Quote Originally Posted by Elesh View Post
If a petty thief, a shoplifter, gets run over by a car... is he a victim?

I'd say yes. You can be a criminal ANd a victim. The people have broken a fairly minor rule with very minimal harm to others. So yes, the punishment from SE is justified. But the targeted harassment of the community was not justified. And thus I'd say yes, they qualify both as rulebreaker and victim. And while their punishment should hold... as I said earlier in this thread, the people who orchestrated the harassment campaign for no reason? They should be banned too. Because they're far worse for the community and harassment is DEFINITELY also against the ToS. Including using 'reporting' as a form of harassment.

If you follow the thread of cause/effect, everyone can be a victim and everyone has someone who is ultimately the cause of their victimhood.

Why is that person stealing? Is it because they were born into a poor family? Why was that family poor? Systemic economic issues?

Same line of thought can be done with parsers:

Why is someone parsing? Because the game doesn't give enough information about how well you're playing? Why doesn't it give that information? Because people have been known to abuse it in the past? Why have they abused it in the past? Because people play multiplayer games with no intention of getting better and ultimately leech off the other people they're playing with? Why do they have no intention of being better? Because the game doesn't do a good job at fostering improved gameplay?


The difference is that there are clear signs "If you do X, then Y will happen to you." with the ToS. Someone aware of that who makes a decision to still do it, in my eyes, is no longer a victim of anything except their own poor decision making.