Maybe a forum "For Newbies" to tf.tv/the comp scene where being anything but helpful to the OP and noobs in general is explicitly not allowed? The way I see it, "Why no pyros in 6v6?" is only a question someone hasn't been here a long enough time would ask. People can get tired of discussing that topic earnestly. In the "For Newbies" forum you either answer the question earnestly or discuss the topic earnestly or don't answer the question or discuss it at all. If such a question/topic is raised in "General Discussion" for example, the OP can be redirected to "For Newbies."

I know we have a "TF2 Help" forum but that forum serves anyone with inquiries.

In virtually every large-enough group setting (e.g. forums) there are assholes and shitposters (not-assholes in nature who act like assholes in group for the "luls" and/or to troll and/or to fit in, thereby effectively being assholes). Tf.tv is going to have its share of that. But there are examples of systemic/institutionalized assholism here that tf.tv and/or the community can get rid of.

For example, not every forum so easily mocks noobs/ignorant posters. Many forums do, but not every one does. Do we really want a major hub of the comp TF2 scene to be one that does (insofar as tf.tv is not a (or the) major hub of the TF2 comp scene, hostility to noobs isn't helping). Tf.tv resembles 4chan in how it treats certain thing such as noob questions/comments and HL-class-related questions/comments: memetic insults That's not inevitable. That can stop and it should be encouraged to stop. The forum is small enough that simply being one less person who hops on the HL-railing train derails it a little bit.

The problem here isn't individual instances of assholism. It's assholism trains. The Ruwin incident reaction was an assholism train. Minus-fragging stabby-stabby into oblivion is an assholism train.

The people who join these trains aren't generally "people who...simply don't care about others." Their problem is trying to fit in with the hive. Talking about the hivemind assholism, accepting it exists, and discouraging it is the best way to deal with that. That and/or perhaps perhaps creating anti-assholism trains. Most people don't care one way or the other how we treat noobs for example, so if you're just another voice saying "don't be hostile to noobs" you'll bring some people to your side. You'll be accused of being too "hugbox-y" by some but you're being more reasonable by discouraging of excess, inappropriate competitiveness/ribbing/insults. Not everywhere is the place for those sorts of things.

Whether or not Ruwin made a mistake on stream and didn't own up to it, the vitriolic nature and exponentially-growing intensity of the reaction to Ruwin's stream perfectly represents the toxicity of this community. That other communities are just as much or more toxic than TF2's community is not the type of excuse your mother/teacher/therapist/mentor would accept in any other circumstance so why should we accept it here? That the toxicity comes from a small, vocal minority of the community doesn't mean the toxicity isn't impactful, because: emphasis on "vocal." Whether or not Ruwin could have had a thicker skin, the loud, vitriolic feedback to a streamer who primarily attempted to use his stream to be entertaining and helpful did likely cause him to stop streaming (with the excuse being "he was mean one time so we can open the floodgates of meanness to him", ignoring the amicability of 99% of Ruwin's stream). That's less viewers being entertained and educated by a TF2 stream. That's a simple, obvious loss to the community.

And for what? A mistake unrepresentative of Ruwin's stream as a whole? (The way I perceive it, people here reacted the way they did, not because Ruwin did what he did, but because it was an excuse to join in a ganging-up of Ruwin and to levy insults about his stream that had nothing directly to do with what he did.)

If tf.tv could at least admit it reacted disproportionately to what Ruwin did instead of dropping the point that "Ruwin was mean on stream" as if that settled the matter, I would believe posters here when they say the reaction to Ruwin's stream wasn't the community being toxic, but I'm inclined to believe the point is rather a disingenuous excuse born of the same obliviousness to how assholishness here often takes a memetic nature (ironic considering the primary genuine criticism of Ruwin's stream) that grows fast to become the prevailing view of the vocal community which is evident in other places of this forum. For example, railing on the HL classes is allowed (even in threads where a new poster is asking a simple question) because "it's funny" and "how we do things here." It doesn't have to be. It's blatant elitism born of the same thing all elitism is born of: a desire to feel special. Stabby-Stabby being downvoted heavily in every thread here is a fault of tf.tv, not something inevitably to be expected. There's a time and place for everything, even HL jokes/ribbing. It's not like the forum is drowning in threads that it can't tolerate noob questions.

That may all seem small in the grand scheme of things, but assholishness from a small, vocal minority is "why we can't have nice things" all the time. They add up. They have indirect negative effects on things. They have subtle, almost unnoticeable effects on things. 99/100 times an instance of assholishness would be better if it didn't exist, even if minimally. Arguably, the effects are magnified if the community is small.

The memetic assholishness here is seen and it does turn people off from the comp scene (and popular streamers too apparently). That should be enough of an argument that the assholishness should stop. It shouldn't have be a prevailing reason TF2 "is dying" for it to stop, or even a significant reason. Competitiveness can be fine, especially in a forum largely centered around comp tf2. Ribbing can be fine. Trash talking can be fine. But being competitive towards nooby posters or entire classes in this game obviously establishes an audible voice in this forum which is against growing the comp scene. The argument that "those with thin skins wouldn't make it to the top anyway" doesn't cut it because 1) that ain't true (I don't know the extent of Ruwin's thin skin but he should at least provide a simple demonstration of how a thin skinned person in this or that way can have a thick enough skin to get good at this game once they commit themselves to it), and 2) the comp scene is always going to have "top" players so long as it exists at all, but it's not always going to have numbers. No matter how good b4nny or clockwork is at the game, the quality of their gameplay is not going to generate and maintain leagues and lans; convince valve to give a shit about comp TF2; etc. You need numbers. Being assholes to new posters or to streamers shouldn't be par for the course. You don't need to look at how things are done in other communities to settle that debate within yourself.

The problem here is too much conviction which comes from the bandwagoning effect.

iama noob, where do you put these scripts?

For all those just saying practice, not only are there techniques that one can try out to be a better scout/anything, but there are better and worse ways of practicing. Don't say that unless you want to suggest that playtime and natural ability is the only things that separate the top players. They're not.

Oh, it's this shit, where you act like any likening whatsoever is an equivocation. In Ruwin's head, he is as "important" as George Carlin. What a pretentious douchenozzle.

Even if it was a mistake (it was), stop acting like it defines Ruwin entire streaming history. There was a reason he was the top streamer for a while even though everyone wants to act like Ruwin suddenly lost any positive attributes whatsoever or never had them to begin with. Silly.