User blog:Sgt D Grif/Harassment of Users

I was considering writing a blog about this a few days ago, but decided that it wouldn't be necessary and thought that I was overreacting. However recent actions have led me to realize that was a mistake on my part. I'm not going to go into names of individuals, in part to respect the anonymity of complaints I've received, and in part to avoid giving them undue attention, but several female users have been frequently harassed in the chat. Comments made by several users have been on the border of being considered sexual harassment, and are extremely unwelcome. However, because some of these recipients don't want to get others in trouble, don't want to sound victimized, not want to cause issues, or might even blame themselves, they have very seldom complained in main or explicitly asked specific users to stop. However, this situation has been ongoing for some time, and quite frankly, I find it sickening, and instead of making my usual comments about not liking the situation in chat, I'm taking action about this now. Sexual roleplay is NOT permitted in the chatroom. While in the past, there may have been some leniency as to what counts as sexual and not, I've grown sick of coming onto chat and finding users being unwantingly "ravaged", "fondled", "pet", "felt", or any other verb people care to use. This is being mixed in with the joking between users who find it acceptable and non-serious. However, because the line of who finds it acceptable and who doesn't is being crossed repeatedly, the behavior is going to have to be cracked down on and stopped. While we won't be retroactively punishing users for past harassment, from this point forward it will NOT be tolerated any longer. Unwelcome advances or insulting/derogatory/demeaning/etc. jokes in that fashion will be dealt with much more sternly from now on. Also note that while it has been for the most part female users who have been subjected to this, ALL users will be given the proper respect and be held accountable to these rules. Some of the actions that some of you enjoy doing with each other will need to be moved to PM. I am quite aware that some of them are innocent and are not unwelcome, however the fact that some users have been treated in a manner that's frankly disgusting, means that some things will have to be moved to PM. I advise and encourage any user that is made to feel uncomfortable by another to speak up, either in the main chat to that user, asking them to stop, or to a moderator if you feel uncomfortable doing so. Users should NOT have to endure and deal with these sorts of issues, and I'm sure I'm not the only user here who has been disgusted by the actions of some other users.