My point is that I'm not sure if the message was sent, in this case or in other cases. Not sure if the judgement will avoid what started the harassment to happen again.
I think that the fact that some players feel the need to publicly claim, OOC, that those who were victims in this case were actually conspiring to smear the culprit, who was as lily-white and unstained as new-fallen snow, shows that, at least on some level, the message has not been received by the players.
I think this is a serious problem, and that it is caused, at least in part, by the same willingness to take IC conflicts OOC, and view the player as being as much your enemy as the character is your character's. Thus, sometimes over a number of years, people who might otherwise be perfectly reasonable begin to form a view of certain other players in the game as being deeply untrustworthy, and willing to go to any lengths to "win".
The result is the sort of thing we have all seen in this case—not only the incidents that actually led to the case being filed, but also a number of the public interactions surrounding the case.
And frankly,
whatever you think of the outcome of this particular case, whether you think that Atanamir should have been punished or praised for his actions, I would think that everyone should recognize that the level of OOC antagonism represented here is terrible for the game, and needs to be toned down in general.
