methods of affiliation with the SBA. If they choose not to reciprocate that’s fine and their choice.

Warnings will generally be a first step except for very severe infractions. We are not aiming to ban members over this but will if we have to. As a general rule the advice is rather simple: don’t use terms that are derogatory towards certain groups. It’s pretty simple advice ultimately.

VHL Code of Conduct Policy @Members Recent events within the league have made it clear that the VHL, both historically and currently, has been running far too much of a "Laissez faire" approach in regards to policing the use of insensitive slurs and other language. Not everyone in the league will obviously agree with how these events went down but the point remains that our approach has simply been too relaxed and things have gone too far without the administration necessarily realizing it. This is not simply in relation to the board, or the discord, or any members in particular but is a wide spread problem across multiple areas of the site and it's due time something is done about it. Ultimately the VHL was founded in an interesting time for the internet, 2007. It was a different place back then, a rather toxic place if we are being honest. However it is not 2007 anymore. The kind of words we have seen weren't acceptable (but perhaps more tolerated) back then and they certainly aren't now. To give a few examples, though they should hardly be necessary, using words like gay or retarded as synonyms of stupid is ridiculous and long past its expiration point. This isn't about censoring your posts, being Social justice warriors, or arguing about meaning of words changing over time but rather about the league being inclusive to all its members and potential members. With that in mind, moving forward, the league shall be more proactive in avoiding these types of slurs. Staff using them will be treated more severely for obviously reasons but from the top down we expect to see uses reduced and will be punishing those who do not wish to comply or clearly skirt the rules when looked at in context. Punishment will be determined by the blue team on a case by case basis but can include: • Warnings • Removal of job positions on the site • Temporary or permanent suspensions from discord, the forum, or both • PT Bans, both full and partial Punishment will depend on how severe and how frequent the offences occur and will be made more severe for repeat offenders. It is not a matter of wanting to ban members for this sort of thing but we will if we have to. Quite frankly it's an easy thing to avoid and isn't something that should be a problem in 2019. We will be leaning on our mod team as well as the BOG and general member base to make sure that people who are using insensitive language towards others or groups; whether intentionally targeted or otherwise, are punished accordingly for it. In addition we will be subdividing the Discord better to hopefully spread discussion from general and make it easier to watch for things. In this vein we will also be doing a search at the end of the week of discord and the forums for key words and phrases to keep an eye on things. In general things will fall under the guise of our already in place rules regarding Drama, Fighting, and trolling but with special attention paid to people making claims in general instead of specifically targeted. Our aim, as I said, is not to censor but to make the VHL a welcoming place for everyone. Obviously this did all stem from an event as I alluded to and there are certain members who shall be receiving punishments for their involvement in that event. The league recognizes that, while these rules were not in place at the time, members were warned to not provoke any further action and to stand down. Instead of doing so several members took matters in their own hands and made an already complex situation far worse for themselves and for the league. For their part in all this the following members shall receive the following punishments: @Josh: 1 week PT ban (as in max cap is 6/12) @Banackock: 1 week Update ban @DilIsPickle: 1 week Update ban @Nykonax: 1 week Update ban @jRuutu: 1 week PT ban (as in max cap is 6/12) @Matt_O: 1 week PT ban (as in max cap is 6/12) I know you guys likely won’t be happy about these but it’s what we deem fair given the situation that was either caused or exacerbated by your behaviour. It is our hope that these punishments are the only ones we require in the subject. Given that it’s Thursday and the cap has already likely been hit for you guys the punishments will be served next week. It is our sincere hope that the VHL can move on past our old behaviour and into a brighter, more welcoming era. We hope you can all understand that this is not an attack on your rights as members but simply a policy to make sure that your right to speech does not infringe upon the rights over others to enjoy the league. Re: SBA Affiliation In addition to the above code of conduct the league would like to make a mention of the SBA affiliation which was recently dropped because of the above mentioned issues. The league has been in talks with the BoD of the SBA but is not making this code of conduct simply to appease them or to get back the affiliation. If things improve and those discussions do continue on the right path it may happen some day but that is not our main goal and is out of our hands. However we do recognize that stopping SBA affiliation claims on our end, which was done while we sorted things out, is unnecessary and does negatively impact some of our players. For this reason, regardless of our affiliation coming back or not, and to alleviate the concerns of 90% of the population about how their dual membership of the VHL and SBA will be affected, we will continue recognizing SBA PTs as valid VHL PTs in line with previous affiliation agreements. Our updaters were told to put a hold on, not deny, any claims made while the affiliation welfare was down and they have also been instructed to approve back claimed ones for this past week if the PT week was missed by dual membership members. Sincerely, @Commissioner @BOG

@emidas has assured me, and I have no reason to believe he’s lying, that the “monitoring” comment was made off-hand with no proof. There has not been any long term monitoring. And yes, Hill House is full of ghostly Easter eggs.

I’m in. Also, morbid curiosity, did anyone tell you to run this this year? I told @rjfryman he could do it.

Hey now, I said they were both good options. And also I think my 122 points and 60 goals kinda proved it did work for me haha

Not that I have a stake in this but if I were in your shoes @oilmandan I’d be looking at how last season went. Your build is very similar to Thompson’s and Malmo’s passing core hasn’t changed. If it worked for me.... Mind you I also loved my time in Seattle, minus that @Banackock and I are cursed to never win a cup together, so both are solid options.

whichever way you want to look at it the point is that I don’t think it was most people saying ADV did infinitely more to deserve it. Was moreso just a minor bit of difference between the two and a lot of people leaned a particular way. same type of deal with the Boulet really. The numbers alone make it look like Borwinn was the absolutely dominant winner when most of the conversation was very split with people just slightly leaning Borwinn, myself included.