A View From The Other Side
Leo Balzac
I was going to do this, then I wasn't going to do this, now I'm going to do this. What is this you ask? This is a direct challenge to DMV's article from early this morning. Why wasn't I going to do this? Simple. What had happened between Dennis and I (indeed it was only between us, until he brought it to a wider audience) was old news, it happened and was dealt with. What is 'it' you ask? Well, I was going to leave 'it' out but after his latest comments and PMs to me, I feel I must go one with my message.
Before I get to far into this, I want to say to Bruce that I am indeed sorry for making you feel vulnerable and uncomfortable in this game. I feel like I must explain my actions. Your twitter feed was discovered late last night when Muglack did a Google reverse image search using the photo you had posted to the eCan forums. While reading through your twitter feed I saw lots of poetry (some good, some decent, some downright bad but no different than if someone was to go through my personal writings) and many mentions of eRepublik. I took this, obviously erroniously to mean that you weren't trying to keep the two exclusive. I then selected the passage that I liked best (my comment on your article) and posted it as a comment. Had I known that this was something that you wanted to keep private (even though it was on a public twitter account) I wouldn't have done what I did.
In the end, the error was mine and this is my mea culpa. Bruce, I am truly sorry for my actions, especially since they have caused such pain and turmoil for you. Please accept my most sincere apology, not as Leo Balzac the player but as Nick Wallace the family man.
The situation with DMV3 or Dennis McVicker or DMV is much more convoluted. I feel it is necessary that I explain my side of the story; for the final time.
Around 6 months ago, Dennis was a newcomer to eCanada, he was throwing his money around buying friends and campaigning to run the country fresh from a 2 month wipe. I, naturally opposed Dennis and back his opponent in the CP race, a legendary eCanadian Acacia Mason. Not one week prior, I had the privilege of eating a delicious lunch with Acacia, MaryChan and JBdivinus. As a bit of a backstory, Acacia had always been a fiercy private man, leaving the game for 6 months at one point after a particularly nasty player exposed his RL name, address and place of business.
Acacia had chosen to be eCan's natural champion, Dennis was the foreign challenger, throwing around CC and gold like no one before. Acacia had been leading the race in all the polls I and other had conducted. I arrived on IRC the fateful night to find Acacia an absolute mess. When I questioned him about what was going on, he proceeded to tell me that Dennis, that is Dennis McVicker AKA DMV3 had threatened to expose his RL information again, unless he withdrew from the CP race. I'm not going to lie, I was livid. Here was a player I had the upmost respect for, one of the first players to speak to me in #eCanSP (if you know what this is, then you are truly an oldfag), a man I had recently met and gained even more respect for as a result of our RL meeting. I knew Dennis was hanging out in another channel, I sought him out and in a moment of extreme emotion, a moment that I regretted until very recently I said "Dennis, How's your mom?". Now, I had heard his mother was sick, I had heard rumour that she had passed, none of this mattered in that moment. In that moment I was protecting a man I knew, from a faceless internet persona who was attacking him on a very personal level over a browser game.
Almost immediately after typing those words, and seeing the reaction of others in the channel, I felt sick to my stomach, I realized what I had done. Dennis quit IRC almost immediately as is understandable. When he finally came back on, I immediately apologized. I knew, in the heat of the moment, in a fit of passion that I had crossed a line that should never, ever be crossed. He did not accept my apology, he doesn't to this day. I can't blame him for that and I had felt badly about it until recently.
The first indication I had that Bruce was upset over what I had posted in his article wasn't a PM from Bruce saying something akin to "that's personal, remove it." (a request I would have immediately agreed to). No, it was an article from Dennis, calling me out for being a CyberBully. In looking back, my actions could certainly be construed as that of a bully. In this case, however, I must defend myself. I apologized to DMV for my insensitive words ages ago, even though he did not accept my apology (again, understandable) he went into very deep detail about his tragic personal life incident, extreme detail. I could do the same, I have had tragedy in my life as well. From a sibling lost, to my own mother, to an aunt who was like a mother. I don't though. This is none of you people's business. I have grown to despise DMV based upon his willingness to use his personal tragedy to curry favour and sympathy. In a Pathetic. Browser. Game. Later on in the day, DMV decided that turnabout was fair play (which it is) and offered a bounty on the names and school location of my children. I guess in a way I deserve that. They do not.
Dennis will tell a different story. He will tell a story of him showing an old article to Acacia to 'educate' him on what would happen if he opposed him (is this not also bullying?). A story of me attacking him from out of aboslutely nowhere, invoking his deceased mother simply because I knew it would get to him. His version of events were strongly refuted by Acacia himself after the fact. When faced with having to believe a man I had known for years, respected and had met in RL; against someone who I didn't know, who had swooped into eCan like a vulture I made the best choice I could with the information at the time.
I have proof of everything I say, I am meticulous in keeping screenshots and IRC logs. I will not be posting them here, because I will consider this matter closed one I post this article. I have had many many political opponents over my 4 years here, from funkyhum24n, addy lawrence even to crisfire at one point. All of them will attest to the fact that I may fight hard, but I fight fair.
With all of this said, my side of the story has been told. This will be my final comment on both matters. In summation, to Bruce: I am again truly sorry that I made you feel uncomfortable it was never my intent. You also have a couple good lines of poetry going, hone it, you may have something there.
To Dennis; you are a sociopath. I have apologized to you for my lack of tact those months ago, you haven't let it go; that I understand. Your immediate attack against me last night was unwarranted, the whole situation could have been solved with 1 private message. Your threat against my children is a level I would never even think about sinking to. Your continued parading of your personal tragedy into this game, in order to garner support and sympathy is particularly disgusting. I hope you get help, I hope you can find peace with yourself. I know it took me a while to achieve, so I don't expect you to find it soon either. I still wish you well.
To the rest of eCan, I also apologize for this distraction, it hasn't been productive or even remotely related to the game. I only hope we, as a collective, can move on together.
Leo
Comments
YELLOW
Nice! Second!
Not third though.
In all, good read, sad things really come down to this though. We all f*ck up, but the fact is, attack TheSmoke, or any player as much as you want, but leave the RL life stuff out. Its a damn game
agreed, this is why I apologize and leave it at this.
I won't lie, I'm speaking at this from a big point of bias, I've known Leo for ages now and see pictures of his kids on Facebook like, all the time, but anyway...
eCanada has always been a community I respected. Not a nation, obviously, can't even attack us unless there's multiple invasions (#eukstronk, innit?) but from what I see in the media and in my shout feeds (there's a lot of you, for some reason...) it's a lovely place to be. One of my first international friendships was struck up with an eCanadian, Zappie, who outtanked me all the way down in D2. Dead citizen now,unfortunately.
Anyway, point being, I'm well jel of all you lot and the relatively nice country you get to live in. For the sake of one of my favourite countries on here, I hope you can resolve the whole situation and put the ugly past behind you, where it belongs.
Zappie, I miss that guy.
What'd I love now is to hear a detailed account of this from DMV3, as I don't think I've read what happened here in his post.
Very nice, heartfelt.
WHOAAAAAA !!!!!!! did I read this right????
"Not one week prior, I had the privilege of eating a delicious lunch with Acacia, MaryChan and JBdivinus"
<<<<>>> !!!
Now THAT is worth getting excited over... you buried the lead buddy !! Okay, never mind all that other stuff about poetry and bullying and ..... THIS IS A jbdivinus sighting !!! Mobilise immediately.
hmmm... getting excited about nothing.
Nice article though.
Jbdivinus overshadows me >;
not in my eyes.
yeah, he is shorter than I expected 😛
I also remember the DMV, Acacia article story now. That sure has gotten bigger. I talked to both DMV and Acacia in PM's at the time as I was friends to both and needed to know what happened. They both talked it out together and in the end Acacia accepted DMV apology and his version of what happened. That is all that mattered to DMV he never cared what the rest of you thought.
I love Acaica but remember he went nuts when someone posted his ipre address. I have no doubt he would of been saying lot of things you are saying in the beginning. I have lived through many of his episodes as we were in the CPF from the beginning together.
Save your breath ED. Leo is only concerned with scoring political points, the truth is irrelevant to him.
Leo, there's something called REAL LIFE POLICE ( mounted police in Canada?). No one has the right to even suggest any kind of real life harm to you, much less to your kids. Say THAT clearly to him, even if he's a teenager he'll understand.
Even he's under bad times and suffering a lot, that should learn him not to create more suffering. Although, I can't blame him for being a child and suffering child.
There's no need to take this any farther Alpha. This is the hatchet being buried.
This will always be the problem when R L & here get mixed up.
People should only come here as a means of relaxation & escape from RL stuff
Yet it seems there are people who get both mixed up - usually via IRC.
I usually stay away from IRC - with good reason it seems.
Leo, yours is a good article - so how about everyone moves on
... Now that we have both sides of the story. We can conclude that the more people play here in fantasy land. The stupider they get. I wouldn't advise tracking me down... It wouldnt end well 😎
Between all others currently embroiled in this stupidity. Fix your problems quickly. If you involve the RCMP, it would become public fiasco all over eRep and everyone will know just how low you can sink. You can take me at my word when I say, the RCMP is not a tool for political gain in a fantasy game... Do not piss us off!
RCMP is a joke, they would be good to get there cruisers out of the lot
...It seems you know very little of what the RCMP are. I believe the public face and parade uniform is old fashion and traditional(kind of like a joke). But the there's more to the RCMP than what you see in the public papers.
Dont get me wrong, I'm sure there are some awesome people working there, but the people I know in RCMP tell me quite the tales. I dont know of any other police organization in Canada that has so much cowboy stunts, ignorance, favoritism, and ineptitude in it.
DMV3 has proven he's the source of all problems in the community. He was the first to attack our party for disagreeing with him, and all of the malicious rumours about these fabricated intentions come from him.
He's a bitter little guy who has trouble NOT taking things very personally, I'm hardly surprised by the above. I just hope he gets the help he needs or he's going to get himself in to trouble.
~hyuu~
~hyuu~
That's 20cc now Leo, please pay your outstanding balance before surcharges apply.
name dropper
Great read and hopefully we can all move forward, maybe not on the same page but at least reading the same book
I'm a big swinging dick around these parts, didn't you know Crisfire?
Indeed, let's move forward. Good read Leo!
To quote: Ever forward! o7
"Later on in the day, DMV decided that turnabout was fair play (which it is) and offered a bounty on the names and school location of my children."
Seldom saw a more disgusting lie before.
What DMV3 wrote was this:
http://www.erepublik.com/en/article/-cyberbullying-stand-together--2415259/1/20
"Does someone need to offer $1000 for children's names and where they go to school before you realize that bringing someone's real life into the game should be off limits? "
So neither did DMV3 mention YOUR children nor did he offer any money but asked a rhetorical question.
I know neither DMV nor Leo but that piece alone tells me enough about Leo's character. To blatantly lie and bring his own kids on the table just to score some pity-points is really low and again something I seldom had to witness in 20 years in the internet.
How would anyone even know he had children? I never read about is 2.3 Children and his dog.
I actually didn't know he had children. I just assumed since he's 40 and is too ugly to be gay he must have children.
You're right Penegrin, it was the implied threat of a bounty. I shall edit the article now. Thanks for taking the time to read. You're mind was already made up before you read this, however, so I take your opinion with a grain of salt. Enjoy your retirement.
It was no threat and no matter how hard you wish you can not twist the words so they mean in any way what you wish them too. But since you didn't edit your article yet (another lie I suppose) I suggest you delete that whole part.
You are accusing DMV3 wrongfully with a serious crime. Just because this is the internet doesn't mean you can break the law. If I were DMV I'd think about hiring a lawyer at this point.
And lastly: how should my mind have been made up allready? I have no business with neither you nor DMV, I have never been in eCanada and retired to eAustria 18 months ago.
I am judging you two only by the words you both wrote and this disgusting (and obvious) lie of yours should be enough for anyone to see your character.
You know me so well penegrin.
Leo, yet again you show your true colors. Don't worry once I'm removed from the blacklist in the eUS eCanada is all yours to ruin as you please. I'm done putting up with you. When eCanada is wiped again and you abandon the community yet again no one will be surprised. I feel pity for you, Leo. The only way you can feel good about yourself is by ruining fun for others.
oh DMV, run, run, run away...
One man's trash...