this is where i stand on how i view the entire forum now.

hello. ^^

my name is Ryuuoutan. i am a forum member who's joined way back in 2009, still as into Cave Story as i always have been. this introduction is more for the many newer users that are here now. anyways, i'm making this thread because i wanted to share my feelings.

does anyone remember a thread creation that S.P. Gardebiter made 10 years ago announcing what he felt about the forums? i remember it very vividly, even when it was first created. well, now, i wanna say, i can relate to what he was saying at the time, even if you may not think much of it now by the way, Gardebiter o-o.

so, my view of people has changed especially within the past two years. even on these forums. i remember my first year or two being on this forum, i may have done some rash things particularly towards people that were innocent and didn't deserve what i sent towards them at all. regardless of that, a good chunk of the older users disliked me and didn't want anything to do with me. i'm sure they still feel that way now. on that part, i just want to say now? that is your problem, not mine. i see that this forum has a ton of new users that are much more friendlier than what i've seen when i joined here. i'm very happy about that. but at the same time, i noticed the last time i interacted with these older users, which was in about 2016, while i may have continued to act rather ridiculous, they still didn't like me. honestly, i don't like you either. and i don't care anymore. by the way, this is not an announcement of me formally leaving the forum. i have never done that and i never plan to. i really love Cave Story and i enjoy making something out of my own with it, and i do love to share the experience and creativity i develop with other people. but i will speak honestly on this. if you people prefer to oppress me over and over again, regardless of how i may turn out, then of course i will not hesitate to oppress you as well. even if you're a moderator here, or administrator, i don't have to put up with the disrespect you give me if i feel it's unnecessary. if you don't like it, welp, that's nice. if you're not, the same applies. i really want to continue my mod of Touhou Story here and finish it so that i can enjoy it to the fullest extent, and so that everyone else can too, and by the way i've been working on it every now and then, even in 2016, even in 2018, even in 2020. but it's hard for me to actually do something on it now since i have to think about coming back to these forums and it de-motivates me to work on it a lot more often as i know i don't exactly have the best reputation here.

i am still willing to work alongside anyone with the Cave Story works i want to make and still plan to make in the future. that means, anyone. i am willing to take in new ideas, perhaps even collab. but don't think if my presence irritates you that i extend such a relationship to friendship. you haven't earned my trust on a personal level. i have nothing to be excited about with you. i am not happy to see you. but if it means that i can get to do the things i love by talking to you, then i will make that exception. i will not act genuinely friendly to you though. also, to those who have a problem with me using emoticons so often? well, i'm gonna keep doing it. if i want to, i'll continue to do so. if it means getting banned off Discord, if it means getting banned off here, welp. do it. i'm not sorry for how i express myself. :\ you can't make me feel sorry, and i have never felt sorry. and i never will. i'd rather have a friendly, open-minded aura to me rather than a judgmental shtick, but not everyone even deserves that part of me. i see the forum hasn't changed too much, either. while things have gotten friendlier with the newer users coming in, i see some people are still wanting to leave. well, why am i not so surprised? in any case, if you don't like me, don't like me. i don't change myself for anyone, okay? and i will continue to stick around here as much as I can, i won't be pressured by anyone here to formally leave. if i do get banned, well, i'll move on. this isn't the only place where i can share my creations, anyway, i know that for sure :]

if anyone here does understand where i'm coming from on this wall of text, well, i'd be more than happy to be friends with you personally if you have a heart. but the ones that don't understand, you have earned none of my genuine respect, and now? it's going to be incredibly difficult to step your way up there. not that everyone will want to, but i encourage you to keep it that way then. i'm not going to argue much about this at this time, but i may reply here every now and then.

i am much more understanding now of what Gardebiter said back then. i'm so sorry he felt how he did about the forums, and by the way Gardebiter, i always appreciated how you defended my name there, i do respect you well for sure ^_^



Ryuuoutan

 

Oh, hey Ryuuotan. We never really interacted, but I've heard about you from others, and I remember you briefly popping back in a bunch of times over the last 10 years. I sure do remember that thread that S.P. Gardebiter created. I've read through that thread many times. That thread was before my time, but it was relatively soon before I joined, and by the time that I did come along, the forum culture hadn't really changed much. It wasn't really until about 2014 that I noticed the tide turning, and by about 2017, I'd say the attitude of this community had significantly changed for the better. Although S.P. Gardebiter did bring up a lot of good points in that thread, it always seemed to me that his way of addressing the problem was not the most mature. DT can probably speak to that a lot better than I can. And I'm sure GIR would have an opinion on this if he were still around.

If it makes you feel any better, I share in a lot of the feelings of frustration that you've expressed. From about 2010-2014 (maybe even before 2010), there was a core group of users here that basically dominated the culture of the CSTSF. There have been a lot of terms for that group. sinophile called it "The Circlejerk." I used to call it "The Machine" (only in my head, I don't think I ever used that term publicly), and looking back on it, I now use the term "The Club." The Club consisted of users that implicitly held a higher social status, and would constantly pick on those who weren't a part of The Club. Granted, they weren't just a bunch of devious devils who loved to go around and cause trouble, they were ultimately just a group of Cave Story fans who wanted to build a community; the problem was, they had a very rigid set of implicit parameters for how they wanted that community to operate. Whenever someone would join who had a weird personality that just didn't vibe well with them, or if that person had poor spelling, or posted low quality content, or asked silly questions, then The Club would attack and ridicule that person, even if that user wasn't breaking any rules. And in the cases when the user would break rules, the whole situation would always get so much messier.

Whenever someone outside of The Club made a mistake, they'd be subject to a lot of ridicule. But whenever someone within The Club made a similar mistake, they'd rarely get more than a slap on the wrist, if even that. All too often, I'd see people within The Club starting drama that never needed to start in the first place, and everyone else in The Club would refuse to call that person out, and would sometimes even egg that person on. What was most frustrating of all was when someone from The Club would start drama with someone outside of The Club, and then all of The Club members would shift the blame onto the latter and ridicule that person for defending himself or herself. The in-group bias of that club repeatedly clouded the judgement of otherwise mature and respectable people, and that was really frustrating to see.

I'll be transparent about the fact that my view on this issue is biased, because I frequently found myself at odds with The Club during my first few years here, especially my first few months. Looking back, I can understand why some parts of my personality as a teenager rubbed some members of The Club the wrong way, and I won't pretend to be without my flaws. However, I still to this day feel as if the blame lies ultimately with them for most of the drama that ensued. For most of the incidents that took place, I can kind of understand why they took me the wrong way, and most of that drama probably wouldn't have ensued if it were 20+ year old Hayden who joined back then. Although to this day, I still don't understand what their frickin problem was with me starting a thread about whether Quote or Megaman would win in a fight. Seriously, that was a perfectly on-topic Cave Story related discussion that I tried to start, and the way those members of The Club all collectively came together to derail that thread was just immature.

I'm convinced that some people picked on me because they were jealous of my rising popularity in the first few years after I released my 4th ending mod, although they would never admit it. Sometimes I still think about this past drama, and sometimes I still feel bitter towards those users who mistreated me. Some of them I've been able to get along with since then, and some of them I even consider friends. Some of them I respect, but I don't really like very much. Some of them I kind of like, but don't respect very much. Some of them I don't like or respect at all, and I hope I never interact with them again. I feel a little bit bad for some of these people, because looking back, I can tell that they were being jerks just to hide their own insecurities, and I never really got to know them as more mature users who've grown out of relying on negativity like that to give themselves a feeling of self-worth.

Despite those feelings of bitterness and frustration that I described above, I never allowed it to consume me. I always tried to learn from my mistakes, and continue contributing to this community with my head held high. I never allowed my past mistakes to define me, and always channeled that past drama as a motivator to make sure that newer users receive the patient and welcoming treatment that I wish I had gotten.

Minor tangent here, one user I actually look back on and respect a lot more than I used to is Captain Fabulous. Not to say that he wasn't brash and immature, but looking back, I see a certain integrity about him that I never really gave him credit for. Even if a lot of his behavior was unsavory, there were certain lines he would never cross. And when others crossed those lines, sometimes even members of the infamous "Club," he would be willing to call them out just as harshly as he'd call out someone outside of the club. Unlike some users from 2009-2014, I don't get the impression at all that Fab made any of his edgy posts to hide any insecurities. He was always comfortable in his own skin. He was simply a dude with a big mouth who always spoke his mind, and didn't care in the slightest what other people thought about him. /tangent

The main point I want to make with all of this is, don't worry about how you think you might be perceived, Ryuuotan. Even if some view you negatively, just press on forward anyway. In fact, there's really no reason to even create a thread bringing up the fact that you have an unpleasant history with some users on this forum. Don't even think of it as a hurdle to you being accepted back into the community. Just jump in like nothing bad ever happened. The main reason I brought up the stuff I did was because it was relevant to the topic at hand, and I hoped that a semi shared experience would give you some encouragement.

Also, here's a dirty little secret... Just about all of those users who were mean to you in the past aren't here anymore. The main reason that The Club doesn't dominate the culture of these forums anymore is because they've all gone inactive, and have been replaced by a younger generation that's not nearly as hostile. So, don't be shy. Just jump on in, and have fun.

 

Generally people learn... something... about how to be more socially informed over time. Things weren't as fair as they could have been back in the day, but if you want to say in essence that you're going to keep being as irritating as you want and everybody else has to just put up with it, first of all, kinda really no, secondly irritation is non-denominational and I doubt the current crew are going to take to it a whole lot better.

Anyway yeah it's mainly just me and maybe XCal (and andwhy) around these days, I look forward as ever to Touhou Story reaching completion in all of its splendour

 

hiya Hayden~ owo yeah, i'm sorry that those particular people gave you a bit of a hard time back then too, i'm intrigued by the name "The Club" tbh i would have never thought to give them a name xD but um, yeah i just got the idea to create a thread like this because i felt tired of all the issues surrounding me >< but you replied with how you can relate to what i was saying, and i appreciate it :3

i haven't tried any of your mods yet actually, i don't often try other people's mods especially not anymore but maybe i will want to one of these days, depends how i feel ehehe~ anyway, i will try to say something in the forums every now and then as you'd like to encourage me to do, whatever interests me lol and i do thank you for being interested in having me around, in any case tho maybe now is not a good time as i am working on finals for college :<

and yup DoubleThink, i will do my best to get Touhou Story completed as soon as i can :]

 

Ryoutan you old dog how've you been! Always happy to see a familiar face in this giant whirlpool of nostalgia.

 

hello WoodenRat, i've been up and down, working my way through college now :];; yeah it is a nice thing isn't it~? how have you been?

 

Same, had many ups and many downs, now I'm living a pretty stable life with a stable job. Though it's a bit boring, but I guess that's adult life huh...

 

i have yet to get the career of my dreams >< i am working at it though~ atleast you're at a higher place in life than me i am glad X3, i do not like adult life, i always knew i never wanted to grow up -3-;

btw feel free to talk to me on my profile or just even inbox me WoodenRat :> i don't want to cause a lot of clutter here hehe

 

Wow, it's interesting to see looks back at the forum culture from back when I was on here by the people around at the time. Nice to see the crowd I liked is still here!

 

Uh, hi. bump

hooooo yeah i’m not gonna lie stuff was pretty cliquey here! i wasn’t really around when Hayden was active so i can’t speak to that but, yeah i feel bad for the way i acted back then as a kid. i wanna apologize to you and anyone else who got caught up in all the bullying.

if anyone has some unresolved stuff they wanna talk 2 me about my DMs are hella open,, also i keep in contact with a lot of the people from those days and i can confidently say they are similarly embarrassed about that behavior. most of us have had 10 years to grow up so they’d better!!!

peace & love
-cultr1

P.S. Ryuu i love the number of emoticons you use and don’t ever change that!!! grew out of my teenage shame phase and use them all the time now ^^

 

What are you talking about, cultr? You were pretty active for the first 2 years that I was here.

But in any case, I'm glad that you decided to pop back in. You have no idea how much it would have meant to 15-year-old Hayden to be able to see this. Then again, I was pretty self-righteous in my mid teens, so seeing this would have probably given me an unhealthy ego boost. If there's one area of personal growth that these forums accelerated through all of this conflict, it's that I gradually learned how to be more self-aware and not come across as anywhere near as self-righteous and overzealous as I used to.

 

Although to this day, I still don't understand what their frickin problem was with me starting a thread about whether Quote or Megaman would win in a fight. Seriously, that was a perfectly on-topic Cave Story related discussion that I tried to start, and the way those members of The Club all collectively came together to derail that thread was just immature.

This was a result of a bunch of teenagers not wanting to have what they deemed a "childish discussion" on a forum about a children's video game. So not exactly the best response from this community, no.

 

What are you talking about, cultr? You were pretty active for the first 2 years that I was here.

But in any case, I'm glad that you decided to pop back in. You have no idea how much it would have meant to 15-year-old Hayden to be able to see this. Then again, I was pretty self-righteous in my mid teens, so seeing this would have probably given me an unhealthy ego boost. If there's one area of personal growth that these forums accelerated through all of this conflict, it's that I gradually learned how to be more self-aware and not come across as anywhere near as self-righteous and overzealous as I used to.

ah sorry! i’ve never had a good memory for that kind of thing, most of my memories of my time here are quite fuzzy. of course what i said above extends to u too in that case.

This was a result of a bunch of teenagers not wanting to have what they deemed a "childish discussion" on a forum about a children's video game. So not exactly the best response from this community, no.

literally haha,,, lotta ppl would just turn up their nose at anything that seemed too “new userish,” cuz we were cool big kid forum veterans…

(quote’s weapons delevelling when taking damage would have him at a serious disadvantage imho)

 

Uh, hi. bump

hooooo yeah i’m not gonna lie stuff was pretty cliquey here! i wasn’t really around when Hayden was active so i can’t speak to that but, yeah i feel bad for the way i acted back then as a kid. i wanna apologize to you and anyone else who got caught up in all the bullying.

if anyone has some unresolved stuff they wanna talk 2 me about my DMs are hella open,, also i keep in contact with a lot of the people from those days and i can confidently say they are similarly embarrassed about that behavior. most of us have had 10 years to grow up so they’d better!!!

thank you cultr :] your apology seems genuine so i will accept it~ i would hope the majority had ended up becoming a more flexible, easygoing bunch ^3^

P.S. Ryuu i love the number of emoticons you use and don’t ever change that!!! grew out of my teenage shame phase and use them all the time now ^^

GOOD sdfjhsdjkfhsdjkfh i don't plan to change, haven't changed for like 12 years and i have no regrets lawl

What are you talking about, cultr? You were pretty active for the first 2 years that I was here.

But in any case, I'm glad that you decided to pop back in. You have no idea how much it would have meant to 15-year-old Hayden to be able to see this. Then again, I was pretty self-righteous in my mid teens, so seeing this would have probably given me an unhealthy ego boost. If there's one area of personal growth that these forums accelerated through all of this conflict, it's that I gradually learned how to be more self-aware and not come across as anywhere near as self-righteous and overzealous as I used to.

self-development is always wonderful C: