As a community rid ourselves of stupid labels.

[Lemonade319]

I feel that especially recently the community in some regards has been split on a stupid boundary of legal vs illegal role play. These titles are ridiculous and only create division where there needs to be none.

 

The terms legal and illegal are something you’d find in an RPG and are honestly not suitable for this server. This server is supposed to represent real life and realistic characters. In the real world people aren’t strictly separated by terms like legal and illegal.

 

the world has many more grey areas and people simply can not fall into these two categories. Someone can commit a minor crime such as doing some drugs recreationally, speeding when they think no one is watching, getting into scraps the list goes on and on. These acts don’t make people career criminals.

 

The onus I feel is on a lot of the “legal” role players to realise and understand that there’s a difference between committing a crime and being a career criminal, I think the server would greatly benefit from more “legal” role players who realise this and incorporate it into their characters. I’d love to see normally upstanding civilians getting cosy with career criminals and partaking in things like gambling, buying illegal substances, using illegal items (think buying fake ids etc.)

 

If we get rid of this two way system I honestly feel we’d have a more united community, one that isn’t seemingly pitched against each other. One that doesn’t blame all criminals RPers when they have a bad encounter.

 

Would love you hear what you guys think.

Edited June 30, 2020 by Lemonade319

[Engelbert]

You know upstanding civilian getting cosy with career criminal? Nah, society outright bans you if you do that and they find out, trust me someone always knows. Also buying illegal substance makes you automatically a criminal if caught. Example should be recent turn of events in my country and on my street where couple of "upstanding" citizens were arrested for selling drugs. Just because they were upstanding citizens, that doesn't mean they weren't criminals, career ones, yes they were. People maybe aren't strictly in either of these two categories. But an upstanding civilian usually does not associate with a known career criminal? Why could that be? Social status quo, the most powerful and most influential thing humankind knows. We are not pitched against each other, legal side just plays legal side. The real life is simple, you make a mistake and society will never forgive you for it, be it minor or major offense. Cause people like to judge and always will judge others. That's the reality. I see no issue with associating with people who commited crime or even career criminals, as long as they keep their activities away from me, cause once I am dragged in, I become a criminal myself. And as far as society is concerned, there's no way back.

Edited June 30, 2020 by Engelbert

[Lemonade319]

5 minutes ago, Engelbert said:

You know upstanding civilian getting cosy with career criminal? Nah, society outright bans you if you do that and they find out, trust me someone always knows. Also buying illegal substance makes you automatically a criminal if caught. Example should be recent turn of events in my country and on my street where couple of "upstanding" citizens were arrested for selling drugs. Just because they were upstanding citizens, that doesn't mean they weren't criminals, career ones, yes they were. People maybe aren't strictly in either of these two categories. But an upstanding civilian usually does not associate with a known career criminal? Why could that be? Social status quo, the most powerful and most influential thing humankind knows. We are not pitched against each other, legal side just plays legal side.

It happens all of the time. Why? Because people are human, it’s natural to have vices and it’s usually the career criminals who provide them. It may also be because these criminals offer a service. Hell it may even be as simple as people growing up with and being friends with people who delve into crime. If you honestly believe people do not associate with criminals on a regular basis then I’m sorry to say that you’re extremely naive. 

Edited June 30, 2020 by Lemonade319

[Engelbert]

21 minutes ago, Lemonade319 said:

It happens all of the time. Why? Because people are human, it’s natural to have vices and it’s usually the career criminals who provide them. It may also be because these criminals offer a service. Hell it may even be as simple as people growing up with and being friends with people who delve into crime. If you honestly believe people do not associate with criminals on a regular basis then I’m sorry to say that you’re extremely naive. 

I never said they don't. Majority of my classmates were career criminals back in 90s. That's just how it is. All I am saying is people don't really wanna see their friends as ones. Cause then they would look bad themselves. As long as they remain ignorant they are fine. Cause you know crime knows no brother nor friends or family. In real life I was arrested many times, just for having such people as friends. In the game, I was shot just for standing next to someone who's been greenlit and I didn't even know him that much. And given the server? Criminals seem to care only about their business. CK apps are handed left and right and you never know when someone targets you for whatever reason. Some  criminals here do not live their lives. They only care about money and bodycount.

Edited June 30, 2020 by Engelbert

[Tree]

"Someone can commit a minor crime such as doing some drugs recreationally, speeding when they think no one is watching, getting into scraps"

 

These all happen with legal roleplayers already. With career criminals though? That's not the way it works- you don't openly associate yourself with them unless you want to be known as a criminal yourself. You might do deals with them (fake ID, as you said) but most people wouldn't dare get close to them.

[Engelbert]

Just now, Horner said:

"Someone can commit a minor crime such as doing some drugs recreationally, speeding when they think no one is watching, getting into scraps"

 

These all happen with legal roleplayers already. With career criminals though? That's not the way it works- you don't openly associate yourself with them unless you want to be known as a criminal yourself. You might do deals with them (fake ID, as you said) but most people wouldn't dare get close to them.

To add to this, legal roleplayers have more speeding or duis on their accounts then criminals IG.

[Ink]

The distinction is a generalized one. The better way to look at it is "career criminal" versus "regular" characters. The legal and illegal divide isn't where one side never commits any crimes and the other side does nothing but do crimes, the question is how comfortable these characters are doing crime, how serious the crimes they're doing are, how they derive their income, and what sort of people they surround themselves with. It's also used as a shorthand way to describe characters who are members in gangs or mafia families, which I think no one here can deny makes someone an "illegal" roleplayer.

 

In real life, I am a "legal" character, so to speak. I work for my money in a legal profession. I pay my taxes. I don't hurt human beings. I don't plot out ways I can hurt people, physically or financially. I still speed and break other minor laws. I even have some criminal friends, but I do not get involved in their business. 

After roleplaying in GTA for nearly 15 years on and off, I can say that I believe that the experience of roleplaying a "legal" character versus a career criminal character is fundamentally different. The game is different. There are similarities, but they're very different experiences at their core. 

The reason there is a rivalry is because criminal roleplayers often like to target legal roleplayers to be their victims because they see easy targets. They know legal roleplayers are less likely to be armed or aggressive (of course, not always the case), are less likely to have armed/aggressive friends, and they know most legal roleplayers won't directly clap back with a car full of masked riflemen. I think that's where most of the nuisance and rivalry occurs in these threads because people roleplaying legal characters can be so easily made a victim of a person playing an illegal character, and if the player of the illegal character isn't considerate to making RP enjoyable, they can severely ruin someone's time.

[BadassBaboon]

27 minutes ago, Engelbert said:

To add to this, legal roleplayers have more speeding or duis on their accounts then criminals IG.

That's true, criminals from what I've seen drive subtle and cheaper cars while "legal roleplayers" often drive the expensive speedy cars and such.

[Lemonade319]

30 minutes ago, Engelbert said:

To add to this, legal roleplayers have more speeding or duis on their accounts then criminals IG.

That just further adds to my point that the whole legal vs illegal character thing stupid. Especially when some so called legal characters have had more punishments for their crimes than some criminal characters.

[Ink]

54 minutes ago, Lemonade319 said:

That just further adds to my point that the whole legal vs illegal character thing stupid. Especially when some so called legal characters have had more punishments for their crimes than some criminal characters.

 

To be fair, that's also because "legal" characters are more likely to stop for a cop and take a ticket instead of doing a high-speed chase and trying to murk them with their homeboys. 

 

It's not unusual for regular citizens in real life to rack up a few minor crimes on their records. Most people I know in real life have been pulled over. The difference is "legal" roleplayers aren't carrying around guns with serial numbers scratched off, have probably never committed a cold-blooded murder, and aren't extorting mom and pop shops with threats of kidnapping/breaking legs/vandalism over a couple thousand bucks.