Otaku Predators?

This is the most important post I'll make all year so pay attention

If a member ever contacts you, unsolicited, and makes any sort of sexual or inappropriate remarks, please do two things ASAP in this order and DO NOT RESPOND:

(1) Copy and paste the correspondence and email us immediately.

(2) Add that member to your block list.

#1 is by far more important than #2. I recently froze a few members' accounts who some might classify as "predators"--I should have been notified about these accounts AGES ago but instead of reporting them, a lot of members simply blocked them and stayed quiet.

How did I find out?

By looking at our block list records.

This is unacceptable.

Let me tell you all a personal story that takes this concept outside of the internet realm and into the real world. This is a story I'm a bit embarrassed to talk about but it's important.

A few years ago, I was walking down the street here in the city. I was on my lunch break at work, returning. As I was walking this middle-aged man, completely normal looking, started talking to me about his daughter who just moved to NYC. We were surrounded by people in the middle of the day and I went along with it, thinking he was a tourist and had a question or something.

All of a sudden, the guy reaches over and starts holding my hand. It was the most horrifying feeling you can imagine. Thankfully I'm a tall/tough guy, but even then who knows if this guy had a weapon of any sorts or if I was just "practice" for him to approach a girl or a little kid.

I pushed his hand away, glared at him and rushed to my office. He backed off quickly, but to this day I regret my actions and know that I made a HUGE mistake with the encounter.

By staying quiet and just glaring at him, I was ENABLING him. See, he could now do the same thing to 50 other people thinking that they'll all simply glare and shove him away. No real consequences.

Here's what I should have done. The second he touched my hand, I should have grabbed my hand away and yelled "Don't touch me you pervert!!" as loud as I could. EVERYONE would have immediately stopped and turned to him and the game would be up.

It's like shining a light on a cockroach, they hate attention. This pervert would be VERY careful if he ever tried to do the same thing from that point on again. In fact that might be so traumatic for him that it might stop him for good.

(Of course sometimes I imagine instead of glaring or yelling that I beat him up instead )

To bring it back, any member who receives an unsolicited, inappropriate PM, by staying quiet and just blocking, is making the same mistake I once made. Don't become an enabler.

End