All right, time to just simplify this. I'll let others handle the peripheral issues... the main point I think was addressed in the last paragraph of Space's response to me:

> What was out of the ordinary last night was that events transpired that could be taken as disrespectful. A "prank" was pulled that could be seen as having derived its humor from the fact that people were hurt by it. Rinkworks is a humorous website, but there are traditions of respect and courtesy. If these traditions are upheld, then really, there's no problem.
>
> -SB

That something could be construed as disrespectful is not the same thing as actually being disrespectful. If people actually got hurt, that's a bad thing. It was never at any time my intention to hurt anybody. HOWEVER, I don't think that I (or Sam or Dave for that matter) did anything that could rationally be construed as hurtful (and definitely not intentionally so).

Let me explain the humor in the prank, as it had nothing to do with hurting people. Essentially, Dave and Sam were pretending to be frat boys. Frat boys, by themselves, are pretty funny. Sam and Dave were basically playing up an ultra stereotype of frat boys. Exaggeration is an intrinsic part of humor (especially satire / parody). THIS IS WHY THEY ASSUMED THE JOKE WOULD BE SOMEWHAT FUNNY.

That was part one. Part two of the prank happened when I (knowing who was behind it), claimed that Morris and Wormwood were behind it. It's not the funniest thing in the world, but I've done it before (remember that I claimed that Rad was originally Darien to a humerous end) and it's worked out okay. I've also had similar things happen to me (Revenge of Sam II) and have been able to find humor in it.

By this point in the chat, I think it was clear that BEER and BUTT were not real. Everybody was starting to figure that out, so I decided to move the prank up a notch. It didn't really pan out, and it basically got carried to the point where it wasn't funny. That's beside the point though. This has happened before. The fact that BEER and BUTT were offensive really shouldn't have made it an insult to be considered them, since everyone in chat was aware that they were jokes (and if not, the implication that Worm or Morris were them pretty much made it a certainty).

In other words, the people that got offended (this means you, Wormwood) need to grow thicker skin.

Now, what's this BS about being respectful? How often does Dave enter chat and tell me how much he hates me? Or vice versa? We need to make clear that any perceived disrespect was not serious. This was all in jest. Compared to the insults and stuff I've traded in RC, this hardly seems worth getting upset about, since there was also NO MALICE AT ANY TIME behind any of this.

You don't have to be able to rationalize why you got upset; it's an emotional response and such things aren't always tied to logic. I can respect that. What I can't respect is that, after much time has passed and emotions have cooled down, why the hell this is an issue with the people who were offended. If anyone's STILL upset over being fooled or "disrespected" from something that happened in an INTERNET CHATROOM they need to get a handle on things.

Stephen