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Of Harassment In The Dungeons & Dragons Community And Other Unpleasant Things

Today I stumbled upon an article by Jeff Rients in which he writes about a rather lengthy Medium post by Dr. Clio Belle Weisman, a psychotherapist and social research scientist. She did a long study about harassment in the D&D community and the focus of her work quickly became Zak Smith. As it turns out – at least according to her research – he was not the harasser but rather the victim. It also seems as if his ex-wife’s accusations of sexual assault were also unfounded. Unfortunately Dr. Weisman quickly removed her post from Medium, but fortunately it has been archived here.

The article is quite long and at times a bit hard to follow, but I think it’s well worth a read. I am still not 100% sure what to make of it. She makes a lot of good points especially when it comes to the harassment against Zak and the supposedly false accusations by his ex-wife Mandy. I was among the people who believed her.

I don’t think or rather I hope I wasn’t actually harassing anyone. I had my issues with Zak Smith and I was mostly taken aback by his rather unfriendly online personality which – at least to me – bordered on being abusive. So Mandy’s claims didn’t come across as impossible. If I ever engaged in any actions that came across as harassing, I do apologize sincerely. I sometimes get carried away, when I think I do the right thing, but I don’t want to be a harasser. Unlike some of the people Dr. Weisman interviewed, I know that this behaviour is wrong.

I think I’ll give the article at least a couple of more reads and let everything sink in. The one lesson I took with me from the article: take everything someone says on social media with a huge grain of salt. Even (or especially) if it was written by someone you consider good people.

That’s enough for today! Take care everyone!

UPDATE: Several people have pointed out to me that the article by Dr. Weisman contain direct falsehoods and misrepresentations. Perhaps that’s why the original article has been taken down so quickly. There’s also an interesting article on the Coins & Scrolls blog about Zak Smith’s lawsuits which includes links to the official court documents.

UPDATE #2: I have read the article by Dr. Weisman again and some things rub me the wrong way. Why would an associate professor of the University of Nevada write such an article in the first place? As far as I could find out it’s not her field of study and she has never posted on Medium before. I also don’t understand why it was important to her to include all the names. Wouldn’t have the article made the same impact – from a researcher’s perspective – if she used pseudonyms? The whole thing gets more bizarre the more I think about it.

One last thing: Harassment is wrong and we should take things on the internet with a grain of salt. And this includes posts like the one made by Dr. Weisman. I really hope someone can shine a light on this whole affair and explain what’s what.
Stargazer

Michael Wolf is a German games designer and enthusiast best known for his English language role-playing games blog, Stargazer's World, and for creating the free rules-light medieval fantasy adventure game Warrior, Rogue & Mage. He has also worked as an English translator on the German-language Dungeonslayers role-playing game and was part of its editorial team. In addition to his work on Warrior, Rogue & Mage and Dungeonslayers, he has created several self-published games and also performed layout services and published other independent role-playing games such as A Wanderer's Romance, Badass, and the Wyrm System derivative Resolute, Adventurer & Genius, all released through his imprint Stargazer Games. Professionally, he works as a video technician and information technologies specialist. Stargazer's World was started by Michael in August 2008.

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ekesleight

Yeah, it’s been clear that this is as serious a problem for the supposedly “progressive” wing of the TTRPG scene (and the Internet generally) for many years. Like:

– I started tuning out the “Fire Mike Mearls” hashtag after three separate failed attempts to find a shred of evidence to justify it.
– There were clearly people present and active in the mobbing of Adam Koebel and Brandon (sorry, I forget his surname, the Swordsfall guy) who were just there to troll and throw rotten fruit at the guy in the stocks, all while engaged in naked self-promotion (and neither person was perfect by a long shot, but the trolls made no pretext of interest in accountability, facts, or proportionality).
– The OGL “controversy” visibly attracted trolls and grifters, while there proved to be actual evidence for basically nothing in the article by Lin Codega that kicked it all off (they subsequently made a naked and obvious attempt to incite trolling against devs and streamers who attended the WOTC creators’ summit, implying that they had sold their integrity and independent opinions for a per diem and a hotel room, so… I don’t trust Lin Codega).
– In the broader cultural and political commentary sphere, the bad faith and viciousness I witnessed in the mobbing of Natalie Wynn and Lindsay Ellis was depressingly educational.
– It’s even manifest in what are meant to be political activist circles, with the followers of Bernie Sanders developing an entrenched reputation for lies, trolling and apparent delusion over the past half-decade.

If it’s the case that the abuse accusation against Zak S. are fiction, I did not know that. Unfortunately, and very regrettably, it wouldn’t be entirely surprising. Is the guy an abrasive dick who is perhaps not as smart as he imagines himself to be and has trouble engaging online conversations productively? Yes. Does that mean there’s an excuse for harassing and defaming him? No. It’s depressing that the article has to be available via an archived version, which rather illustrates the point the author is making.
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    Stargazer

    By the way, I posted a couple of updates. It seems that Dr. Weisman has made some interesting omissions and not everything she said is true. We should definitely take the article with a grain of salt. Maybe more than that.
    The article is still important. Regardless of whether anything claimed by the author is true or not, we should be reminded that online harassment is wrong and we should be very careful when it comes to believing anything written on the ‘net.
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      ekesleight

      She did some to be going pretty heavy in the paint on Zak’s behalf on a re-read. And I do notice that she misrepresents the outcomes of his various legal endeavors. So the updates make sense, thank you. (I also notice Zak turned up in Rients’ comment section, and… sigh. I feel like that dude will never fail to make people regret supporting him.)
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        ekesleight

        “She did some” s/b “She did seem”
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ekesleight

Oh, BTW, the link to Jeff’s article seems to be broken: https://jrients.blogspot.com/2024/01/egghead-reports-research-weirdos-pissed.html

Thanks again for posting this. It is interesting, albeit depressing.
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    Stargazer

    I fixed the link. Thanks for letting me know.

    And I fully agree, it IS depressing but interesting and I’d even dare to say important.
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king_serpent

Hello Stargazer, I am glad for your updates on the article. I was very confused because the internet has a common refrain of trying to whitewash bad actors, but it also has the issue of condemnation first and then never asking questions. I always worry that if I see a defense of bad actors that I have wandered into a certain gaming sphere subculture that is never healthy (I mean reactionary people). But I think based on this piece and the updates that you are empathetic to the subjects and the reality of the situation. I do think it is important for accountability and a sign that the perpetrator of abuse truly makes efforts to heal the harm, but it is important for a community, not the victim for clarity, to make pathways for restorative justice. That is just how I am thinking , in this moment and hope that it is logical and fair for a better community. I just worry that bad actors can use this frame to spread misinformation. It is tiring to look for the best and find solutions and then have bad actors try to manipulate these good intentions to further harm.
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