Originally Posted by
Transylvania Count
I'll summarize my points, and hopefully that'll get them across more effectively.
Ranting here will do nothing. It won't educate those who don't care to be educated. Those who care to be educated already understand that "no means no." A more effective solution is to block the offender and post about the experience in the ladies' forum, so others are warned.
We can go on unhinged rants about what should be, or we can learn to cope with what is. The hobby has been, is and will remain the same.
For those of you who care to read about an example of ineffective communication, read on. I grew up on the first floor of an apartment building. The hallway is enclosed because the winters are harsh in Transylvania. Even cars are kept in garages because of the cold weather. The hallway has two doors: one at the front which most people used, and one at the back used by the tenants to get to the detached garages behind that apartment building. One of the tenants who lived on the fifth floor never remembered to shut the door behind him and make sure it locks. Hobos would sneak into the hallway to spend the night and would leave behind trash and excrement. For those living on the top floors, this didn't matter at all. But for those of us living on the first floor, it mattered. My father (who was a teacher and absolutely should have known better) thought that the best way to handle it would be to yell at the tenant about shutting the door. It went about as well as you would expect. Nothing changed. My father started loudly slamming the door every time he found it open. We heard it and it was supremely annoying, but likely nobody above the second floor heard more than a muffled thud. The tenant on the fifth floor likely heard nothing and couldn't care less about it. No matter how many times my mother and us kids tried to convince my father that what he was doing was ineffective, he wouldn't listen. "See, the door was locked today! It's working!" (hint, hint). He died about ten years ago convinced his useless act of loudly slamming that door made a difference. In the end, the effective solution is a badge system on a door that automatically shuts and locks. So simple!
