Like the Friend, Don’t Like the Preaching

You do have quite a dilemma. Your friend has an annoying trait and it’s become so bothersome to you that you’re both embarrassed by it and you’re at the point where you have taken steps to avoid this person.

Generally, it is considered impolite for people to push their personal beliefs on others. It’s invasive, inconsiderate and it’s also a very ineffective way to get your message across. While it’s not against the Terms of Service to which everyone agrees when they sign up for Pogo, it is something that most people recognize as a social no-no.

The most polite thing you can do both for yourself and for this person is to be honest. You do risk losing the friendship, but you might also be doing this person a favor. Normally I would suggest you find some time to sit down in a private chat or in a private two player game room and talk to this person directly about the situation, but a topic like this with a person who has such strong feelings might cause your friend to become immediately defensive and tune out to what you are trying to communicate. So, in this case a well-written e-mail or message may actually be a better option.

Of course you will want to be delicate. In your own words you may choose to tell this player that you enjoy his or her company, but you have your own set of beliefs that you don’t wish to discuss with others. Furthermore, you would appreciate it if your friend would keep his or her beliefs out of the conversation whenever you are present.

Hopefully your message will make an impact on your friend and he or she will oblige your request. However, it is likely that even a carefully crafted message with kind criticism may trigger a defensive reaction and you may find that this player is no longer interested in maintaining a friendship. Or worse, this person may decide that you need saving worse than he or she expected, in which case you may need to begin to move away from the friendship completely.

Without being able to read exactly what happened in the chat room, I’m afraid I am not able to tell you precisely why you and your friends received warnings or suspensions. The discussion of religion and politics is not against the Terms of Service. However, if someone made threatening comments towards a politician or used some form of hate speech, then it is likely that is the reason you and your friends received your reprimands.

Or, it is possible that a mistake was made by the Customer Support staff. It’s not always immediately apparent what is happening in a chat room, and people do make mistakes. If you are certain that a mistake was made, and you have the chat log that was provided to you in your warning or suspension, then I recommend that you contact our support department to discuss the situation.

Now to answer your questions!

1. If the room you are in says “Uncensored,” it means that you should expect to see some salty language. It does not mean you can violate other Terms of Service, such as hate speech or solicitation.
2. You should not be reported for normal conversation, but people may on occasion report you for whatever reason. If the conversation is indeed “normal” with even some salty language thrown in, then our Customer Service department should not take any action against your account.
3. The rooms are uncensored in that we do allow salty language, and topics that we don’t allow in other rooms. However, and as stated previously, we do not allow certain types of chat anywhere.

Hope that clears up your confusion!

I’m sorry you feel like you have no friends. The good news is that everyone on Pogo is a potential friend.

The first thing you want to do is to change your mindset from being “friendless” to being “in search of friends.”

The second thing you want to do is to set your expectation to a realistic level. While people do make long lasting and deep friendships on Pogo regularly, that’s not always going to be the case for everyone. In the beginning just focus on finding players whose company you enjoy. Find a room that seems to have a community feel and return there regularly. And remember: deep friendships develop over time.

Remember that as an online player you have some anonymity to try new things and that unless you’re being really obnoxious or abusive, you can have fun doing so without worry of long lasting repercussions.

For instance, if you were to walk down your street yelling at the top of your lungs “I eat the bee’s knees for breakfast and the elephant’s eyebrows for lunch!” your neighbors would likely never look at you the same way again. However, if you were to click your way into a Lost Temple Poker game room one day and type “I am the Queen of the David Hasselhoff fan club and I command you to kneel!” and then come into the same game room the following day and say “Hello everyone, I wish you all good luck!” chances are extremely high nobody would remember you from the day before. So, you can be goofy one day, serious the next, outgoing the following day, and mysterious the next and in all probability no one will be the wiser.

The point is to try different approaches. If you have a sense of humor, use it. A good ice-breaker is always “Hello everyone, how ya doing?” You can ask about the weather, about their favorite Pogo game, or even whether or not anyone ever reads that Ms. Netiquette column!

I recognize that everyone is different and while this sounds simple, it’s likely frightening for some people who are extremely shy. So, be realistic. Your time on Pogo is for you to enjoy. If trying to overcome your shyness interferes greatly with your ability to enjoy your games, then set aside one hour one day a week where you will actively be more social and see where it takes you. After that hour is up, you can go back to playing as you did before. Take baby steps, because you don’t want your Pogo time to be stressful.