A formal apology to r/kappa, but with caveats:

Through no motivation other than it's the mature and right thing to do, I offer a formal apology to r/kappa. It's not fair to paint that whole scene in one broad stroke and there are many people there who do great things for the FGC and have positive affects on the community.



Having said that, work needs to be done on both sides: as many people who have come to criticize me about my rant in a productive and POSITIVE way (even WITH them being very critical of me), more people have praised me and thanked me for calling r/kappa out. If what people tell me is true and that kappa isn't ALL bad, they need as much of a PR makeover as Capcom does.



So there are a lot of good people who frequent kappa. I acknowledge that and I apologize to the good and productive people there for implying they're worthless. That was wrong and again I apologize. But I will stand by my belief that they are overall still far too negative and people need to be more positive there. And by positive, as I hinted earlier, I don't mean holding back critiques. PLEASE be critical and vote with your wallet and continue to call out stupid behavior and stupid policies. But you can do it all in a more productive and positive way. There's a difference between telling your kid who got 3rd place in a race, "You idiot! You're supposed to conserve your energy! I hope you get worse and stop racing so your little brother learns from your failures!" and "Look, you didn't pay attention to my advice from before the race. We want to do better, so next time, pace yourself. Remember that second wind. Remember what we talked about." The more negative the criticisms, the more chances you'll get replied to with "Left Behind" comments. People at Capcom are human, too, and as unfair it is to paint all of r/kappa as mindless haters, it's also unfair to believe that the people at Capcom aren't trying really fucking hard to do the right things. But negativity begets negativity, so here we are.



What kappa needs is to police itself as much as they try to police the FGC. Not calling each other out on over-instances of negativity only cause people like me to ignore them as a whole and blow them off, including their good sides. But a lot of what they do, including sponsoring players, IS admirable. A lot of people in that subreddit are good people who do a lot of good things for their local.



(Side note: I was harsh on sponsorships for sure. The sponsorship that made me soured on kappa's efforts was the Evo top 8 AiAi instant sponsorship. They didn't fly him out, they just paid AiAi to put r/Kappa on his name for top 8. I mean, think about that. If someone like TriForce did that, man r/kappa would have CRUCIFIED him. They should have just let him finish the event and sponsor him starting the next events. So apologies for letting one instance really irk me that badly, but it felt very hypocritical and insincere at the time.)



I know a lot of kappa prides itself on is its rawness and its ability to "tell it like it is." But then you can't get mad when people do the same thing to you (not talking about me specifically. I definitely went a bit overboard due to frustrations). If you breed yourself off of being raw and promoting hate, you have to expect those kind of responses to you. So I think the positive influences within kappa need to do the same thing you guys are telling Capcom to do: get better communication, get better PR, and do shit to fix yourselves internally. Highlight the good members there, call out people being unproductively negative, and show people that you are more than just a group of "haters". Again, this reputation isn't just from me: too many people have come out and said, "Yeah! Fuck them!" to me to the point where _I_ am starting to feel uncomfortable with it. I'm not like most: people agreeing with me on the internet tends to make me worried. And this one in particular because of all the Counter points that others have provided to me.



I said it before in a previous rant: r/kappa is dangerous because they have so much power to affect the scene, and they use it irresponsibly. They matter and they matter a lot. People mocked me when I said that in the previous rant, said I have them too much credit. But it's true: their influence is strong, and it's caused our scene to be full of negativity and hate. Even a guy like Valle has been noting the increase in negativity, and he's from the Watson school of "Fuck your shit." Many people I know in the FGC have become VERY weary, stressed out, and depressed by the overall negativity in the scene of late. It's why what Tokido said made me so emotional: it was the greatest, most succinct positive thing you could say about the FGC at the perfect moment. It was a bright beacon amidst a lot of internal turmoil, for myself in particular, and it made me lose it.



And again, this has little to do with what kappa thinks of me personally. I don't care if they hate me. It sucks, but it's whatever. I made my own bed. But it's more that they hate on a lot of people, and many of people I consider my friends and family. I see shit they say about a lot of people, and it's rarer for others to come out and tell them to chill than it is for others to come in and chime in and agree with it. This isn't a one-on-one for me: it's a team game and I care about my teammates being spoken about so negatively and and being joked about like they don't have feelings. These negative things you say are real: real people are affected by it. And they aren't even real celebrities so the "fuck the haters" mentality can only get you so far when you ARE playing the game for love and care about the community and then you see that same community come back and shit on you. And you don't WANT to breed an environment of "celebrities" who DO think "fuck the haters" in the first place!



So again, tl;dr: being positive does NOT mean not being critical. You can and SHOULD be critical of all things you find problematic. But don't try to take things down and don't think those that ARE enjoying the thing you hate are shills or "Capcucks" or whatever term you want to use to justify them liking something you don't. And r/kappa needs to do a lot to fix its reputation if it doesn't want people like me ranting about them. I'm down to work with kappa on this effort.



Fighting games is something so great. So let's try to bring back the positivity in our scene.

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