The Most Nathan Karr Thread in OHRRPGCE History

[Nathan Karr]

On a meta level, this might become the most Nathan Karr of all posts in the history of the Internet.

Nathan,
Your post has shown a lot of people how you feel, which is great.
I think a lot of what was said was perhaps best said on a different thread.
I invite you to join the discord channel and join us in talking things through.
We are all a family here, and I'd really like it if we could make an effort to mutually understand one another.

https://discord.gg/9EGT2acV

I thought I'd made it pretty clear over time, but it won't hurt to say clearly, that I left the Slime Salad Discord on bad terms and have no intention of returning, but this response made me decide to put this post in a thread of its own so as not to muck up our very professional and cordial discussion in the contest thread with even the remote possibility of seeming hostile.

I've no interest in being continually dogpiled because of any combination of my disgraceful past or people hating me for some of the few things that have ALWAYS been good about me.

---

If anything I've said in the past...what's it, six years or so now? Sounds harsh, know it comes from a place of tough love, and I am simply being somewhat inarticulate or needfully blunt as I've found a delicate touch actively ineffectual. That sounds about right for how long I've gone without lapsing into trying to start slapfights or attacking other users rather than their content. I was too old for that by then and I'm even older than that now.

I've spent a large amount of my adult life attempting to socialize online going out of my way to present myself as softly and timidly as possible, to avoid conflict or even stating too strong an opinion that might hurt someone's feelings. Why wouldn't I, when most of the interactions I get anywhere are people trying to slap me around or accuse me of things that are blatantly untrue about myself? Whether I was right or wrong at a given time, I'd be treated basically the same numerous times, and it's very exhausting.

At times I've also been on the receiving end of good tough love that made me really evaluate how I present myself, but this is getting less and less frequent outside my most personal circle of friends. The way my early appearance as the young, naive religious firebrand Nathan Karr and the mask I put up to emotionally shield myself later as the crass, shitposting edgy memelord Ronin Catholic being placed in stark contrast in OHR House 3 was what I'd call my first actual wakeup call. The first time the clear change in my behavior and how it came across and how my earlier form was better was communicated to me in a language I understand; rather than incensed by being depicted somewhat negatively, I had a good laugh at myself and started considering how I should conduct myself.
Much later, this discussion on writing evil characters:
https://www.slimesalad.com/forum/viewto ... 3446#73446
I was used to putting up the memelord façade still, and not much further up the thread you can see me say something more brief. "A person can do wicked, horrible things and justify it to himself as for the greater good; a person can do things that help the world while having selfish motives for doing so, like saving the world from being destroyed entirely because he lives and keeps his things there; and it is entirely realistic to have both a bad motivation and commit a bad action, as I sometimes do."

Pepsi Ranger/Zippywings however noted this post stood out from what was then the background noise of me giving innocuous opinions on game aesthetics or quoting 4chan/TVTropes/YouTube Poop style meme culture. It made me think maybe I should unmask more often and share how I truly feel on things.

I still stand by everything I said then, ten years ago, aside from [spoiler]"Muslims do not believe non-believers are people" changing to "Muslims who actually follow Muhammad's teachings as he preached and practiced them believe in violently enslaving all non-Muslims and killing those who resist"; there are some peaceable Muslims, possibly even the majority of them, who don't understand the history of their religion and its teachings. I highly recommend the YouTube channels Acts 17 Apologetics (Christian, legitimate diagnosed sociopath, far braver man than I am) and Apostate Prophet (Atheist, former Muslim, politely disagrees with Christians but doesn't hate them or spread open fabrications of their beliefs). Basically, at its core Islam is exactly the strawman version of what the liberal media has been saying fundamentalist Christianity is for 30+ years - pro-slavery, racist, misogynist, violent, kill homosexuals as a matter of course, and colonialist conquerors.[/spoiler] So in short, this tangent is me saying I retract one of my previous statements only to double down on it in light of my having received new information; this lines up with another thing I said there:

I don't give a flying rip what people choose to believe, only what is true. This has meant, on many, many occasions, changing what I believe.

And as I have done on many occasions, I admit that I have, quite intentionally, done wrong things which I knew at the time were wrong. It's not hypocritical to admit I've done wrong things, it would be hypocritical if I claimed they weren't wrong when I was doing them; a lie I have also occasionally told myself on specific pet sins I've tried to keep.

For a while I was openly advocating for pornography to remain legal so long as good faith efforts were made to keep it away from children (like I was the first time some was slipped into sprite animations on old Flash sites or buried in OHR games when I saw it), but self-admittedly for the selfish reason that I was addicted to the stuff and didn't want other Christians cutting off my sauce. I still hold this Libertarian view on the subject right now, but am feeling a lot happier the longer I go without.

I am not attacking anyone, I'm inviting everyone else with shortcomings to overcome to make the right choice and turn from their ways; I know most won't, I know me even mentioning this will be seen as hostility instead of love.

When you let your soul become infected, products of your soul (the arts) will carry that stink with them. Letting lust fill your thoughts and fester inside of you leads to content that reeks of thirstposting, and indulging it only makes it stronger; this might be most clear in places like the original version of the rolling pin scene in Puppy Adventure or the panty scene in Vikings, but it even shows through a little in the sample game opening I wrote for TutOHRial, much less some other things I've made from 2013 going forward, and which would have been present in Karrible had I finished it. These things can't be compartmentalized, not the way people seem to think. And you know what? I'm starting with the man in the mirror; I'm asking him to change his ways.

Now, getting to Karrible. A lot of people did and still do misread its message. I could explain it very bluntly in words, but most will stop their ears and still insist the game proves I'm racist, and this would be the case with the message regardless of if I hadn't fumbled the execution (which I did, I will be clear). The entire point is literally what I say here:
https://www.furaffinity.net/view/38532034/
Racism is bad no matter who the perpetrator and who the victim. It doesn't become okay to hate people for their skin color just because their ancestors are Northern or Western European. It's not okay to hate all Caucasians by proxy simply because some of them were slavers or colonizers or did terrible things in the past ([spoiler]never mind that all other "ethnic groups" have done this, and some still widely do to this day especially in third world countries where outreach is sorely needed[/spoiler]). It's also never to be condoned for people to be racist against minorities, but that's something widely accepted on both sides of the political aisle, or at least in words if not in actions.

Simply for not being a self-loathing white-guilt laden virtue-signaling racist...I am considered a racist. Because I don't want non-whites put on a pedestal or given better treatment, but want everyone to be equal. This makes me the racist. These accusations were being leveled at me years before I said All Lives Matter in response to the claim that (only) Black Lives Matter or made a game where the villains literally actively embody negative stereotypes about human ethnicities which they vaguely resemble (including the white man being a pompous, condescending racist even among the other pompous, condescending racists; since the strongest stereotypes of whites are "they're boring" and "they're racist"). For example, I made this comic a few years after the FIRST time I was accused of racism with no evidence beyond using the word white somewhere in my writing in the context of metaphorical purity and knights in shining armor (absolutely serious here).
https://www.furaffinity.net/view/5173570/
Oh no, he made a joke about Nazis, that must mean he sympathizes with Nazis! And he used a slightly uncommon vocabulary word that sounds adjacent to a racist slur but decidedly means something different...he didn't actually use the slur itself, and it was being applied to said Nazis who would certainly have a hard time actually fitting that description...whatever, ignore logic, any excuse to call my opponent a racist as an ad-hominem, right? If I can poison the well enough that nobody takes him seriously I can say whatever fabricated excrement I wish of him and any attempt he makes to defend himself only makes him look bad, then I don't need real arguments against any of his actual points.

And even if I had written it, as I have on rare occasions elsewhere in strictly and carefully controlled contexts? It's literally just a word, stop clutching your pearls and grow up. Literally nobody has a right to get violently angry at being called a name. And as I said in the other times the subject came up, I personally disapprove of slinging slurs at people regarding characteristics they have no control over such as sex and race. It's an assault on my artistic pride as an internet troll to do such an utterly lazy low blow, like kneeing someone in the nuts during an official boxing match; the ref will flag you for it and you're a lazy coward for even trying it.

So yes, I welcome being hated, insulted, and denigrated. Especially when this is done over my religious or political views, which both stem from a love of and belief in objective truth overriding feelings and experiences, including my own. I can't stop anyone from continuing to accuse me of being a "Q-anon" even though that's not the source of my knowledge of both real and fake conspiracies but I'd prefer they stop doing so. I can't stop people wrongly calling me racist when I've done more to denounce racism over the past fifteen years than possibly the rest of the OHR community combined, but I'd prefer they didn't do so because it's factually untrue. I have enough actual, legitimate flaws that you don't need to make up things to attack me over; things I well and truly stand by and sincerely believe or preach in opposition to your own personally deeply held dogmas, my failures to live by my own standards, and so forth.

The terms homophobia, transphobia, and islamophobia are all made-up terms to have an easy ad-hominem attack against anyone who voices any opinion, belief, or fact on a related subject that you disagree with. Just accuse them of being full of hate, of being afraid implicitly because it's different, of being self-loathing (which, as a biological male human often struggling with self-identity both of my objective, verified maleness and my objective, verified humanity, I have some on one subject at least) and you don't need to offer any actual countervailing facts or logical arguments.

Any accusation that I hate persons of a same-sex attracted persuasion is also a falsity, as crass as some of the comics I've published on the subject may be. Saying, rudely or politely, "Doing this behavior damages your body and/or soul, please stop" isn't hateful; if anything, someone who believed such to be the case as I always have, and kept quiet as I often have, would simply be failing to live up to the standard of actual love. I've allowed myself to be cowered into quietness by the brigade of cry-bullies who think anything less than active endorsement is some sort of attack on their fundamental humanity; to me this indicates a deficit of identities outside of which segment of humanity you would like to engage in intimacy with.

If you're going to hate me and wish I would drop dead, please do so for the right reasons is basically what I'm asking for here. I know this plea would fall on deaf ears anyway...

Blessed are you when they revile and persecute you, and say all kinds of evil against you falsely for My sake. Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

If the world hates you, you know that it hated Me before it hated you.

Another thing is I don't pretend to be perfect, and never have. Hopefully I never will. I intentionally leave my older and more shameful game projects up and forum posts I can even if I later regret them, change my mind, or was failing to convey some sort of sarcasm/reverse psychology effect. I want others to be able to look through my history and see the story of how I changed over the years for both better and for worse. I know there's such a thing as burying the past and trying to move on, but it seems a not insignificant amount of people want their embarrassing pasts erased while still trying to put others' feet to the fire over fundamentally not very different "offenses", and I in particular have always been a lightning rod for this kind of targeting and harassment. I won't deny what I've done, but I also don't owe it to you to decide for me what my motivations were.

In fact, I've been afraid, very frequently, that I might be going too far astray and in danger of dying in a state of sinful rebellion. I've had a serious wake-up call this past autumn and winter, and like most wake-up calls I slept in on it for a long time before beginning to act.

Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works?

And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity.

But I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection: lest that by any means, when I have preached to others, I myself should be a castaway.

Getting my body under control and saying "no" to things that feel good in the moment is hard, and something I've failed at many times before. I'm barely beginning to sober up from a downward spiral of addiction that's been almost half of my life.

---

I still plan to continue interacting with the community for things like scripting feedback, announcing further games I make, and discussing feedback of the actual body of my work as a game developer going forward, barring discussions getting TRULY out of hand and myself receiving a ban. But this community? It's been pretty consistently hostile to me from the start, and no matter how my own behavior has changed for better or for worse I've been subject to round after round of ridiculous ridicule.

I owe nobody an apology. I've given out all the deserved apologies to those of this community I actually wronged in the past years ago, and then some. I then continued to give out more apologies even when I hadn't done anything wrong, and I will stop that right now and no further. Apologies can never placate a hate mob, which I know a lot of you aren't a part of, but that's the kind of feeding frenzy on places like Twitter and Tumblr; someone does something questionable or even innocuous, gets dogpiled, apologizes, and the apology only enables more of the same.

Nobody will accept that you're sorry about your past even if you are, you likely shouldn't be anyway, and the attack can come long after you're dead (Ulysses Grant, Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, Dr. Seuss of all people, the list goes on). Nobody is perfect by the standards of the outrage mob, members of it not least of all. While traditional, devout Christians also believe nobody's capable of living up fully and unfailingly to our high standards, we believe in forgiveness and accepting each other as flawed. So either go with the group that is looking to spitefully Mean Girls you into a social pariah and destroy your career because you fail their utterly arbitrary list of qualifications of virtue, or go with the group that admits no mortal can live up to divine standards and sincerely trying is more important than success itself.

So thus far and no further; I will no longer bend, I will no longer be cowed, and if anyone wants an actual civil discourse on game design with me in the future I'm all for it. I am pre-canceled. I can be banned, I can have threads locked, I can be kicked out...or I can be tolerated, I can be disagreed with like an actual adult, and I can be addressed for flaws I actually have instead of ones I decidedly don't.

[SwordPlay]

1. Not Useful, Not Good, Not Appropriate
but what are you actually doing to make a better world?
do you think anyone will listen to you? judging by what you've written, probably not.
and maybe they shouldn't based on some of what you've said.

2. Not like this
at the end of the day, you have to value inside you... but to share it with others is a separate art...
you want to explain but you're achieving the opposite.
your really needs a good,long, edit. maybe some hard cuts. a LOT
you can't get it by force, throwing words at the problem.
maybe if you stopped and had a think you'd come to more appropriate conclusions instead of miserable delusions.
expression should be full of clarity! not junk poorly-formed thoughts

3. Not right now
you seem to prepossessed with a paranoid delusion about some threat to the world or your personal self, that it informs everything you do.
but what you fear will not come to pass... probably... why are you rushing to rash judgements?

[Spoonweaver]

Well!
As my invite prompted this thread I guess I should reply!

I want to start off with, Nate I do not dislike you at all as a person. I disagree with a lot of your talking points here, but that does not mean at all that I dislike you.
On a larger scale, to EVERYONE on Slimesalad. Anything negative I say to you I say in jest. I believe the internet is for letting loose and saying any thing that comes into your head.
So Nathan, I do not fault you for a single thing you have written here. As I said, I do disagree with many of the points made in your post, but that's not really what I'd like to come to slimesalad to discuss.
I can do plenty of this sort of thing on Reddit or 4chan if I wanted to.
But largely, I have found that discussions about these sorts of things do not yield positive results.
These are STRONG topics you're bringing up. There are people that have VERY strong opinions about these things. These are not topics that are going to be hashed out and solved by anyone on this website, or likely by anyone in the world, anytime soon.

But I can foresee replies as I see swordplay has already replied while I was writing this.
I have always felt that "flamewars" were actually very healthy. I know that's not a shared belief and I know actual real life bad things can stem from them. But I think ultimately people should be heard and topics should be discussed. Nathan, I don't think you should apologize for your opinions, but I do hope you have an open mind to different opinions.
As you said yourself, you are not perfect.
I believe the main reason you feel dogpiled is because you have opinions that are uncommon here, clearly.


And so, even though I do not personally agree with a lot of the points being argued here. I'll take Nathan's side for any arguments made in this thread.

[Spoonweaver]

1. Not Useful, Not Good, Not Appropriate
but what are you actually doing to make a better world?
do you think anyone will listen to you? judging by what you've written, probably not.
and maybe they shouldn't based on some of what you've said.

Spreading useful information to people is something people do that can be helpful. The Catholic church does do a large amount of charity work. There may be a lot of negative things that the catholic church is accused of, but it's also known for a very large amount of good things. I think if everyone actually acted how christ actually acted in parts of the new testament of the bible that the world would actually be better.

2. Not like this
at the end of the day, you have to value inside you... but to share it with others is a separate art...
you want to explain but you're achieving the opposite.
your really needs a good,long, edit. maybe some hard cuts. a LOT
you can't get it by force, throwing words at the problem.
maybe if you stopped and had a think you'd come to more appropriate conclusions instead of miserable delusions.
expression should be full of clarity! not junk poorly-formed thoughts

I believe honest efforts of communication should be valued. Perhaps you believe this was a low scoring attempt at communicating his feelings, but the effort is clearly there considering the length of the post.
A large part of the post is about how Nathan no longer wants to hold anything back, so the fact that a lot of the post seems to be venting holds true to that point.

3. Not right now
you seem to prepossessed with a paranoid delusion about some threat to the world or your personal self, that it informs everything you do.
but what you fear will not come to pass... probably... why are you rushing to rash judgements?

I don't believe Nathan is completely delusional when he speaks of the topics he is speaking of. He clearly has a high level of passion about these topics, but I don't think he's delusional about them. Spreading information that you believe in has been a goal dating as far back as we have history recorded. Nathan isn't doing anything unusual when he shares his opinions.
I do not believe he is reacting rashly without stopping to think things out. I believe he has done a lot of thinking.

[ArtimusBena]

Nathan, nobody hates you. From where I'm sitting, it seems like you need to feel persecuted so you can feel like the lone hero fighting the good fight. You've just GOT to be a martyr. Can't just find a way to fit in and have fun without muddying the place with controversial topics. It's really not that you can't find people here who might *agree* with you. It's that SS works really, really well with its no politics, no religion policy. So when you shove that sh** into the equation, into this *COMMUNITY*, what you are doing is pooping all over what WE find sacred: Slime Salad, as a peaceful and positive place. It wasn't always peaceful, as I'm sure you recall. Now that it is peaceful, I for one wanna keep it that way!

So, if you're open to learning yet another new thing on your journey: if you'll stop going several parsecs out of your way to be some kind of martyr, everything will probably get a lot better.

[Spoonweaver]

Nathan, nobody hates you. From where I'm sitting, it seems like you need to feel persecuted so you can feel like the lone hero fighting the good fight. You've just GOT to be a martyr. Can't just find a way to fit in and have fun without muddying the place with controversial topics. It's really not that you can't find people here who might *agree* with you. It's that SS works really, really well with its no politics, no religion policy. So when you shove that sh** into the equation, into this *COMMUNITY*, what you are doing is pooping all over what WE find sacred: Slime Salad, as a peaceful and positive place. It wasn't always peaceful, as I'm sure you recall. Now that it is peaceful, I for one wanna keep it that way!

So, if you're open to learning yet another new thing on your journey: if you'll stop going several parsecs out of your way to be some kind of martyr, everything will probably get a lot better.

I think this ignores a lot of the things that have taken place Artimus.
There were some very heated arguements that took place on Discord and there were a few people all arguing with Nathan and no one really arguing on his side when it happened.

As far as Nathan's religious views and bringing them up. I would say that other people bring up their views that directly contradict Nathan's views. And they do it quite often. Nathan's post is literally about how he's let that slide a lot but was getting frustrated in doing so. What you believe is a peaceful place is what nathan is saying is a hostile place. He finds it hostile and ignoring that someone here find it hostile and calling everything peaceful right now seems incorrect.

[ArtimusBena]

I've certainly broken that rule a couple times, and have been rightfully corrected

[SwordPlay]

1. How is THIS thread... helping... this post... any post... who is it helping? how is it helping anyone?

2. WRITE WRITE WRITE. EDIT EDIT EDIT
Stop writing pages and pages. Just write a few sentences that really matter.

3. It's Muslims and Gays, for some reason.... well-founded fears or...?

[Spoonweaver]

1. How is THIS thread... helping... this post... any post... who is it helping? how is it helping anyone?

2. WRITE WRITE WRITE. EDIT EDIT EDIT
Stop writing pages and pages. Just write a few sentences that really matter.

3. It's Muslims and Gays, for some reason.... well-founded fears or...?

Getting feelings off your chests is always a step in the right direction swordplay. Venting is healthy. Venting is as long as it has to be. Clearly Nathan had a lot to vent. If it was "tl:dr" I can dumb it down for you.

Nathan's comment about Muslims and Gays was specifically that his views on those topics cause people to verbally attack him in his view. I think being verbally attacked is a well founded fear considering it has happened to him more than once.

As far as the over all topic of Muslims. It is not a uncommon thought that only Nate has. Thousands of people think like Nate does. If Nathan's ideas are so upsetting, then you disagree with thousands of other people as well, who just aren't on this website to back Nathan up.
Also, normally Nathan shares his thoughts as a reply to someone sharing their thoughts that differ from Nathan's on the same subject first.

[ArtimusBena]

My point I guess is nobody hates you and you don't have to be a different person to have a friendly interface with a community.

[Bob the Hamster]

Nathan, I take time to look at your screenshots and read your game-related posts. I normally skip over the long rants, but this one I took time to read based on the responses from others

This is a forum about game making. Games are a form of art, and it is unavoidable that a person's systems of belief may be expressed through their art.

It is also unavoidable that some people may choose to criticize the belief systems of others, especially if it is a belief system that harms others.

Anti-gay and anti muslim rhetoric are not tolerable to me. Neither in a rant post, not in a game, nor in someone defending them just for sale of argument as a devil's advocate.

I will echo ArtimusBena. I definitely don't hate you, and I like having you around and seeing what games you are working on.

Nevertheless, there is certain behavior that I cannot accept and ignore as a "difference of opinion", and some of that seems to be on display in this thread.

[Idontknow]

[Rue]

In regards to how your "message" is being received by people incorrectly, that tells me that you need a lot of growth as an artist. You can't use being being on the spectrum as an excuse. You need to learn, and to grow. On paper, on in your medium, when you put your message down, that's all there is. And it stays. And it represents you.

Simply for not being a self-loathing white-guilt laden virtue-signaling racist...I am considered a racist.

On second though, please refrain from posting anything else ever again anywhere else on the internet ever again, for the good of the human race.

[Eonhetwo]

I have absolutely no business posting in this thread and have no opinions to contribute to this topic.

[Spoonweaver]

I think this is the sort of dog-piling Nathan is talking about.

I believe James makes a good point though that there are some topics that are off limits. They represent a history of real-life trauma for many and like I posted earlier in the thread I believe topics like this are not going to be worked out through conversation and certainly not via forum posts on a game dev website. (I'd like to again state I do not share Nathan's view points, and I'm defending him as a person and not his views.) I believe a part of Nathan's post was about how his stance on those topics is misunderstood and he does not wish to be viewed as being anti-lgbt or anti-other religions.
I hope we can all put this aside. We can understand that Nathan has some extreme view points on taboo topics and simply leave it at that.
My invitation to the discord was to basically prevent this exact thing from happening by letting Nathan vent on discord rather then on this forum for all to see. But I can see now that was not really a good option in his eyes.
I want to believe that this post is not about spreading some sort of message but is instead about coming out of his shell.

@Nathan
I think we all have had a very good understanding that you have extreme views. But ultimately I don't think you should give much heed to whether or not other people online fully understand you. I think the main take away is that there are certain topics that you know will cause issues. There are meme's about things like this on 4chan involving bait and trolls, because there is no easier way to get attention online then by bringing up the topics you are bringing up in this thread, as negative as that attention may be. So if you do not want to be dog-piled, then just don't bring up the sort of topics that politicians make careers addressing. We don't need to discuss abortion here, it's a complex issue. We don't need to discuss transgender rights here, it's a complex issue.
If you do plan to discuss any topic of that nature, then you have to also plan for backlash. That's just the nature of those topics. So you really have to pick one. Either you are a "champion" of you view point and will take any and all ridicule that comes your way, or you can understand that there is a time and a place to voice your opinion on those sorts of things and save it till then.


I think I'm going to take back what I said before about defending Nathan in this thread if it comes out that this thread is not about feeling like he's bullied online and is instead to voice anti muslim opinions, anti gay opinions, or some other extreme views.
Let me know Nathan. It's your call.