Time for some philosophical, idealistic nonsense:

As I have watched guild chat and the guild website I have seen some interesting trends. I hadn’t noticed anything until I had an odd conversation a couple weeks ago about group communications, norms, and rights – and to some extent responsibility. A group is often defined as 3 or more people with common beliefs and/or goals. Our guild is unlikely to share common beliefs on everything (esp. RL), but as far as WoW is concerned you can certainly find some commonality in both belief and goal. There are, of course several sub-groups within the guild that have different goals regarding their drive to excel in PvP, end game PvE, or simply social game play at any level; however, it seems that the thing that ties these groups of different aspirations together into a guild may be some common beliefs of what a guild should be and how a guild should act. One thing that strongly suggests this is the fact that all wow players are generally pursuing one very few goals. If this were the only factor in determining guild membership, then there would only need to be roughly 3-4 guilds on every server; a PvP guild, a PvE guild, etc.

So what do we, as members of Downfall, believe a guild should be? This isn’t a question I expect or want to hear answered person by person, but rather a rhetorical question intended to get you thinking about what you get out of your guild . . . as well what you put back into it. I think that some things have been made abundantly clear in the past: Downfall does not exist for the purpose of getting gear for our members. Downfall does not exist for the purpose of being better than every other guild in terms of prowess in end game or PvP.

This is where the somewhat . . . “different” . . . social engineering perspective of that conversation came in. It was pointed out to me that although as a nation we push for a lot of freedoms and rights from our federal government, our actions in smaller groups don’t always align well with our political convictions. While we may push for full protection of the freedom of speech nationally, we will often put great effort into silencing group members we disagree with. We scream in outrage when there is a risk of the government invading some portion of our privacy, but we’re willing to spy on each other. We demand trial by jury, legal representation, the right to face our accusers and be presumed innocent until proven guilty when our legal system thinks we may have done something wrong, but we rarely offer any semblance of these things to those who wrong us personally. This is not to say that we are wrong to want these things from the government, nor that we are wrong in the way we conduct ourselves in private groups – it is merely meant to point out that in general, we seem to hold our governments to higher standards than we are willing to commit to ourselves.

Why? This is a question philosophers have been raving about for centuries. Is it selfishness? Is it some belief that we, ourselves, are an exception to the rules? As we watch court cases, both fictional and real, we sometimes see a partial clue. Every day, guilty people try to get a jury to believe that they are innocent. Civil cases are opened all of the time where people try to shift away blame for their own accidents. We don’t want to be responsible for our own mistakes. This may be partially attributable to shame, but is more likely due to a fear of facing the impending consequences.

So how does this apply to the previous discussion of rights and freedoms? There is a struggle between protecting the right to maintain certain freedoms, and protecting ourselves from the abuse of those freedoms. In the example of illegal searches and seizures, we certainly don’t want the government busting into our house all the time to look for illegal possessions or activities, but we don’t want people abusing the right to privacy by being able to keep copious amounts of cocaine, evidence of a crime, or other such things in their home without any danger of legal reprisal. Or in the example of the freedom of speech, we should be able to say anything we like without fear of being thrown in jail for voicing an opinion, but we don’t need a nation full of people constantly uttering racist, sexist, or otherwise hateful comments. People often get confused about what freedom really is. Freedom lies in the ability to choose, not in the end decision. For another example: Freedom isn’t making detestable comments, freedom comes from having the choice to do so. In other words, you can generally demonstrate your freedom every bit as much by choosing to comply with a given societal norm as you can by breaking it. “Rebellion” in this sense often stems from insecurity in your ability to act freely, and the need to try to prove this ability to self or others. (It should be noted; however, that often times inconsistencies occur between people with different societal backgrounds, and thus, different societal norms. This does not constitute a “rebellion” from society, but rather an expression of cultural differences.)

Where do things I’ve seen in guild chat and on the site come in? I’d rather leave that mostly open to interpretation, but there is one area that has bothered me – so I’ll comment on it: Guild Apps. In many ways, I like the freedom to see our guild applications. I like to know who is applying and have an idea of who I can potentially look up in game if we need help with raid, or want to do some pre-made PvP or five-mans. My concerns come from the fact that I have seen some douche-baggery creeping into the app forum. We are certainly free to make rude comments directed at these people, but I wonder what that says about our guild, our group, and our community. Is that our norm, or do we have some people abusing a freedom they’ve been given? Maybe I’m off-base here, but I think that although there is more of a gray area than a line between having fun and being a jerk, there is no good reason to test the limits. I don’t want to see Downfall characterized as “a bunch of arrogant douches.”

None of this is directed at any person in particular. This is just me rambling on about something that caused me to think a bit. What do I believe Downfall (or any guild I’m in) should be? Am I adding to that vision, or detracting from it?

[/Idealistic Rant]