Vadim-Graham Controversy

The Vadim-Graham controversy refers to the controversial presence and conduct of Graham and Vadim, and occasionally other RTSG members, mostly between June and October of 2020, and primarily between the duo and Conq. The main reasons behind the situation was a mixture of their general toxicity, unclear server rules, and differing attitudes to moderation by various members of the GS moderation team.

Background
The word cope was the main catalyst of the controversy, as the word had become increasingly unpopular in GS due to its use to flame and annoy people. Vadim was the first of the two to begin using this word in large quantity, first recorded on the 17th of June 2020., where he used the word in a self-depreciating manner, meaning that it isn't truly an example of Vadim's or Graham's use of cope in a way to harass other members. The first genuine example of Vadim using the word in its best known sense was on the 18th, when he used it to annoy Duck over an in-game argument. Tensions slowly rose over the course of late-June, notably when Vadim began using the word cope against Conq when he claimed that Vadim was abusing game mechanics. On the 4th of July, Vadim used the word further to irritate Duck once again regarding an argument about game processing, while other members such as Delta got angry at Vadim for his poor attitude and rude behaviour towards other members. A few days later, Avraso threatened to rage quit the server because of how annoying the word "cope" was, though the word at that particular time was used by Duck. Graham's first use of cope occured on the 11th of July when Delta complained about unfair processing.

Main phase
The situation had become severe by mid-July, as more members began complaining about how the word was only used to harass other GS members. Vadim began using the word frequently against Conq to irritate him when the latter made complaints about game processing.

On the 14th of July, Delta half-ironically asked Chegg for admin perms so that he could ban Vadim. On that same day, an in game event regarding the sinking of ships, of which Japan was accused of doing, resulted in the best example of cope as a way to flame. Conq and Delta, the Japan players, denied being responsible of sinking the ship following an investigation by Greece, which was led by Graham. Vadim was the USA player, and his main response was to spam laughing emojis and tell them to cope. Conq and Delta laid out their arguments asserting their innocence, which was met with a long silence by Vadim, followed by him saying "Axis cope". He refused to argue any further, stating that he only needed to say "cope". A few days later, Quartz made a small complaint about people such as Vadim and Sins constantly saying "cope" to annoy Axis players. Funnily enough, even Pat was opposed to the word in some cases, stating that it was "low-key toxic", though he would occasionally use the word anyway and later defend it. On the 17th of July, Avraso stated that Vadim's brain consisted fully of "Cope!!".

On the 20th of July, an argument broke out over Germany's foreign policy, where the axis had secured more or less a strategic victory in Eastern Europe. Several allied members, namely Sharky and Vadim, called the Axis members primates, and then told them that they would be "coping soon". Quartz, the Italy player, and Delta turned Vadim's toxicity on him, and told him that he was coping. To insult Delta, Vadim posted a screenshot of Delta accidentally sending him an invite to a discord server, and called Delta a retard several times. Delta got infuriated and told Vadim that he was being incredibly toxic, to which Chegg came online and ordered Vadim to stop being rude. Vadim apologised for his attitude.

Further use of cope occured, such as on the 22th of July when Avraso was randomly called an "England brain" and "wasteman" for some reason by Vadim, to which he responded that he refused to listen to somebody as toxic as Vadim. On the 27th of July, in response to Conq's attempts to defend himself following the Presidential Promise, Conq was faced a barrage of "cope" by Pat, Sharky and Graham. On the 29th, Delta got frustrated at Vadim once again for his insulting use of "cope" instead of showing any form of respect. That day, Chegg hinted in the elder moderator channel that she too was getting weary of the word, and somewhat wished for it to be banned. The controversy was only made worse when Vadim supported banning Conq due to the promise, which other GS members were highly critical of and saw as opportunistic.

The apex of the argument began to be reached by the start of August. On the 1st of August, Conq wrote a small anecdote about a Christian preacher on a school bus that he met, to which Vadim called him an "unironic tankie Mak boot licker". Conq called Vadim a "kid on the internet" who only likes to say "cope", to which he was again called a tankie. Koe and Delta told Vadim to cope.

On the 4th of August, Koe posted decided to post a public poll on whether cope should be banned. This was met with some pushback, though most non-RTSG members were supportive of the ban, reflecting the divide between regular GS members and RTSG members in the server, It was following this poll that Pat decided to fight for the pro-cope faction, mainly Vadim and Graham. Chegg was supportive of the ban because of rising toxicity in the server surrounding the word, and got angry at Pat for his dismissive attitude towards the word and its use. Pat claimed that the ban on cope was unenforcable, which Chegg believed was an exaggeration. The argument quickly ended without a resolution. Hatknight also opposed the ban because of how widely used the word was, to which Avraso stated that it was only widely used to flame. On the 6th of August, the word was formally banned by Koe in announcements. Vadim did not oppose the ban, yet he would continue to use the word in the following days, despite the word being punishable with a small mute. On this day, Vya jokingly gave Vadim a "cope-pass", which spurred Chegg to mute both of them. Once unmuted, they persisted in saying mute, causing Chegg to kick them both. Vadim would not return to the server for some time due to the cope ban. Graham used the word a few days later during a trade dispute with Bean to no punishment.

2nd Postman Pat Incident
With Vadim's departure, Graham would become the main focus of the controversy. Graham said the word on the 14th of August, the first day of the 2nd Postman Pat Incident, and was muted by Conq as a result for about 10 minutes. However, Chegg would unmute him anyway, to Conq's surprise. Graham criticised the server's enforcement of a cope ban, believing it was unfair. At the end of their argument, Graham teased Conq by telling him to cope, resulting in a 30 minute mute. Once he was unmuted, Conq got into an argument with Graham and Avraso, with him being accused of hypocrisy following his persistent past use of the n-word. Graham claimed that Conq deserved to be muted for muting him, to which Avraso told him to "shut the fuck up". Graham argued that the cope ban was stupid, to which Conq repeatedly stated that it was because of its use to flame and be toxic. Graham stated that he only wanted to annoy Conq, and defended his desire to annoy him. Eventually, Chegg relented and unbanned the word, largely due to pressure from Pat, but highlighted that using it to be toxic was still against the server rules. In response, Graham immediately told Conq to cope, resulting in a 1 hour mute. He was eventually unmuted as Chegg believed that it was too harsh, causing Conq to accuse her of being too soft.

On the 15th of August, Pat restarted the argument. During this argument, which has since been largely lost due to Pat's ban deleting all of his posts, Graham asked Chegg to mute Conq. Conq told him to just leave the conversation, causing Graham to simply insult him. He told Conq to cope, resulting in a mute. Graham started a bad faith argument, asking repeatedly if he was allowed to say "cope", implying that if the word was allowed he would use it to continue flaming Conq. Despite the toxicity rule, Graham demanded to be allowed to tell Conq to cope. He proceded to tell several people to cope during the argument, resulting in a mute from Conq.

In the midst of the 2nd Postman Pat Incident during the 15th of August, Graham continued to use cope to annoy Conq, albeit in a way that did not break the literal meaning of the rules. He spammed it before being muted for 1 hour, though Koe and Chegg believed that the mute was extreme. Pat was supportive of Graham throughout the argument, claiming that Conq was abusing his powers as a moderator. Pat also claimed that Conq's attempt to punish Graham was "detrimental to the server". Graham requested a quarantine channel for him to say whatever he wanted, stating that it would be like CHAZ, in a spooky foreshadowing of CHAD. Conq relented but stated that he would be very harsh on use of the word outside of this quarantine channel. Graham demanded a server review into Conq's mutes against him. Chegg finally announced that Graham would be muted for 30 minutes for any infraction, and that Pat and Conq could not veto each other's enforcement of rules. The arguing persisted however, as Graham continued to argue in bad faith over what was allowed, before finally being told to "shut up" by Chegg. Pat would be banned later that day due to various of his actions. Graham accused Conq of causing the 2nd Postman Pat Incident, and claimed that the only way to prevent any further drama would be to remove Conq's moderator abilities, claiming that he was controversial. Quartz defended Conq, stating that he was only "controversial" because of Graham's incessant harassment of him. Graham told Conq to cope, causing Chegg to mute him for 45 minutes, longer than the 30 minutes agreed upon earlier that day. Conq remained opposed to a quarantine channel in the following days, believing it would legitimise Graham's habits.

Post 2nd Postman Past Incident
The 2nd Postman Pat Incident led to the death of GS6. As a result, a new server was created for GS7, led by Cactus. Vadim returned to GS, joining the GS7 server. Graham was briefly banned by Chegg from the server beforehand, but he was allowed into it soon enough. Graham and Vadim did not flame on the first day of the server, preferring to stay. Controversy returned on the second day of the server, on the 24th of August, when Vadim told Bean to cope, for which he was muted. By now, many server members felt that while Graham was in the wrong, Conq should try to ignore him as well. Some members such as Airwicka began pinging Conq to say cope as a way to make fun of him for being sensitive about the word, though Chegg still asserted that members should not be annoying Conq. Graham attempted to defend himself, but Chegg told him to shut up. He continued shortly, before Delta muted him. Koe argued that banning Graham far outweighed any positives of having him in the server. Vadim was unmuted and agreed that he should limit himself. On the 29th of August, a debate took place about the role of US forces worldwide. During the debate, Graham called Conq a "fucking monkey brainlet" in response to Conq portraying US forces as "terrorists". Conq banned Graham, stating that this was his final chance to stop being toxic. While it was agreed that a punishment was warranted, GS members also believed that a ban was too much, sympathising with Graham due to him having a family history with the US military. He was eventually allowed back in.

The situation was stable for most of September, with sporadic mentions of "cope", although it was never used against Conq. However, Graham continued to use the word in ways that would annoy Conq without breaking the rules.

Bans
On the 24th of August, Conq petitioned to ban Vadim and Graham in the admin channel. This was met with opposition from most moderators, but Conq persisted and stated that he was angry at being the focus of most flaming from Graham and Vadim, which most other servers members didn't face. Eventually, it was agreed that he would get a final warning. On the 9th of September, Vadim finally left the server due to mounting opposition to his presence. He would be banned later.

On the 4th of October, Koe asked for Graham to finally be banned from the server, citing this irritating behaviour that day. Chegg defended their actions, citing them being middle-schoolers, but Koe stated that it shouldn't be GS' problem to accomodate his immaturity. Chegg also argued that it might make tensions between RTSG and GS rise, but other members stated that it was meaningless because the situation was already terrible. A poll was made in the elder mod channel, and all elder mods except will5stars voted to ban Graham and Vadim.

Legacy
By 2022, assessments of the Vadim-Graham argument had changed considerably. Most members agreed that the two should have been banned much earlier. Chegg is the only member to still be somewhat sympathetic, arguing that they were immature and should have been forgived more, but most GS'ers believe that it should not be the concern of GS to accomodate them.

There are currently three main factors believed to be the reasons why the situation was dragged out for so long. Firstly, GS relied too much on trying to be "fair" when it came to banning members, a sentiment mostly held by Chegg. Secondly, due to Conq's role as the spearhead of the anti-Vadim and Graham group, many were turned away from opposing them, due to persistent feelings of distrust towards Conq following previous incidents in the server such as the July Bans. Lastly, the incident was dragged out for so long that some server members forgot individual acts by Graham and Vadim's, causing them to believe that the two were not as toxic as they actually were. This is notable though members such as Avraso, who was aggravated enough by the two in July to the point where he threatened to leave GS, yet would defend the two months later in GS7 due to his impression that the two were not that troublesome.