Roboticphish Announces Harassment Task Force

In response to the Super Smash Bros. community's history with harassment, Josh "Roboticphish" Kassel, the project manager behind the MIOM ruleset panel, has announced the formation of a task force aimed at curbing harassment in the community.

The panel consists of nine voting members. Roboticphish has opted to take on a non-voting organizational role, due to his own past history with harassment in the community, though he will serve as a tie breaker should one occur due to members of the task force not voting on a decision. The task force consists of:

• Emily "Emilywaves" Sun
• Sheridan "Dr. Z" Zalewski
• Daniel "Tafokints" Lee
• Chuck "Mudkyp" Vigus
• John "SleepyK" Lee
• Kelly "Kupo" Goodchild
• Kyle "Dr. Piggy" Nolla
• Alan "Alan" Moore
• Alex "SweetDee" Grove

Based on the members of the panel and the fact that it was spun off from the MIOM ruleset panel, it will likely be focused primarily on the Super Smash Bros. Melee community.

When asked on twitter about the catalyst for forming this task force, Roboticphish discussed his own past harassment towards members of the community and the process of learning and improving as a person afterwards. He also mentioned that Emilywaves was the one who originally proposed the idea of the task force, explaining that "she deserves the majority of the credit of fighting against this issue; she was doing it long before I could even admit there was a problem."

For more information about the formation of the task force and the rationale behind it, be sure to check out Roboticphish's original thread.

 

As long as they can draw a clear line between banter and actual harassment, then I can see this being worth-while. I feel like banter is part of what keeps a scene alive, but then again, as games like Melee (and potentially other Smash games) are making their way towards TV stations (they are, right? i'm not just hallucinating?), I can see why there's a need for a clearer set of rules and whatnot. Not just to make a community more open, but also to even be on the air and have advertisers.
I also took a look at Bones0's post on the thread linked, and I really like that too. Perhaps the task force can help appoint people at a more local level, making sort of a "web" effect, I guess? Besides, I honestly doubt 9 people can do everything on a case-by-case basis for the entirety of the Melee community/Smash community in general, and having more local people could mean that there would be an easier time doing cases instead of it being full-on black & white.

 

Good. This was much needed.

I hope they can have more administrative power over events and TOs than the 25.

 

the name sounds like a fanmade power rangers series

 

Haven't signed into this forum in ages (got 10 years member trophy lol) but I saw this and had to comment.

There needs to be examples made of people. I'm a betting man and I'd say the smart money is on the vast majority of infringements just getting ignored because they weren't serious enough to warrant actual action where the bar for what is 'serious' enough is forever one notch higher than any given misconduct. Remember, "The standard that you walk past is the standard that you set." This is also ripe for abuse of 'top player privilege.' I think what you guys are doing is great, I don't however have faith that you will actually make the hard decisions and put down punishments.

In all of the time I ever played smash, the biggest trolls and abusers have always been high ranking players who act as if the fact that they are good at the game gives them a license to harass, mock and tease anyone who can't beat them in smash. Examples need to be made of people, that's a cold hard fact. Friends of high-ranked players accused of misconduct will revolt against TO's that accuse people of violating the rules and the TO's will eventually agree with them because the backing you give them will be superficial.

Change my mind*

*By actually doing what you say.

 

This is a good move. Melee scene is toxic af.

 

Ha ha ha... Cannot say I never saw this coming with all of the arbitration. As far as I am aware, all of this BS started with DaShizWiz (oh no, he was violent, that means he is going to come and commit mass battery if we do not arbitrarily ban him). In serious cases, it is just best to let the police handle it over incompetent smashers. This is some weird pseudo-vigilante nonsense and we all know it. Whatever, common sense was never really that common if we banned Leffen for "being mean." Lmfao, I cannot even...

 

I hope this doesn't end up like Bully Hunters