Tall Poppy Syndrome against raiders.

[Khorm]

I have been playing WoW since launch with breaks here and there however at the moment I have never seen such vitriol against people who raid. Earlier in WoW raiders were looked up to by the whole community. Even if you couldn't raid and achieve what they did you still admired them and whole servers were proud of their raiding guilds and what they achieve.

EDIT - Forget about the being admired part if you guys can't get past it. It was a personal subjective memory so lets deal with what is going on today.

Now days raiders are shouted down as 'elitists' or 'special snowflakes' by those who don't raid. It's really a disgusting environment when you have people saying raiders should F off and die simply for playing a game.

social phenomenon in which people of genuine merit are resented, attacked, cut down, or criticised because their talents or achievements elevate them above or distinguish them from their peers.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tall_poppy_syndrome

EDIT-
Good responses guys but lets keep the insults down, to me and everyone else.

EDIT 2: Some people are getting hung up on thinking TPS only works if certain people are considered better. This thread was not created to denigrate, belittle or claim superiority of one group of people over another. I hope this clears that up

social phenomenon in which people of genuine merit are resented, attacked, cut down, or criticised because their talents or achievements elevate them above or distinguish them from their peers.

Distinguish:

To perceive as being different or distinct.

[Deleted]

I have been playing WoW since launch with breaks here and there however at the moment I have never seen such vitriol against people who raid. Earlier in WoW raiders were looked up to by the whole community. Even if you couldn't raid and achieve what they did you still admired them and whole servers were proud of their raiding guilds and what they achieve.

Now days raiders are shouted down as 'elitists' or 'special snowflakes' by those who don't raid. It's really a disgusting environment when you have people saying raiders should F off and die simply for playing a game.



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tall_poppy_syndrome

yeah...no

raiders thought people looked up to them.....its called ego and delusion.

the rep raiders have and yes ive been one, is largely deserved, not all, but the "i'm so pro" attitude is absurd, and the idea that because you do a certain type of content you are better than other players is quite frankly moronic.

you do it in you post, assume raiders have more merit......its that attitude that creates the backlash..

[Pann]

OP, I think you might find the reason why people think that raiders are elitists or special snowflakes somewhere in your first paragraph.

[Xayl1]

I have been playing WoW since launch with breaks here and there however at the moment I have never seen such vitriol against people who raid. Earlier in WoW raiders were looked up to by the whole community. Even if you couldn't raid and achieve what they did you still admired them and whole servers were proud of their raiding guilds and what they achieve.

Now days raiders are shouted down as 'elitists' or 'special snowflakes' by those who don't raid. It's really a disgusting environment when you have people saying raiders should F off and die simply for playing a game.



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tall_poppy_syndrome

well when folks are acting like elitist assholes who all need to be super special snowflakes they are gonna get called that. and you shouldn't make it sound like every one who is a raider is getting targeted by the angry masses of blind hate. it's how it's always been the raiders who aren't dicks are looked up to as accomplished possibly awesome people and the ones who are make every one look bad. apply this logic to PvP,RP and even pet battling and it all comes out the same.

[endersblade]

Cause - effect. Raiders became elitist assholes, people started calling them on their shit. Special snowflakes start complaining about asinine bullshit, they get called out on it. You act like raiders are god's gift to gamers or something; they're not. I mean, good for them for wasting so much time and effort to do something in a video game. Take your title/mount/achievement and move on. Don't bitch when people start getting the same title/mount/achievement an entire expansion pack later, when you've already had months and months to bask in the limelight.

A simple perusing of the forums shows you all you need to know about elitist special snowflake raiders. They make snide posts and threads all the time about it.

[Deleted]

raiders thought people looked up to them.....its called ego and delusion.

Pretty much. Sure, some people who didn't raid admired them...but most probably didn't give a single fuck about it.
A lot of raiders thought that many people looked up to them, because while standing in front of the Ironforge AH for several hours per day pretending to be afk, there usually was a least one player targeting them. That's some serious admiration!

[Khorm]

Case in point of these replies.

[Pann]

...because while standing in front of the Ironforge AH for several hours per day pretending to be afk, there usually was a least one player targeting them. That's some serious admiration!

Too true, and I bet it never crossed their mind that they were being targeted because the player was trying to click the mailbox rather check out their leet gear or massive mount.

- - - Updated - - -

Case in point of these replies.

Oh! Why didn't you say this was one of them joke threads from the beginning?

[HitPoint]

Pretty much. Sure, some people who didn't raid admired them...but most probably didn't give a single fuck about it.
A lot of raiders thought that many people looked up to them, because while standing in front of the Ironforge AH for several hours per day pretending to be afk, there usually was a least one player targeting them. That's some serious admiration!

What's wrong with that, though? That was well before Achievements existed, so that was really the only way to show off your achievement. It's human nature to hang trophies/accomplishments in your house, no different in a video game.

[Notdev]

I've seen people call others who ask them to gem/enchant their gear or use a certain talent to help them down a boss elitist assholes.
I've seen people call others who list perfectly non-selfish reasons why gear shouldn't be incredibly easy to get special snowflakes.

People just throw these names at people when they have no idea what they mean.

[Post]

I think it's always been the same, it's just more easy to see it nowadays with lots more people/media about the game. I can guarantee in vanilla people were calling top raiders nerds with no lives etc.

[squid]

"People hate me now for being better than them; they used to look up to me."
"Maybe people are hating because you are saying you are better than them."

Case in point of these replies.

[Kaleredar]

Okay first thing's first.

No one cares if someone is a "raider." People do not "look up" to raiders. Why should they? Normal-mode raids aren't difficult. Doing decent DPS isn't difficult. Anyone with half a brain can do either of those things. It all falls down to time you're able to commit and gear you're lucky enough to get. So what's to be jealous of? That this person happens to have a schedule more conducive to raiding? That they were able to eek out a raiding spot? That they got lucky with warforged drops?

No one beyond the wide-eyed new player (which I'd assume most people, especially on this forum, stopped being long ago) envies "raiders" for their "skill" or "gear," because the former is largely intangible and the latter is just luck.

Don't flatter yourself by thinking you're a "tall poppy." Frankly, that's just another "special snowflake" term.

[Pann]

What's wrong with that, though? That was well before Achievements existed, so that was really the only way to show off your achievement. It's human nature to hang trophies/accomplishments in your house, no different in a video game.

There is nothing wrong with doing that but don't get upset when others do not care for your achievements.

[Erolian]

Well this is a pretty great thread for proving the OP's point at least partially so far. Not the looking up to part or w/e but the tall poppy syndrome seems to be fairly accurate in the context of WoW. Sure some people take the time to notice the difference between elitist jackasses and the rest of the raiders but, as seen in this thread, a lot don't.

[Vargas]

Raiders were never looked up to or admired; that's purely a raider's ego running amok.

[Freaknsweet]

I'm gonna have to disagree., it works both ways. This reminds me of the whole " PC master race, console peasant" fiasco additude we have come accustomed too.

[Post]

There is nothing wrong with doing that but don't get upset when others do not care for your achievements.

People aren't getting upset that you don't care about their achievements.

[Kaleredar]

There is nothing wrong with doing that but don't get upset when others do not care for your achievements.

Exactly. Tryhard "raiders" wanting to say they're being "persecuted" are just incensed that they can't make other people care about them, and have started blaming facets of the game for supposedly "fostering" an attitude where people in the peanut gallery "no longer look upon them with reverence," even though... well, they never did.

[HitPoint]

There is nothing wrong with doing that but don't get upset when others do not care for your achievements.

Has nothing to do with making other's care, it's more to do with looking forward to your next milestone.. Being proud of something shouldn't make you an elitist asshole, it's part of human progress.. -_-