Community safety and consent

Purpose and authority

Southland is an adult text-roleplay community. This policy covers age, harassment, discrimination, privacy, mature content, and consent in the game, official Discord, and Southland-operated website. The roleplay charter governs ordinary IC conduct. This policy takes priority when a scene becomes a personal safety or consent issue.

Conduct outside Southland is normally outside staff authority. Staff may consider it when it directly targets a Southland member or community space, or when it provides credible evidence of harassment, doxxing, threats, grooming, or another safeguarding risk inside the community.

Adults only

You must be at least 18 years old to use Southland’s community spaces or game. Do not join while under 18 or help an underage person evade this rule.

Staff will not ask for identity documents, photographs, payment details, or an exact date of birth as routine age proof. A person who states that they are under 18 will be removed. Staff may also act on credible evidence that a member is under 18, give the reason privately, preserve only the evidence needed for review, and provide the ordinary appeal route.

Lying about age or pressuring someone to conceal their age is a separate violation.

Treat people as people

Do not target another person with sustained abuse, intimidation, humiliation, unwanted contact, stalking, threats, blackmail, sexual pressure, or retaliation. A disagreement, faction rivalry, character conflict, report, refusal, or appeal does not justify personal harassment.

A character may use real-world slurs or express prejudice in clearly IC roleplay. That permission ends at the character boundary. Do not use IC speech as a pretext to attack the player, repeat the material through OOC channels, follow someone between scenes, or target a person because of a real protected characteristic. OOC slurs and degrading attacks based on race, ethnicity, nationality, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability, or another protected characteristic are prohibited.

Context matters, but a character concept is not immunity from harassment review. Staff may stop a scene when the pattern, OOC conduct, or choice of target shows that the player rather than the character is being attacked.

Do not recruit for or promote real-world extremist organizations. Historical or political discussion must not become praise, propaganda, recruitment, or a way to target community members.

Stop unwanted direct contact when clearly asked. Necessary staff, support, or appeal communication may continue through the official route, not through personal messages.

Protect private information

Do not request, reveal, threaten to reveal, trade, or exploit another person’s private information. This includes legal identity, address, workplace, school, phone number, private accounts, credentials, IP or device information, private images, and non-public conversations.

Do not impersonate another community member or staff member, attempt to access another account, or encourage someone to share an authentication code. Report a suspected compromise privately.

Private reports, appeals, staff discussions, and evidence stay private unless the person who owns the material and staff both approve a lawful disclosure. Receiving access to a staff or faction channel does not authorize copying its contents elsewhere.

Sexual content and mature themes

Adult characters may have relationships, romance, and implied intimacy. Sexual activity must fade to black before explicit description. Explicit sexual roleplay is prohibited in the game, official Discord, and Southland website, even in a private message or closed channel.

The following are prohibited without exception:

sexual content involving a real or fictional minor, or a character presented as a minor;
sexual violence, coerced erotic roleplay, grooming, or sexual blackmail;
pressuring someone to begin, continue, or move sexual content elsewhere;
sharing intimate material without the subject’s clear permission; and
using an OOC relationship or rejection to drive retaliation in game.

Ordinary crime, injury, and conflict may involve mature themes. Graphic detail is not automatically necessary to establish the event. Use the consent rules below before adding unusually sensitive detail.

Consent must be informed, specific enough for the proposed content, freely given, and revocable. Silence, prior participation, faction membership, relationship status, or acceptance of an unrelated game mechanic is not consent to sensitive narrative detail.

Ordinary rule-compliant conflict does not need prior OOC consent. Players may rob, arrest, threaten, injure, or impose a supported mechanical loss when the roleplay charter and owning game system permit it.

Ask for explicit OOC consent before introducing unusually sensitive or irreversible narrative detail, including:

detailed torture;
permanent disfigurement or disability not already established by an approved character outcome;
pregnancy-related harm; or
content centered on a real-world trauma a participant has disclosed.

Permanent character death follows the separate character-death policy. Its private notice, cancellation, reconsideration, and approval boundaries govern a CK; consent during a scene cannot create one or replace that review.

A participant may withdraw consent at any point. Stop the sensitive detail immediately. Withdrawal does not erase a fair mechanical consequence already committed, and it does not authorize either side to abandon the ordinary scene. Reduce the detail, continue safely where possible, or ask staff to intervene.

Do not punish, mock, pressure, expose, or retaliate against someone for setting a boundary. Consent cannot authorize content this policy prohibits.

Voice and accessibility

Discord voice is OOC. Do not use it to conduct or coordinate an active IC scene. No player may require voice participation for a faction, event, support request, or ordinary roleplay.

Do not exploit another person’s disability, communication needs, language, or client limitations. Give a reasonable opportunity to read and respond. Use text and the available command alternatives when a player cannot use a visual, audio, motion, or keybind-only presentation.

Reporting and immediate safety

If content crosses a boundary, say so plainly in OOC text and stop contributing the sensitive detail. You do not need to continue explicit or harassing content while waiting for staff.

Use /report for a live issue. Use the published private Discord route for an offline report, evidence, safeguarding concern, or sanction appeal. Include what happened, who was involved, when it occurred, and the evidence you already have. Do not bait someone into producing more evidence or post accusations publicly.

Make reports honestly. A report that staff do not uphold is not abuse by itself. Knowingly fabricated evidence, coordinated false reporting, retaliation, or using reports to threaten another person is prohibited.

If there is an immediate real-world danger, contact the appropriate local emergency service or platform safety channel. Southland staff cannot provide emergency or professional support.

Enforcement and appeals

Staff may remove content, separate participants, restrict access, or apply an audited sanction. The subject receives the applicable rule and a private reason. Staff do not promise the reporter a particular punishment and do not publish private evidence or case details.

The issuing staff member cannot decide an appeal. Permanent bans, main-Discord removal, safeguarding or age removal, game bans of 30 days or more, and another indefinite community removal require two independent Management reviewers. Use the sanction-linked private appeal route. Do not contact the reporter, pressure staff privately, or organize public argument about the case.

The roleplay charter covers IC/OOC separation, powergaming, conflict, fear, scene avoidance, and death. The sanctions-and-appeals policy covers review. The support and reporting guide explains the available task routes without replacing these rules.