I started my own discord server for Final Fantasy 14 stuff. Originally, it was a place for me and a small group of people to go in order to get away from a space that we shared with someone none of us liked and that kept dropping in when we’d hang out in one of the voice chats. They are close friends with one of the officers, who enables their terrible behavior (odious perosnality traits, not something actively harming other people by any means other than annoyance), so we didn’t really have a way to address the problem without causing a bigger problem in the discord. When we all realized that we’d rather stop hanging out with each other than continue to spend time with this person, I turned my idle musing about creating a discord server for my Final Fantasy 14 crafting workshop into a reality. They’re easy to make and, since it was just the four (and then five) of us, there didn’t really need to be much to the discord. Eventually, though, I started using it for other reasons, to handle alternate characters, my FC for said alts, and then as a safe place for a small selection of poeple to gather in private. Once that happened, I started building out the server a bit more, with roles and hidden channels and various pieces of infrastructure as I realized that this was quickly turning from a place for me and a handful of my friends into a small community space. Now, while I still keep the invitations locked down to just myself and single-use only, I am not necessarily super familiar with everyone in the server now. Which is how a lot of internet communities work, regardless of their size, but I am trying to keep it small enough that I can actually get to know people and better manage the community as a result.

So now, this community I’ve taken to calling “The Haunt” (because I named it something that abbreviated to WFH–[My Character’s Name]’s FF14 Haunt–when I expanded it to include other people solely because I thought it would be funny) is full of people I’m currently calling “Ghosties” for obvious reasons, has been slowly settling in over the last couple weeks of its life. I’ve had a few serious discussions about the people that this place was originally a retreat for, in regards to what kind of management they can expect from me, I’ve figured out how to set role permissions in such a way that everyone can only see specific channels if they have specific roles, and I’ve now had my first group events, complete with a situation that I am going to have to talk to someone about. Because that’s the thing about running even a small internet community. If you’re the one running it, managing it, making sure people feel comfortable and safe, and setting the tone for the entire group is your responsibility. It is one I also take very seriously since I’ve had a front row seat to how Twitter became a “Nazi bar” called “X” and the dissolution of so many other internet spaces as a result of a refusal to turn shitty people away. Thankfully, so far, no one has done anything that has required me to put them in Time Out so we can talk about their behavior, much less eject them from the discord, but I am still a little bit nervous and tense about some of the people I do not know very well. To put it simply, I detest “Pepe” memes and am willing to write them out of existence thanks to their identification as a hate symbol in specific contexts (though there have been a lot of insidous efforts to whitewash the hateful ones since then that muddies the waters quite a bit) and their wide adoption by the alt-right and various racist, sexist, fascist, and generally hateful communities. Of course, every use of a “pepe” meme or emote is a dogwhistle, just like the phrase “frens” isn’t always a dogwhistle, and I should allow people to not know things unless I catch them sharing or using any particularly racist or hateful ones.

Which I unfortunately have. One particular emote caught my attention the other night and I finally managed to track down why. It is a “plausibly deniable” reference to an antisemitic caricature that feels incredibly plain when you know what to look for (and while it has been a while since I refreshed myself on my dogwhistles and stand-in symbols, I still remember most of them well enough to know something’s off when I see one), but the way that wide usage strips context on the internet means that it is entirely possible that this person did not know. Thankfully, they were willing to accept my request to avoid using it in my discord and further asked to be told if they wind up using any others that have similar offensive relationships to hate symbols or stereotypes, so I am hopeful that this matter is resolved for the time being. If they keep using it or somehow just happen to wind up using new dogwhistle emotes every time I call them on one, then it will become a more serious conversation, but I doubt it will come to that. They don’t seem like a bad person, just someone who is a particular type of “too online” that has some unfortunate crossovers with alt-right and neo-nazi online groups (gamergate really did a number on most online communities built around video games). Now all that’s left is to have a frank but hopefully relaxed conversation with another person whose constant panic during a raid event I was running made it difficult for people to hear my callouts and put several people on edge/the verge of panic because even the most routine stuff caused this person to react with alarm and loud anxious energy.

This is what I signed up for. As much as I dislike conflict and want to make friends, not lose them, I am perhaps one of the more brutal people in most of my social circles when it comes to not taking this kind of stuff. One of my friends absolutely will argue and take issue with things before I would, but I am much faster and willing to cut someone loose if I don’t think they’re a good fit. I will attempt to remain friends so long as their behavior didn’t cross a line, but I will do it to anyone who is creating an uncomfortable environment. I take this duty and responsibility very seriously, and will make myself out to be the villain if I must, but my rules about my space and the kind of environment I’m trying to create where very clear that I will not stand for pushing the line or intentional boundary pushing. I’ve had enough boundaries pushed to last me a life time and have gotten very good at setting them clearly and in a way that leaves final interpretation of the results up to me. I’ve also had a lot of practice following through on pushing people out when they repeatedly violate the boundaries I’ve drawn. After all, if I was willing to do it to my parents, why would I hesitate to do it to some poeple I’ve known for a few months in an online capacity? It doesn’t need to be personal when it happens, but I can’t control whether or not the other person takes it personally. All I can do is explain, offer a chance to learn and grow, and then follow through on what I said would happen when something eventually happens. I’m not going to let this place become toxic or admit even one person who I would rather end a hangout to avoid than put up with so I can keep spending time with my friends. I’m not letting this place become a graveyard like so many others have.