What is a PCU?

Argent Dawn
667

i nearly choked over this one, thank you

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668

That is… Not catboy community, that is Limsa coomer community. I’m sorry your experience was like that :frowning:
Also I hope you reported the unsolicited PMs too, they crack down on those hard

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669

I think Styg is just LARPing as a tough guy so he can be recast as Brad Pitt in the Snatch remake.

Actually yeah, there’s an idea @Styg. Post your caravan to prove you aren’t lying about your ethnicity.

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670

Sometimes I wish instead of “Dust Devils” I’d called my guild “PCU”* then I could pretend I’m running the most talked about roleplay on the forums.

(*It stands for “Perky Cowgirl Undead”)

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671

my brother in christ you spent the entire day arguing with valteryl, you were not busy.

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672

He has a BBQ though.

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673

I am a very busy person actually… well, kind of. It’s complicated

674

Now that is a tag I could get behind.

675

Here I thought it meant Peanut Consumers Unite. I thought they just liked peanuts alot :frowning:

676

You’ve been at it all day buddy. Quoting snippets and replying to every little post that people make. Y’ain’t been busy fella.

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677

To those who flagged my previous post.

I’m sorry for hurting those fragile fee-fees.

Perhaps don’t tar people with the same brush, Mm?

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678

Only at 9 am.

679

arguing with everyone on the forums doesn’t count as busy

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680

And yet the PCU seem to use it as barometer for their activity :smiley:

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681

And yet you seem to want to keep posting on a level 10 without adding anything of worth.

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682

Just not worth to you or the other trolls.

683

So… Stop replying?
Or are you just that incredibly bored you feel the compelling urge to post pointless :poop: ?

684

This is a very un-spiritual post.

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685

Cope and seethe.

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686

Unironically tomorrow I am going to a BBQ and will leave home at 8.30AM.

What I see as the main problem is a pervasive, community-centric and toxic attitude. Where by toxic I mean an attitude that goes at the detriment of the receiver (in this case, non-affiliate members of the community) and that is practiced without interest or care to improve (you, imo, are the only one who made an effort to consider my perspective), and has the tendency to belittle or harm the other party. These are, in general, maladaptive attitudes that do harm the larger community as a whole.

By community-centric I mean an attitude focused on one’s sense of belonging to that community, which has the tendency to dismiss, misunderstand or inaccurately assume other people’s problems whenever they do not align with the community’s problems.

These attitudes are pervasive, in that it is seen as normal that members of the PCU engage in them, with members and officers alike promoting or turning a blind eye to this stuff.

This not only prevents dialogue but fundamentally denies a right to mutual growth. It destroys, over time, the possibility of an area where communities/guilds can share experiences which enrich one another. It’s a distress call that should be listened to. And when it is not, it fragments the community - and now, it already has.

My suggestions might not work for everybody else but if you ask me to think about what solutions could be implemented, then this is what I would say:

1. Listen to understand, not to win.

When it comes to PCU interactions, I’ve seen a few times people trying to communicate and voice their distress, only to find out that they met a wall. People going “Okay, this is enough, stop it” or going “I am not comfortable with this” would receive something along the lines of: “What? I am just asking questions!” or “Sounds like a you problem, we just role-play”, or “Yes but I don’t care about it, I am still going my way because I enjoy it more”. This is an approach that nullifies people’s feedback. This has happened so many times I can’t even count. And this is likely connected to why a lot of people don’t like the PCU. It is not just rumours; it is seeing a lot of times that people in discomfort were completely ignored or belittled.

What I am trying to say is: build a dialogue as a way to meet each other along the way, otherwise a lot of people in the community will just move in the other direction. My suggestion would be to understand more the feedback given by the community at large. If there are people saying: “This doesn’t make me comfortable.” That is likely a diplomatic way of giving out a warning. If the reply (by your community leader, nonetheless) is: “Good, that is based. I don’t think what others say or do matters; I care only about what I like/my community.” then any attempt to build a genuine bridge has collapsed in that very moment. And others members of the community will see that. Word will spread.

I think this happens all the time and often degenerates into bullyism, gaslighting, and other shenanigans. On the Horde and beyond, I can think of many situations where this did happen. Being transparent is part of this bit, I would say.

2. It should not be about control.

In the past some people that I know of have been subjected to bullyism and harassment from the Rotgarde and associated guilds even when they had done nothing wrong – and their only fault was that they had, say, a friend on skype that the RG happened to dislike.

These kinds of tactics, perhaps, were implemented in the stygian legion as similar situations may have occurred again against other members of the community, and have been refined and transformed, and eventually became the PCU’s attempt to police the server to grant quality RP, which more often than not ends up in drama, witch hunts and the like. “Unleashing the pack” as a member called it once. To me, a lot of the “anti-ERP action”, “anti-OOC action” feel like an attempt to stir up drama and control the server, and often an excuse/weapon for harassing others (Nietzsche used to say that people feel pleasure in hurting others, and I believe this is something that some members of the PCU have incorporated in their mentality).

While they may, on occasion, have a point (ie. Goldshire is a serious issue and Blizzard should do something about it) a lot of situations end up being petty, repulsive, and flat out acts of bullyism against innocent people.

Point 1-2 are kind of connected, as a more empathic and genuine dialogue would be for the best.

3. Holding members accountable for harassing others.

In any other community that’s a big no-no, and yet it is entirely accepted and even supported by the officers. I think it would be best if these people would actually get a warning and/or a kick, rather than have some officers backing them up.

4. Be open to negotiate different interests / When interacting with others, multiple approaches might be necessary.

Again, it is kind of similar to point 1, but I think it goes the longer way. It is kind of self-explanatory. It is about not just seeing their point, but trying to find a solution that can appeal to both, when such can be found. I can’t help but think that a lot of drama around, say, a certain group claiming a building and a guild of the PCU being uncaring of that group’s conventions could have been avoided entirely by adopting a less cold approach to the situation. Surely there’s a good chance that both groups would have had a less sour experience in their heads by now.

Same goes for another interaction with a group of non-loyalists, where no organization was made for the situation, and it did come across as an attempt to hurt others not only ICly, but OOCly too.

5. Remove the P from the PCU.

It’s clearly not needed to further the community’s health and due to his mixed reputation, many associate him with a bad-faith actor.

I myself do think that a certain night elf’s words were kind of true, not only because Perroy’s story about his name is a rip-off of groups such as Dadaists, but also because people from the PCU have always been really eager to call names, whereas in the story it was always “some bad guys” who came up with the name and he’d later adopt it (and also, even if true, that story wouldn’t mean that the name isn’t narcissistic and an attempt at further recognition – it still might be).

Besides, as far as I recall, a lot of the people who disagreed with the PCU did call them the stygians at the time, because most disliked the term PCU – and eventually had to adopt it only later on, when more guilds branched off from the loyalist archetype.

6. No double standards for role-play.

Questioning someone for their character concept when your guild host a very, very similar concept is just a big no-no. Again, it perpetrates the idea that some people in the PCU don’t really care whether or not others enjoy their role-play, but that it is all about them. They have to be more special, more unique - and the others can either join them and be part of the special club, or be denied such (bonus points if that person is also harassed in-game for a quite harmless character concept).

Note:
I know a lot of people from the PCU won’t like what I have to say - and are free to disagree with it. But this is what I think, what I told back then, and what I am repeating now (with the addition of point 5). Feel free to go wild.

I naturally know that not everyone is guilty of these things. I do think a lot of people on the PCU just want to role-play, and don’t care one bit about all of this stuff. I am inclined to think that the likes of Distantpeak are really good guys, and just want to chill. And you too, Marus.
Also I purposefully removed any name from the episodes that I mentioned. A lot of people might not want to go through these experiences again, and it may be better not to poke at them when, most likely, they just want to move on. People are free to ask for my discord and I will provide them the pictures/links to these topics.

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