I remember when I started out, it always made me raise a brow and probably put a kink in my fine mood too That's when I learned to 'screen' a lot harder before attempting to start anything with anyone. I developed a fairly successful strategy over the years for handling ghosters and would be ghosters. You see, (no offense at all to the people that prefer to write this way) I'ma be completely honest and say that most of my experiences with ghosters (most of which came in my first four years on major rp forums), came from people with a... How to put it; 'Small-scale' approach to this game. I'm talking; people whose starters and posts could be slapped together in a couple of minutes tops. It's not surprising to me too, because the mental and emotional involvements that goes into most of their works are so comparatively neglible, they have a very good chance of actually FORGETTING some post they made just ten minutes ago, COMPLETELY. Again, I'm no fan of stereotypes at all; I'm not saying that it's the rule for people who prefer to play like this, I'm just stating my observations.
On the other side of the coin, those of us that find ghosting as the invariably classless act that it is (C'mon, let's call a spade, a spade lol), tend to be people that put a lot of emotional and mental investment into their work, as well as value their precious free time. Most of us aren't pros, and I'm sure all of us do this for fun, but ghosting is literally the opposite of fun for the big investors like me. Generally, I try to decipher the overall 'vibe' of anyone that contacts me, or I'm about to contact for rp, before reaching out. I do this over the course of our pm discussions too. The moment I get that 'lax' vibe from anyone, I adopt one of two options. I either reduce the amount of mental efforts I invest in the partnership— making it much easier to cut them loose if they act up, or i just politely end it once I'm convinced that they're high-risk for ghosting.
Everyone has a life behind the screen, I don't need to be reminded of that, because mine's demanding enough to ensure that every second I spent on this and other forums, are clawed out, and precious. I came here to write too, not to wonder if someone who COMMUNICATED with me to start something, is gonna reply or not.
I find ghosting immature as hell. Most people make this about having to give an essay on why you're not gonna be available to play for the foreseeable future. I speak for myself, but I'm certain most that feel the same way about ghosting, also share this sentiment; I'm not interested in hearing all about how life's kicking your ass. If we're close enough, and you took the effort to add that in your heads-up, I'm gonna respect you a lot more. However, the base minimum I want is for you to gimme a little; "Hey man, can't play for the foreseeable future, sorry." Hell, hang it on your profile even for all your partners, it doesn't even have to be personal.
These days, I also have my partners start (I suck ass at it anyway). It helps me gauge a lot about the path our partnership would take. That way, you hit me with a pebble of a post, I can comfortably hit you with one back. If I'm ghosted after that, well, there's a good chance my brain deletes everything about you on a whim. As in, your username wouldn't be the lightning that strikes me twice, lmao.
This has gotten awfully long already, but it must be said; there are people that may have been caught completely off-guard by life. These people mostly have the maturity to reach out and explain things, and that, really tugs at the strings of my respect, and forgiveness with great success. The people I don't care any bit for, are the ones that vanish without making any attempt to reach out after, or even if they did, make it sound like they were doing me a favor for coming back. Like no! Lmao! Keep your immature presence away from me, thank you. I don't enjoy the flavor of brazen disrespect. That's why I respect others to the best of my ability.
It's not rocket science, it's a matter of commonsense and etiquette; if we communicated to start something, it only makes sense that we communicate to end it, or put it on hold.