Actually, i do agree with part of your statement. Transparency is very important, and when there is information is missing from a situation, it is human nature to fill in the blanks. Where i disagree though, is the expectation of what information should be shared by staff or in regards to staff decision.
Firstly, don't summarize. You wanted a response, and here it is. Unfortunately for anyone who reads this, long responses are my specialty lol.
Lets address the "lack" of explanation of admin decisions to players. Those decisions involve private conversations between members of staff and/or players. Even though the decision may affect the community, the details of some of these conversations are not ours to publicly disclose.
The specific decision at hand, the "disappearance" of Shifty and Raymond without a vivid explanation to the player base. You are correct that we did not make a public announcement. That was a deliberate decision because the matter involved private conversations and personnel decisions that were not appropriate to discuss publicly. I was not involved in the conversations with either one of them throughout this process so i can only understand what i know, and speculate on the rest (I tend to keep my speculations to myself though). They were not both removed by higher staff. The entire reason why Shifty is not with us anymore, while I was not informed of every aspect of, is not my business to share and I also don't know everything. But yes, he did not leave on his own accord. This is where my opinion comes in. Shifty, I am going to be honest brother (I know you will read this or someone will send it to you) I was disappointed with the way you handled yourself after the decision was made. I sat in VCs with you man, and we discussed a lot of things that players were doing wrong, skirting the rules by doing, or just disgusted with the information they shared with each other that we didn't think was appropriate that they share as they were just going behind each others backs non stop. For you to immediately send screenshots of your DMs with an admin regarding the situation, knowing what would come of this, made an already difficult and uneasy situation worse. Seeing you go make little comments on posts or using certain reactions knowing what it stirs up, i wasn't expecting that.
Raymond left on his own accord, and he left while standing up for his friend in a truly commendable manner. Everyone should have a friend that stands up for another the way he stood his ground. I have nothing else to say about Raymond being gone. There is nothing else to say, other than he left by his own choice. I respect his stance and decision, even if I wish he had stayed.
Now lets address the broader concern.
The expectation that every administrative decision, punishment, staffing change, or internal discussion should be explained to the community simply isn't realistic. Transparency does not mean every conversation becomes public. I personally try to be as communicative as I possible can, but it is simply not always possible.
Being an admin is not as easy as one would hope. It takes way more time than I would have ever thought I would put in to try my damned hardest to improve the server as much and fast as possible and to keep as many players as possible feel welcome and continue to have the desire to return. There are many things you dont realize come along with agreeing to be an admin. The ridiculous number of DMs that you receive about every single decision or action you take; whether to commend you on it, ask for more info, or just to bash you and complain because someone doesn't like it or it has a negative impact on their personal IC gain. Its wild, and it comes from a lot of people, even ones you would never expect you to come at you argumentative as if you have done this specifically to affect them. So many people come to dms to try to use your relationship with them or history to sway your decision. Having people try to get you to put your integrity in jeopardy because it helps them. I WILL NOT EVER JEOPARDIZE MY INTEGRITY FOR ANY REASON. Everyone is different, but I personally live and carry myself accountable for specific values, and I will not change that. My integrity isn't negotiable. Having people accuse you of not being the person they thought you were because you hold them accountable for their actions or dont treat them differently than you treat everyone else was an odd experience (those occasions hurt, and those people know who they are, but i hold no grudges and move on).
If every staff discussion became public whenever someone wanted an explanation, we would lose the ability to have honest internal conversations and we'd fail the people who trusted us to keep those conversations private. Most players only see the final decision. They don't see the hours of discussion, reviewing evidence, hearing both sides, or debating the fairest outcome.
Zak, you put in your above statement that you understand that there are situations that require confidentiality, and I appreciate that. My issue is that this situation was one, but that has been blown out the window. Sharing a screenshot of a "private" message with the public chat, just because it was sent to you and you felt that was a good place to share it, was the wrong thing to do. Did anyone every think to respect the other person involved in that conversation? When private conversations are shared publicly, it doesn't just affect that single situation. It discourages honest conversations in the future because people begin wondering whether anything they say privately will remain private. That action was completely counterintuitive to what you are trying to get accomplished here.
I would counter your last paragraph by saying more accountability needs to be taken by certain players in their actions. Accountability isn't a responsibility that belongs only to staff. It belongs to every member of this community. Staff are expected to follow the rules, and so are players. Zak, you specifically, have expressed repeatedly that you will do what you want, and wont follow rules if you don't want to. What position do you think that puts people like me in? I have nothing personally against you, no distain, no grudges, and wont treat you differently than i treat others, but the message you put out conveying the message that the staff is the reason that we are in this situation is a statement that i believe is an unfair accusation.
Blaming the current admin team for the server activity being much lower than it was in the past? Has the server lost players over time? Absolutely. Every RP community goes through highs and lows. But attributing that entirely to the current administration ignores the many factors involved, including the transition from RAGE MP, changing player interests, and the work being done every day to rebuild. Lately, and our media and PR team have been working extremely hard for this, and continue to do everything possible to grow. Do I think we can improve communication? Absolutely. I don't think anyone on the administration team would claim that they, or we, are perfect. If there are opportunities to better explain policy changes or community-wide decisions without violating someone's privacy, I'm all for it. Improvement and transparency are not mutually exclusive with confidentiality.
The size of the server should never play a part in how transparent or communicative an admin/staff team is. I believe this server/staff is significantly more vocal and transparent than other servers. It just comes down to certain players believe that we should disclose more info than we do, and the staff team shares all the information that they believe needs to be shared. In this situation, the people involved in making the decision and executing it, deemed it not needed to share private conversations.
At the end of the day, I'm not asking everyone to agree with every decision we make. That's never going to happen. What I do ask is that people recognize there is almost always more happening behind the scenes than what can responsibly be shared publicly. The administration team is made up of members of this community too. We want Libra RP to succeed just as much as everyone else does, and every difficult decision we make is with the long-term health of this server in mind—even when those decisions aren't popular.
