Hi everyone!
Just got my account validated and I thought about poppin in to say hello to you folks.
I was a Gaf lurker in 2012~'17, before creating an account on RE after the big exodus. Era has then been my post-work chill place to discuss and get news about one of my favorite hobbies, like I'm sure most of us do.
Well, I haven't been very active for the past year - during multiple lockdowns, of all times - as the climate has become more and more.. bizarre. Never knowing what the boundaries are, one assumes "well, let's just be polite and respectful as usual" thinking that would suffice, but it's so hard to coexist in a place with such strong influences, clear biases and dogmatic rules - explicit or less so. This even without taking into account their extremely weird moderation trends, where one can get banned just for expressing concerns that go against the grain: doesn't matter how respectfully, logically or according to the TOS one acts, their logic bends with the hivemind. Neutral points of view get you banned, it's a mind bending proposition.
I'm an European leftist, always been, and I was incredibly happy to see the stance taken by the Trans community over there in front of dubious actions from CDPR over CP77's development but even that got sour.
As valid as their concerns are, a community should never be in a position to dictate what a neutral individual should think, or say. I voiced my support for their cause in their thread multiple times but their continuous lashes towards neutral posters in the hype thread kept coming across as extremely wrong, especially after they started considering everyone that was just there to merely talk about the game as transphobe.
Then fast forward today with the whole thing blowing up and honestly, enough of that.
"Freedom of thought" is just not there.
So yeah, I'm looking forward to get into this community with you dirty bunch without worrying about the Gestapo