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Never seen anything excepcional here in the forums against paradox or their devs who post on SA People here criticize games, tv shows, movies, artists, companies, anything, and be often pretty harsh. I never seen anything out of the normal directed to paradox, if anything I would say they get an easier time than most cause a lot of people here love their games
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Oct 14, 2021 15:01
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There was a dev who got pretty disheartened about how negative the Stellaris thread was. I don't remember who it was, though.
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Oct 14, 2021 15:04
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Cease to Hope posted:There was a dev who got pretty disheartened about how negative the Stellaris thread was. I don't remember who it was, though.
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Oct 14, 2021 15:09
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The Imperator release didn't go great for Johan, but that wasn't limited to just these forums. And they've done a pretty amazing job improving the game and addressing the criticism since.
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Oct 14, 2021 15:12
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Poil posted:Isn't most of the crankiness/animosity towards paradox here mostly just against them as a whole or their various studios and not the individuals (except maybe for upper management since it is part of their job to be responsible)? It's not like anyone here is calling out for LordMune or Wiz personally to be burned at the stake for every single thing paradox has ever done wrong. I mean I called the people who did Leviathan incompetent and I stand by that, because it is bad, but if one of the people who worked on it would for some bizarre reason post here I would NEVER harass them or blame them personally for it. (but I definitely could have tried to phrase that whiny post better). I mean, goons were out here calling johan incompetent to his face over imperator/eu4. So, no, it wasn't mostly just against paradox as a whole, nor about any of the scandals. Paradox devs get poo poo on a lot here just in general.
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Oct 14, 2021 15:17
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Jazerus posted:the devs that post here are by and large not managers. the ones that are managers are either johan (who imo is a valid target given that this is, in many ways, his company even if he doesn't run it) or wiz, who immediately came out in support of the union. also at this point almost all of the paradox dev goons were goons first and became paradox devs later...i don't see the point in aiming criticism at them rather than the people who made the culture they were hired into, especially when they're all apparently in the union. that’s sort of what I’m saying? I think we agree. The devs can only do so much vis-a-vis the management, and I think goons shouldn’t lay off discussing the myriad allegations against Paradox because the devs - who may well not be involved - might get upset. That doesn’t make sense. And unfortunately, despite his forum superstar status here (see the post above), I completely think Johan had to have been complicit, especially with how close he was to Fredrik. And if not, ideally more information will come out exonerating him.
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Oct 14, 2021 15:46
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You don't actually know what's going on and a dead internet comedy forum is not remotely an appropriate place to ask about this sort of stuff.
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Oct 14, 2021 16:06
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"Goons shouldn't criticize bad games or talk about corporate misogyny because it might upset goons who work with the company" is a weird take. It's fair and square not to attack these goons personally and directly, because thats just stupid. But if one of them gets upset about people making GBS threads on Rome or stellaris, that's on them, not us. And if they get bummed out at us discussing these serious accusations of harassment and misogyny, they simply should take a step away from the forums and focus in helping their affected colleagues.
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Oct 14, 2021 16:34
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We don't have to hold off on discussing the allegations because of the devs, no one's saying that. But we shouldn't bother asking the devs for more details, nor should we expect them to tell detailed stories about it. People whose real identities are linked to their forum accounts are not going to tell us non-public information about poo poo that is currently getting their employer lots of negative press. I don't think anyone's saying we can't be mean to the Paradox employees who post here, they're just saying that we shouldn't be surprised if the Paradox devs stop posting here because they decide they have better things to do than get yelled at on an internet forum.
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Oct 14, 2021 16:36
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Sure is a lot of people imagining posts that didn't happen here.
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Oct 14, 2021 17:07
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Alchenar posted:You don't actually know what's going on and a dead internet comedy forum is not remotely an appropriate place to ask about this sort of stuff. no one is asking folks anything? What
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Oct 14, 2021 17:10
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You can criticize a paradox dev but only if your regdate is before theirs.
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Oct 14, 2021 17:13
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LordMune posted:Eh. My experience is that I've moved on to positions of greater responsibility so I'm slightly more careful about what I say/have less time to say it, but that's the only relevant internal change. The tone of online discourse absolutely impacts willingness to engage. That's good to hear! Keep it up! 
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Oct 14, 2021 17:13
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Lady Radia posted:no one is asking folks anything? What DrSunshine posted:Paradox Goons: Have you witnessed anything like this in your meetings and teams? Do you have women employees in your team? What do you do to include their input?
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Oct 14, 2021 17:15
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Cease to Hope posted:There was a dev who got pretty disheartened about how negative the Stellaris thread was. I don't remember who it was, though. Stellaris has become maybe my favourite Paradox game by now, so that dev is hopefully happier now (even if the last patch/DLC or two just added stuff nobody cares about).
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Oct 14, 2021 20:55
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oh i did miss that. Very dumb post
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Oct 14, 2021 22:50
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Zeron posted:The Imperator release didn't go great for Johan, but that wasn't limited to just these forums. And they've done a pretty amazing job improving the game and addressing the criticism since. I’ve stopped posting much on the internet after imperator unless i really have to. However, these forums were not exactly that hostile though.
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Oct 14, 2021 23:27
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Grevlek posted:You can criticize a paradox dev but only if your regdate is before theirs. Youre safe this time Johan......
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Oct 15, 2021 01:39
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If I've got Archangel's reg date beat both here and on the PDX forums, does that mean he is obligated to make a Communist Germany path? It does, doesn't it?
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Oct 15, 2021 03:17
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Grevlek posted:You can criticize a paradox dev but only if your regdate is before theirs. Oh it's loving on now
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Oct 15, 2021 04:30
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Mans posted:"Goons shouldn't criticize bad games or talk about corporate misogyny because it might upset goons who work with the company" is a weird take. You're right, that is a weird take, so it's a good thing that nobody has ever posted it here.
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Oct 15, 2021 04:35
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Grevlek posted:You can criticize a paradox dev but only if your regdate is before theirs. I can live with this.
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Oct 15, 2021 05:52
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I feel like there's a lot of talking past eachother the last page or so. I think the two things everyone can agree on are, 1. Paradox's management has been openly complicit with sexual harassment and belittling on a fundamental scale for years, if not since founding, and 2. Paradox's CEO is literally being "wow this is such a shock" after coming back into power when the last woman CEO stepped down, despite allegations against him directly, and that's Really Bad.
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Oct 15, 2021 06:39
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Johan said he's a member of the union, so he's definitely not management. His role sounds more like a technical lead than a personnel manager anyway
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Oct 15, 2021 08:28
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Okay the thing to remember is that Paradox Interactive started out as a 7 man studio that achieved escape velocity from the bankruptcy and breakup of Target Games. There's an in-between moment where Fredrik gets brought in to advise on strategy for Paradox Entertainment and when the board decides to double down on making unsuccessful AAA games rather than repeat the successful grand strategy formula he buys out the video games division which I believe includes Johan (does this story seem familiar?). So without really having any detail as to what's going on, rather than assume individual malice it seems more likely that Paradox just did what hundreds of other small companies that experience rapid growth have done, which is that they didn't quite get right the necessary cultural shift as they grew and had a core who kept on acting like they were a company half dozen guys taking on the world rather than a medium-to-large international enterprise with hundreds of employees.
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Oct 15, 2021 09:20
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eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeh fair points as they may be that still ultimately rubs me as apologia, you could just not be misogynist in the first place maybe edit: nvm I think I understand the point you're making better. Still not exactly exonerating for anyone involved tho ThatBasqueGuy fucked around with this message at 09:29 on Oct 15, 2021 |
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Oct 15, 2021 09:25
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Yeah I'm not trying to make claims either way, the point is more that as outsiders it's not productive to assume malice or demand names for the pitchforks (the pitchforks in question being angry posts on the internet rather than a formal/union process in Sweden that might actually make things better). The thing that is useful for us to understand as outsiders are the structural problems that lead to this happening, because that's more likely to have relevance to us in our real lives. e: /\/\ I do get what you are saying, but I suspect having a policy of 'just try not to be misogynist, okay' is probably a part of how Paradox has ended up with all these accusations. Alchenar fucked around with this message at 09:52 on Oct 15, 2021 |
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Oct 15, 2021 09:49
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Alchenar posted:Okay the thing to remember is that Paradox Interactive started out as a 7 man studio that achieved escape velocity from the bankruptcy and breakup of Target Games. There's an in-between moment where Fredrik gets brought in to advise on strategy for Paradox Entertainment and when the board decides to double down on making unsuccessful AAA games rather than repeat the successful grand strategy formula he buys out the video games division which I believe includes Johan (does this story seem familiar?). rather than assume individual malice on behalf of the perpetrators? Uh are you serious? I get this isnt an issue with them using an UNPROFESSIONAL WALLPAPER, something you care deeply about, but
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Oct 15, 2021 16:35
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Part of the problem is that policies have to address two separate scenarios for bullying/harassment. (1) people who know exactly what they are doing and revel in it. Honestly I don’t think there are a lot of people like this but it’s not zero either. (2) people who don’t understand where the boundaries are or the impact them being them has on other people. Lots of reasons for this; they could be clueless, slow, low empathy, autistic, from a more conservative cultural background, etc. It seems very likely that games companies are overrepresented with this group. Usually people in category (2) go through a period of cognitive dissonance and then re-evaluate and become nicer people when they realise they’ve upset someone. Like, re examine and update their idea of what the social rules are. Sometimes it takes more than one instance. I don’t really know anyone who switched over to category (1): every so often someone threatens to but it’s usually just part of reconciling the cognitive dissonance and they eventually rejoin the mainstream. This means that at any given time a policy is probably not harsh enough for the real problem people and too harsh for the rest. It’s a hard one to solve; deciding where the line is is an inherently social thing and the line is moving all the time whereas the policy is fixed until someone changes it.
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Oct 15, 2021 16:46
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Lady Radia posted:rather than assume individual malice on behalf of the perpetrators? Uh are you serious? I get this isnt an issue with them using an UNPROFESSIONAL WALLPAPER, something you care deeply about, but I mean rather than calling out random devs on social media and demand that they justify why they aren't a terrible person. Or assuming that the people at the top of Paradox deliberately set out to create an environment where sexual harassment is a norm. Alchenar fucked around with this message at 16:54 on Oct 15, 2021 |
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Oct 15, 2021 16:49
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calling out random devs on social media is dumb and they’ve already been laughed out of here, but I’m pretty shocked you’re talking about how we shouldn’t believe allegations against Fredrik because “who knows what happened”.
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Oct 15, 2021 20:09
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Lady Radia posted:calling out random devs on social media is dumb and they’ve already been laughed out of here, but I’m pretty shocked you’re talking about how we shouldn’t believe allegations against Fredrik because “who knows what happened”. I'm not saying we shouldn't believe specific allegations, particularly the ones he's held his hands up to. I'm saying that an awful lot of leaping is being done from 'Fredrik once did a bad thing and got immediately called out for it by HR' to why exactly Paradox evidently has a lovely culture, and I particularly don't think it's helpful to be trying to engage Paradox employees in this leaping when there is a company and union process going on.
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Oct 15, 2021 20:21
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There's value to being judicious about allegations but didn't Paradox rehire Fredrik after all this stuff came out internally and he left? If you believe the allegations against him then Paradox necessarily has a lovely culture.
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Oct 15, 2021 21:04
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I am surprised. I thought this stuff was almost stamped out here in Scandinavia, but then again I have never worked in very male dominated industries.
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Oct 15, 2021 21:14
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Hryme posted:I am surprised. I thought this stuff was almost stamped out here in Scandinavia, but then again I have never worked in very male dominated industries. Anecdotal and all, but my gf from Russia and woman friends from both sides of the atlantic, pretty much universally find euro, including scandinavian, men to be significantly pushier and more aggressive than in North America. And that's not a compliment to North America. It's a huge problem just swept under the rug. People just shrug and go "well, we must be more progressive than anywhere else, right? Right??"
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Oct 15, 2021 21:19
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I can imagine sexual harassment. But refusing to listen to someone because of their gender just seems alien to me. That seems like the 1950ies.
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Oct 15, 2021 21:30
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Alchenar posted:I'm not saying we shouldn't believe specific allegations, particularly the ones he's held his hands up to. I'm saying that an awful lot of leaping is being done from 'Fredrik once did a bad thing and got immediately called out for it by HR' to why exactly Paradox evidently has a lovely culture, and I particularly don't think it's helpful to be trying to engage Paradox employees in this leaping when there is a company and union process going on.
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Oct 15, 2021 21:42
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Alchenar posted:I'm not saying we shouldn't believe specific allegations, particularly the ones he's held his hands up to. I'm saying that an awful lot of leaping is being done from 'Fredrik once did a bad thing and got immediately called out for it by HR' to why exactly Paradox evidently has a lovely culture, and I particularly don't think it's helpful to be trying to engage Paradox employees in this leaping when there is a company and union process going on.  So you're telling us to ignore the multiple surveys conducted which show there's a systematic cultural issue at Paradox, again, because "we have no idea what's going on"? Again, sorry it doesn't measure up to the wallpaper poo poo you melted down about.
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Oct 15, 2021 22:03
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Lady Radia posted:
No you are repeatedly misreading my posts, which I presume is whatever got you banned and forced you to re-reg.
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Oct 15, 2021 22:11
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Lady Radia posted:
All Alchenar is saying is don't go after individuals that haven't had confirmed knocks against them and blaming or extending blame to them for the systemic culture issue at Paradox. It's not our place to do that. Definitely signal boost stories and reports, but don't witch hunt anyone who just so happens to work for the company.
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Oct 15, 2021 22:35
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