Baffling B.S.
This part has been expanded based on the Anime North 2024 presentation.
Problems such as acts made in bad faith or lapses in logic that are baffling and unreasonable are red flags to be aware of and hopefully avoid.
The Dunning-Kruger Effect, Brandolini's Law, Sunk-Cost Fallacy, Whataboutism (& False Equivalances), are some red flags that were previously missed throughout the years in fandom - with various levels of debacles as a result (info available at the support navigation link).
If it smells like $#!t, you're likely going to step in it ...unless you have already and need to scrape it off.
Originally this section was called - Groupthink & Lack of Oversight,a core issue that lead to some spectacular and completely avoidable downfalls.
‘Make-believe is fine, but we’re all bound by reality and laws…’ this can, and has, resulted in costly and potentially dangerous outcomes.
Just because a group of select people put themselves in charge doesn't mean they're performing with all due responsibility and evaluation of consequences. This makes oversight essential - and when that's delayed, missed, or intentionally obstructed this can possibly become a terrible red flag.
Many years ago, a group of people took control of a core segment of a convention and decided to control an operation that violated provincial and federal laws, endangered public safety and unacceptably put volunteers at risk of legal consequences.
In early 2008, that wrongdoing was inevitably exposed and those responsible for carrying on that scheme reacted... horribly. Instead of being honest and accountable, those at fault immediately engaged in deception, personal attacks, and questionable social media postings about their very biased take on their involvement with really questionable activites.
To make matters worse, the convention chairperson decided to post on the convention website and social media (yay, livejournal) admitting their involvement in illegal activities while trying to justify it. That convention chairperson quit or was fired three days before that year's convention, those responsible for allowing the illegal operation to run were removed within about a year's time afterwards (and joined a very select group of people to have been fired from a convention).
This upheaval and downfall would have been prevented by not choosing to engage in unlawful acts, brought upon by groupthink, a lack of oversight, and arguably people holding onto their fiefdoms. To be succinct, a core group of people exploited a convention and those supporting it to commit illegal acts for financial gain while willfully setting up innicent people to face legal consequences - and when it ended chose to avoid responsibility and blame victim(s).
Ask the questions, it's reasonable to expect reasonable answers. Ask/hire someone to check your work (says me and my notorious spelling errors) ... at least make sure you're not telling anyone to do anything illegal, you'd think that was a given - but here we are.
In late 1999, an internet fan group collapsed not long after a significant amount of money was discovered missing. The revelation came after years of the same person having had control.
In November 2005, an attempt to start a new three day convention in the GTA collapsed amid over exagerrated aspirations and underwhelming infrastructure and a lack of grasping reality.
Extra eyes can prevent a nasty surprise.