Dogelore Civil War

### Alternate names

June Conflict, (among loyalists) Fatherland Liberation War, Anti-Zeemist Campaign, June 18th Incident, (among separatists and Zeemists) Second Dogelore War, Dogeneral Square Massacre, Day of Reckoning, 19618

### Result

Largely considered a loyalist victory; hhh remains owner and loyalists retain power of the server. Main pro-Zeem belligerents either face bans or leave. Flat Rat is remodded. Migration to separatist servers takes place.

### Belligerents

LoyalistsZeemists

Neutral separatists

### Commanders and leaders

Loyalists:* hhh
* Gabe (Killed-In-Action)
* Flat Rat
* Kirbizia (contested)

(among others)

Zeemists:

* Zeemgeem
* Emma
* Ultra

(among others)

The **Dogelore Civil War**, also referred to by r/dogelore users as the **Fatherland Liberation War** and **June 18th Incident**, and by various separatists as, among other names (see *Alternate names*), the **Second Dogelore War** and **Dogeneral Square Massacre**, was a civil conflict that took place in the r/dogelore Discord server mainly on the 18th of June, 2019.

The war was fought between two primary factions; the Zeemists, headed by Zeemgeem, and the Loyalists, led by hhh. It was initiated with the abdication of Kirbizia as owner of the server, a position immediately afterwards inherited by hhh, and ended with the banning of Zeemgeem and subsequent migration of her supporters to a new server. The vast majority of protests and conflict took place in mod-only chats and #dogeneral, the latter of which seeing forcible suppression towards the end of the conflict. The civil war also served as the main catalyst for the ongoing Dogelore Cultural Revolution.

Set off mainly by tensions between Kirbizia and Zeemgeem regarding who deserves ownership of the server, the war reflected anxieties of nepotism (hhh is a known close acquaintance and ally of Kirbizia), corruption and potential mismanagement both in the popular consciousness and among moderators. Later on in the conflict, grievances such as a perceived lack of democracy and a potential reform of the moderation team were also called into question. As the conflict developed, several methods of both protest and pacification were used; Zeemist moderators used their position to mass ping the server and argue directly with hhh, while Loyalist moderators employed slowmode and muting, banning or otherwise punishing protesters involved; most famously, Zeemgeem, Emma were all deposed from their positions as moderators and eventually banned for breaking rules.

Since the conflict, the Zeemists, along with various other separatists who were neutral in the conflict, established a new server split off from r/dogelore, named *Cum City*.

## Background

The pretences for the conflict date back to c. late May to early June, when hhh was given the role of moderator by Zeemgeem for helping with developing certain parts of the server. Periodically during the days prior to the outbreak of the conflict, Zeemgeem, along with Emma, another prominent user and moderator on the server at the time, as well as other users with similar wishes, had requested that Kirbizia transfer ownership to Zeemgeem; their argument was supported by Kirbizia's inactivity on the server, usually only logging on once a day and doing little to nothing in terms of actual moderation.

While not all users at the time were in support of this, the concept steadily gained traction among the public eye over the course of the week or so that lead up to the outbreak. As of today, it is still the subject of debate as to whether or not Kirbizia was ever on the receiving end of harassment from Zeemgeem or Emma regarding the issue.

On the 17th of June, a day before the war begun proper, Kirbizia banned Zeemgeem and Emma, stating in announcements "if they want to make another server, let them." She also stated that she intended to make no more "executive decision[s]" and pledged to make the server "more democratic.", despite the current use of democratic practices by the mod team.

## Conflict

### Early Stages

On the 18th of June, 2019, Kirbizia resigned as owner of the server and handed ownership to hhh. She stated in announcements that she had been "kind of a shitty owner," and expressed her distaste for the server and her position in it. She also unbanned Zeemgeem and Emma, with her stated intentions being to let them talk things out with hhh. She left soon after.

In the server's dedicated mod chat, hhh initially told the rest of the team that they would hand ownership over to Zeemgeem, creating a useless role labelled "Owner" and assigning it to Zeemgeem without actually transferring ownership. When initially inquired about the delay, hhh remained silent, seldom responding to any questions.

As time passed and tensions built, several moderators began to suspect that hhh never had any intention of handing over ownership and was merely stalling for time; in particular, taxi drew a comparison to Wheatley's betrayal scene from *Portal 2* , and Zeemgeem set her username to "hhh stole my owner role."

Discussion of these events also began to slowly enter the public consciousness, particularly in the serious and general chats. Tensions continued to build over the following hours, eventually resulting in the banning of, among other users, Gabe, Flat Rat and with many eyes by Zeemgeem and her supporters - whether or not these bans were under fair or unfair pretences is still speculated. It was at this point that the war left the control of the moderation team and spiralled into a server-wide conflict, centred in #dogeneral.

### Later Stages

As the conflict escalated and left the direct control of the moderators, multiple channels, namely #dogeneral and #doge-zone, were bombarded with spam and mass protests on behalf of both factions. In particular, #dogeneral saw particularly harsh pacification, earning the conflict one of its titles, the Dogelore Square Massacre.

At some point during the protests, Ultra pinged everyone with a joking copypasta originally posted by Gabe detailing the toxicity of the server moderators and "leaving and making [one's] own server." Zeemgeem posted various invites to Cum City around the server; all three of these actions were met with direct punishment at the hands of the mod team. Zeemgeem was soon muted, then banned after evading the mute to post more invite links. Soon afterwards, #dogeneral was quarantined entirely, and by the time the conflict was dwindling, multiple moderators and users had left the server.

### Aftermath and results

Zeemgeem and Ultra were banned, and Emma was demodded.

Flat Rat was also remodded after previously being demodded in the days prior. Since the conflict, r/dogelore and Cum City have largely existed as separate entities, with few users being active members of both servers.

Few small-scale guerrilla attacks have been carried out after June 18th; however, the vast majority of them were joking in nature and did not involve any malicious intent. However, aside from the posting of an imgur album detailing what has been described as bad moderation and power abuse on the part of Zeemgeem, discussion of the events that took place during the conflict is still kept to a strict minimum on the r/dogelore server. Irredentists have called for the unification of the two servers, but at this stage such an undertaking seems incredibly unlikely.

## Accusations

### Against the Loyalists

The Loyalists, namely hhh, have been widely accused by those opposed to them as corrupt, incompetent and nepotist in nature. hhh and Kirbizia's acquaintance and alleged alliance is often referred to when discussing such nepotism, and speculations of hhh acting as a client or alternate account of Kirbizia have been thrown about, but are far from common place. hhh stalling for time and lying to the rest of the mod team regarding the transferal of ownership has also contributed to accusations of deception and corruption. A joking copypasta pointing out the flaws and wrongdoings of the Loyalists during the conflict also exists, in reference to another copypasta of the same nature depicting the various wrongdoings of the Chinese Communist Party.

### Against the Zeemists

Prominent members of the Zeemist faction have faced accusations of breaking various integral rules of the server, such as mass pinging, spam and unauthorised advertising of servers outside of r/dogelore. Most of these accusations stem from the actions of Zeemgeem, Ultra, Emma and so on. These actions resulted in eventual punishment and caused them to migrate to Cum City. The mass protests in #dogeneral are often a focal point of anti-Zeemist rhetoric.