The Gaming Den

I don't suppose any of you live in Texas, near the Denton area? If you do, I've been looking for another player for my Ars Magica campaign; held every other Saturday.

Registered sex offenders need not apply.

Registered sex offenders need not apply.

Is that something you actually need to specify? Is there a story behind this?

Longes wrote:

Registered sex offenders need not apply.

Is that something you actually need to specify? Is there a story behind this?

Just nipping any potential problems in the bud. Some people are fine gaming with child rapists, others are not. My group happens to fall in the latter camp. To each their own, after all.

Not all sex offenders are child rapists. I expect that is the minority even. I don't know if they're any worse to game with than your average non raper. I'd ban kender players first since they're all child rapists and irritating gamers.

You didn't ban any Islamic terrorists. Might want to nip that one in the bud too. Nothing ruins a session more than a suicide bombing.

Eh, you have a good point, Erik. There is some non-zero number of sex offenders who sent their SO nudes while they were a minor or are statutory rapists and such, but those aren't exactly the cases people tend to think when someone says "sex offender."

They are probably a lot more common though.

I know this is the internet, but god damn that is the straightest face I've ever not been able to see. There has to be a funny and horrifying story here. That is not boiler plate disclaimer.

That aside, "sex offender" does not mean "child rapist." It also means regular rapist, prostitute, someone who paid for sex with a prostitute, someone who whipped their junk out in public, someone who took a piss in an alleyway, someone who had sex with their partner in public somewhere not quite secluded enough to avoid being caught, and a bunch of other shit. Soon (as in there are already cases of prosecutors doing this), it will mean "seventeen-year-olds who have naked photos of themselves on their phones, and the other seventeen-year-olds that they sent those photos to." Also, fun fact: "she lied about her age" is not a defense, so if you are, say, a 19-year-old boy hooking up with a 17-year-old girl, you might want to ask for ID. Note: that boy received the sentence he did because the judge is a good ol' moral crusader and teens hooking up online is destroying America and he won't stand for it. If he has to destroy a few lives to make a point, by god that's what he'll do.

Sex offender registries are weird, and they are weirder the more conservative your state is. But I would trust the Texas sex offender registry about as much as I trust the Texas board of education. The same assholes run both, and those particular assholes are not interested in things like "truth" or "honesty." Or even things like "protecting children," because if they were, they'd have actual sex education that taught them how to avoid getting knocked up in highschool.

No, I strongly suspect that the majority of people on the sex offender registry are there for petty bullshit and happened to get a judge who wanted to punish them for their wicked, deviant ways.

DSMatticus wrote:I know this is the internet, but god damn that is the straightest face I've ever not been able to see. There has to be a funny and horrifying story here. That is not boiler plate disclaimer.

Ordinarily, I would chock someone's status of being registered as them being the victim, and I did for the now ex-player for a month or two. I ordinarily do not like to pry into peoples' business, but they made an off-hand about their ex-girlfriend being vindictive, and the scene dinged my creep-dar. Out of morbid curiosity, I looked them up in the registry, and the information was corroborated by their roommate. They were 27 and the ex-girlfriend was 13.

So, nobody? Curses.

Don't feel so bad. The only other person who I knew thought lived in Texas is fbmf. Myself and others would l9ve to join your game, but I now live in NE Arkansas, and we have others from the California bay area, Germany, the Czech Republic, and Australia. We're a pretty global community and it's a bit far to drive.

I live just south of Ft. Worth, but I've never been interested in ARS Magica, and between my family and work my gaming schedule is tapped out.

Also, Texas is like... TEXA$ big. I've only ever been accross the panhandle on I40 from Memphis to Fremont and back, and that felt forever long, almost as long as Oklahoma.