@HometownHumble You asked for a welcoming environment, and that’s exactly how I welcome new people. I first welcome them to the cuddling community, then lightly comment on something they wrote. Like when someone puts in their bio ‘I like to cuddle while laying down,’ I’ll playfully call them out on their lazy response. Most people just laugh or respond with something funny about their own post. It’s not that deep. I only added the emoji ‘😁’ to soften the tone, and admins/mods can probably see the unedited version. It’s also usually done in the context of an inside joke with another cuddler, while still also calling you out. You did ask for a catty response, so I took out my claws. 🐈 💅
@mauvefox
Respectfully. I don't think you realize how some of your posts are coming off to a good portion of the room. Because they're not reading well and you're coming off as passive aggressive and avoidant.
Respectfully, I don't think you realize how your previous posts came off. And by injecting "to a good portion of the room" you are basically subtlety pressing the idea that your side is bigger and more important, and that your perspective should be the default. This is part of the original problem here and why OP felt dog piled on. Many times in history, the few have needed to stand up to the many when they lost perspective and started to become what they had previously advocated against. I think this effect has been present here.
Thanking someone else for their 'mature perspective' for agreeing with you, automatically puts others in an 'immature perspective'.
I understand what you're saying, but I've also been told in this thread that we should only strictly read what is there and not jump to conclusions. I agreed with them, so I was bound to give them some sort of compliment on what I thought of there perspective. I chose to say mature. I could have said a lot of other things. I suppose regardless of what I had chosen, you were going to automatically assume I was implying the opposite of the specific compliment to everyone else?
Now please understand, I'm not faulting you for feeling that way and questioning my meaning. It's the nature of how humans communicate. It's not just black and white all the time. We're constantly "reading between the lines" whether we really think about it or not. Our own experiences and viewpoints shape how we read things at times. This has been the cornerstone of what I've been trying to get across from the beginning. People here were so quick to insist that we "say exactly what we mean" and that we "don't read what isn't there", particularly directed at OP. And yet multiple times throughout the thread, this same perspective was quickly abandoned in other contexts. And I'm not just directing this at you.
So what I'm questioning is, why were some so focused on dog piling on OP instead of stopping to clarify what he meant? I try to read things people say in the best light, interpreting them in the way that gives them the most credit. I felt that this courtesy was not at all being shown to OP by many here. If we read a post and our first thought is that we feel the question is overly vague, doesn't make a lot of sense, and indicates the OP hasn't researched enough, then why isn't our first impulse to calmly and maturely ask for a clarification from the onset? Especially given that the topic presented including the OP being curious about how newer members were welcomed and integrated into the community. I would have hoped that of all the forum topics presented by a newer member, THIS would have been the LAST thread that would want to spiral out in a negative direction.
Telling a large part of the room they clearly misread and have piled on to OP, when we have given reasonable explanations for why we responded the way we have doesn't make you better at reading folks.
Well, I did seemingly understand what OP was asking a lot better than most. But I also wasn't alone in that either. It just feels like the opposing side was "louder". I even received messages thanking me for the rational perspective and stance I was taking in my early attempts to slow people down to take a breath, hoping the thread could get back on track.
cuddlefaery did an extremely thorough review of the timeline here and asked important follow up questions without answers from you, and got called toxic for it with no evidence of that. Calling someone 'toxic' without identifying anything specifically they have said to warrant that label, is toxicity itself.
And yet she still couldn't spot the initial breakdown. I spotted it before it even happened, and as I mentioned earlier, I had a gut instinct to speak up immediately because I could already see the difference in communication styles from early commenters and the OP, and I Just had a feeling it might deteriorate. The comments themselves were not bad or anything, it's just that I saw immediately that they might be misinterpreted, because they were along the lines of an "inside joke" and if you aren't a frequent reader of the forums, or hadn't read enough of the right topics, you wouldn't know what they meant. The only reason I knew the intent was because I had noticed enough on the forums to be "up to speed".
The reason I didn't finish following up with everything is because of how she started acting towards me. And yes I absolutely did cite examples, and I will do it again now.
To imply that people were editing comments to dishonestly hide hostility is a pretty hefty accusation to make.
She claimed that I made a hefty accusation when I absolutely did not. I called her out on it, but received no apology, and instead she just went right back to pushing me to respond to the part I hadn't gotten around to yet.
notably responded much more favorably to men who responded than to women
Her inclusion of this in her list of issues was extremely provocative and unnecessary, and yes, toxic. There was absolutely no basis for it, and it was honestly uncalled for. It doesn't matter if OP clicked on all the names to see profiles and discover genders or not. The primary people who were engaging with OP early on in the most combative manner just so happened to be women. One of the people engaging with OP early on in a more favorable manner (me) just happens to be male. So of COURSE you're going to see a worse interaction in one case versus the other, but to try and make it about gender? That's not a card to just throw around recklessly and without substantial evidence, and yes, to do so is indeed toxic behavior. Period. As people who seemingly try to project love and inclusiveness and support to all, that would be an incredibly horrifying stance to take if you don't believe doing something like that is indeed toxic.
Your first reply here was well thought out and measured, but they have declined since then. You have claimed you are excellent at reading things and understanding, and yet I think you have had some severe misreads and replies in this thread. I understand this is unsolicited advice, but I would take caution moving forward because you risk alienating people who could be wonderful friends and resources to you.
Your first reply here was well thought out and measured, but they have declined since then. You have claimed you are excellent at reading things and understanding, and yet I think you have had some severe misreads and replies in this thread.
I understand this is unsolicited advice, but I would take caution moving forward because you risk alienating people who could be wonderful friends and resources to you.
I actually agree with some of this. I really didn't WANT to continue going back and forth with all this. I had hoped that when I first asked people to stop and take a breath that things could settle and immediately get back to a healthier state. But it didn't happen. However, I don't believe my misreads are nearly as severe as you believe. I think you have a jaded viewpoint because you've interacted a lot with some here over time. We all can fall victim to that. It's natural to support people we are more familiar with by default and overlook any negative behaviors they may display, or to try and rationalize it away in our minds. It's just human nature. It's easier than we'd like to admit to land in that space, and it takes some very conscious self-reflection and effort to step back from it from time to time in order to see things more clearly again.
I'm not a perfect human by any means. Have I made mistakes? Of course. Did I conduct myself perfectly here in the manner I had hoped to maintain from the onset? Probably not. But I'm not looking through jaded glasses here, and I had messages supporting exactly the things I cited as well, but honestly none of us should be trying to "tally troops" with this. At this point I think it's best to learn from mistakes and move on, and maybe get back to what was actually a great topic that OP started on this thread.
Plenty of litter boxes
I came for the kittens, stayed for the perspectives. I got lost when someone said something I didn't read fully about beating horses. And where did that cute doggie come from?! So grateful for the sprinkled cat pictures and playfulness.
When I first got here, I started reading. Read through the provided forum topics and love the discussions. I asked questions that didn't get answered and answered questions no one asked. I am still learning.
That being said. I have made connections that I value and appreciate from being here. from showing up and participating in ways that feel comfortable and a few that don't, because of my personal stuff. I like sarcasm. I didn't realize how much until reading in the forum. I'd comment more but typing...
Wait a minute. There was horse abuse in here? I'm calling the ASPCA.
Ut oh this just got serious
@BellaAine I just wanted to clear any air (if it even needed to be) just in case you read anything into any of my previous posts.
I saw your first comment when you initially posted it. I 100% read it as a funny, catty response just as you framed it, and I in no way assign any fault whatsoever in your direction over it. I laughed. It was a funny comment.
But then my brain looked at the perspective that someone new might have. They wouldn't know anything about pmvines and his "special sauce" that you mentioned. So they likely glossed over that part and were more focused on the rest. You said you weren't sure how to answer as you had only skimmed through OP's post, and would let everyone else do the work for you.
OP responded to you with what I felt was banter, but I also understood that some might not read it that way on the other side either. You responded to ask if it was a jab, and added that you had added an emoji to soften the tone. The OP clarified that is wasn't a jab, and there was banter about how he didn't fault you for skimming his original post as he had only so far skimmed through some things also.
So I felt the two of you handled it beautifully, as there was some potential there for misunderstandings to get started, but each side chose to clarify instead of escalating, and it was great.
EDIT: Just to clarify that moving onward below, I'm switching over to just addressing the community and not at all speaking towards BellaAine at all.
I think where the very first thing happened that started the cascade failure was just the timing of when mauvefox wrote in as well, and maybe OP's brain was still in a mode of trying to process how to interpret the tone of the previous remark made by BellaAine, and you guys were just kind of getting that resolved between the two of you (beautifully btw). But it may have left their brain in more of a primed state when combined with what mauvefox initially posted.
By saying something about "every new person wants everything laid out for them even though every other new person has asked this question already", that kind of set the tone, and OP interpreted that more negatively, and I can't fault him for that. The whole schtick revolving around similar things when calling newbies out can feel passive aggressive at times. Especially when spoken indirectly as if the OP isn't standing right here (i.e. the forum veterans talking directly at each other basically gossiping about the OP right in front of their face). That's kind of what happened.
If you make a post, and are misunderstood, and the first thing to happen is to see a forum veteran just go "hey {Veteran #2} check this guy out, he wants us to just do a bunch of leg work for him for stuff every newbie keeps asking over and over"... instead of speaking directly to you to at least ask for a clarification or elaboration when they felt they didn't understand your initial post.... how would we maybe feel if we were brand new?
OP became the butt of the joke at that point instead of a participant in banter. OP really didn't react dismissively either, he actually posted back some banter and made an attempt to keep it light, which I applaud. THIS is where everyone should have perked up and moved to clarify and bring kindness to the conversation. But instead, mauvefox chose to double down on the snark and negativity with their next post shortly after. Lecturing OP about being a grown adult, knowing how to use a computer and website. They even cited multiple times that the question was vague in that 2nd post. Well if it was seen as VAGUE, then why wasn't the choice to CLARIFY and bring KINDNESS? That second post was honestly so unnecessary and one step too far in the wrong direction, and in my opinion it's where things really started to spiral in a negative direction.
I can understand to a certain point that forum regulars can get a little frustrated with similar questions coming up all the time, and they may react too quickly with a knee jerk reaction without stopping to really assess it. We're all human and misfire like that sometimes. But think about it from the newbie's perspective. Those posts that "every newbie has asked a million times" get buried in the forums, long lost in a mess of other topics and pushed far down the list many pages deep. It isn't in many people's nature to dig through things to that degree. The nature of many is just to start up a conversation and socialize to interact and discover things. So can we really fault them for it to the degree that some are seemingly wanting to perpetuate here?
Or should we just take a breath once and a while, regroup, refocus, and work harder to bring the love, acceptance, and caring to the new folks that this community is supposed to be about without harping on every misstep they make?
Our egos will always point in our own general direction when it comes to being right about something. I personally don't feel OP did anything terribly egregious, nor do I feel anybody was being overtly mean. Maybe it's because I don't personally coddle people myself but I think the running to his defense thing isn't entirely necessary. He can speak for himself, and has. Personally I think he has done a pretty good job if rolling with the punches and seems to remain in good spirits.
@jdev25
Some observations.
Two full page response with quotes pointing out other people’s behaviors that sums up with "I wish we could move on" and “you all need to focus on self reflection” is pretty ironic. That's not moving on. That's having the last word and calling it moving on. And without giving any of the data that was requested.
"I'm not a perfect human” and I “probably” made mistakes.” No definitely. I’ll come back around to self reflection at the end as you cited it was so important to you. You spent considerable amount of time and type space reflecting on how hard self reflection is and how it takes conscious effort, but all directed outward to others.
This extremely brief bit of theatre in which you heavily qualify and minimize your involvement in the hostility of this thread, and your lack of insight into it is concerning and performative at best.
You mentioned receiving messages of support about how irrational we were being. I also received multiple messages from people who have not commented in this thread who were concerned about how toxic you were being. 🤷♀️ So that particular point cuts both ways.
Observing a pattern of differential treatment from a group that is routinely treated differently, especially in these threads, and naming it is not toxic behavior. Calling it toxic because it made you uncomfortable is toxicity itself.
I've found your posts throughout this thread far more passive aggressive and condescending than anything OP ever wrote. He was defensive. You've been quietly positioning yourself as the ‘reasonable’ voice in a room full of irrational people, while doing exactly what you've accused others of doing. That's a more insidious dynamic than anything that happened in the first ten posts of this thread.
The irony of telling others not to rally troops while spending the thread doing exactly that is not lost on me.
And for the record, feeling refreshed by people who communicate directly does not mean I view things in black and white or that I can't read between the lines. Those are your assumptions about me, not observations. And actually that would be you clearly misreading ‘between the lines’ which I thought was an accelerated skill of yours. I guess not.
I’m actually quite good at clocking what lurks beneath someone's online presence. And at this point, it’s become clear that you are on a singular track to wanting others to view you as ‘right’ while belittling those who might have the audacity to present a reasonable counterpoint. Which makes you an unsafe person to have these discussions with.
Your performance here has been illuminating.
@pmvines to clarify, I am mostly hopeful that my post will give community members at large a reason to pause, reflect, and re-evaluate maybe the general attitude and stances that get taken so quickly on similar issues. So while this specific post is the example at hand, I hope that it can apply to other situations in the future, so that the response of the community can become more welcoming in general. I have seen other posts on the forum where the default reaction to things seems to be slipping away from the concepts of love and caring that should be seen throughout this community and what it's being built on and growing from. I think it's important to ensure the foundation is rooted in the right stuff. All of us can fall into some snark and exasperation. It's human. We can all strive to do better, and I include myself in that.
You're turning this into your own personal moral high ground argument and taking over someone else's battle as your own. If that's the hill you want to stay on its your prerogative, but you're making it more bloated and big than it is. And as opinionated as you are and as correct as you believe yourself to be, you aren't the forum police and grown adults aren't going to like being told what they should or should not be posting.
@mauvefox Honestly, I think the most likely thing going on is that neither of us are truly clocking the other accurately. If we're truly honest with ourselves. We're likely very different, and speaking through text on the internet naturally has the effect of two parties becoming quite performative indeed. We both have done it here. Obviously neither of us are stupid, and we understand how to craft and sculpt our messages to try and show ourselves in the best light while making the points we support. It's tough not to do. It's tough to see fault in ourselves. It's human nature. We're both right, and we're both wrong no doubt. I've responded to what was asked of me, and I explained how I felt about it and how I view it. We are both probably in a state of mind where we're going to read what the other writes in the worst light by default at this point. So it's probably healthiest to stop.
So we have two camps assembled. That's always how it ends up. Which one is in the right? Usually each side swears theirs is. Usually it's neither I would imagine. I've said my piece. I attempted to cite what I was asked to explain. I don't think anything is gained if we continue. So this is my attempt to de-escalate.
@pmvines Yeah, I can see that perspective. I didn't originally want to get sucked into this. My original intent was to try and slow it down and thought if everyone breathed for a second, it might get back on track. But yeah, it is definitely in my nature to just get rolling with something. You're right, I'm not the forum police, but I can still express how I feel and how I would like to see people interact here on a post like this. I think that much is fair. People sure didn't have a problem with expressing how they felt OP should have done this and not done that, so ya know...
@pmvines Agreed. Sometimes people get real righteous about stuff while being unable to direct that insight inward.
@HometownHumble Overall I think you've showed up very well here in the end.
You came in a little snarky (and don't read that as a negative, I'm snarky as hell and appreciate it when i see it in others), got a little defensive but that's ok, recognized the miscommunication and clarified, and have since moved on.
Not too bad for your first forum post 😉
Wait now I'm petrified since I get clues when I skimp over the comments but don’t have time to read every word.😝
Okay I'll stop 😁
@jdev25 I’d rather you direct your attention toward me and not other members who have already exhausted themselves trying to explain their perspective. We’re all adults here, and people on both sides shared their views. I don’t take anything personally, and I’ll simply step back from the thread since I stay busy focusing on getting my 💰. In my opinion, I think this struck a nerve for you, and I’d be open to continuing the conversation privately if you want to unpack what came up. We can even start with some box breathing before going through it.
(edited for typos)
@mauvefox I appreciate the continued defense. I gave up last night when it became clear that he had moved into bad faith arguments intended to have the last say rather than engage in actual dialogue. While I am happy to clarify my meaning and answer direct questions, I'm not going to waste time breaking down everything I said for people intent on cherry picking for their own ends. To chastise people for not seeking clarity, but then also repeatedly ignore direct requests for clarity is disingenuous and a cognitive dissonance I do not have the time and energy to bother with. Like you said, it's illuminating behavior.
For @HometownHumble : I do appreciate the further clarification on what you intended this discussion to be. As I said earlier, I think one-on-one discussions are better had in DMs than in a forum where it's expected anyone and everyone can participate. And in that vein, if you have specific questions about my experiences, I'm happy to answer in DM.
My early experiences here were much like @mauvefox described. For my interactions with newbies, as an educator in general I tend to lean heavily upon providing resources, allowing for self-paced learning, and meeting people where they're at when they have specific questions. When people come in with very broad questions, it can be hard for us to effectively answer. After new folks read through those resources, they tend to have a better understanding of how things generally work and thus also have a more concrete idea of what their specific questions are.
No one expects new folks to instantly understand everything in the FAQ, TOS, and contracts. New experiences are bound to be confusing no matter how much "book learning" we prepare with. But it's hard to answer questions when the asker doesn't even know what their questions actually are because they have no context to work from. It's much easier to troubleshoot and answer "what does x mean? I can't find it in the FAQ" or "how do I do y? I'm getting stuck after doing z" than it is to answer "what is cuddling about?" or "how do I cuddle?". Without any context to go off of, we're left having to give vague answers to vague questions which tends to just further frustrate the asker.
There's a saying that "you don't know what you don't know." Until someone gets exposure to concepts and terminology, they will struggle to define their lack of understanding. And none of us can read newbies' minds to know what they do and don't already know - they have to be able to ask.
@BellaAine Oh I think maybe my edit was misunderstood. I just wanted to make sure it was clear which part of my post I was talking to you vs the rest which was more of a general thing. Maybe I should have made it two separate posts. I just wanted to make sure you didn't feel like I was singling you out with the rest or anything like that. You probably would have understood, but I was just trying to proactively prevent a potential misunderstanding, that's all. I think we've all exhausted ourselves at this point lol.
LAST WORD
@pmvines No, YOU hang up first.
Click. Redial .
@BlueIris @pmvines
I'm so Chandler
@BellaAine I've seen enough of your responses in forum posts to see that you don't mean to be anything other than sweet when you use your emojis. Don't ever change. I'm just calling out that I'm totally opposite. When I use emojis the way you do I'm purposely being condescending to someone. (I'm human, we all fall short) So yeah it could be read as really sassy and dismissive. Again, I know you're not. 😸 In the end structural changes wouldn't be so bad. I have shared this site before and man oh man I had those same questions they asked me. When I was brand new I believe I was reported for being an untagged pro. I had no idea where to go to apply. I wouldn't say no to structural changes at all. Ok, now I'm meowtta here 🐈⬛️
More kitties !!
@Cuddlesofcuddle Aww, thank you for the kind words. 😸 I think we may have gotten our wires crossed a bit. My comment wasn't really about emojis or communication styles. I was genuinely curious why the people defending the OP weren't answering the question he was asking. I think what most of us agreed on is that the forums are great for specific questions like the one you mentioned (how to apply to be a pro). The OP was asking something so broad that even the people defending him weren't really answering it. 🐈⬛