Griefers; the only ones at fault?

I've seen countless threads about griefers and how they mass-kick people from guilds, yes while these people are dispicable and deserve everything that's coming to them I don't believe that ONLY they are at fault.

Honestly I think the GM's are partially at fault for any griefing that may happen to their guild. When you make a guild you are expected to keep the guild safe and keep members happy, of course a guildmaster can't be on at all times of the day so officers are a must. Appointing officers is the riskiest thing you can ever do as a guildmaster as officers have the power to kick anyone lower than the officer rank from the guild hence the reason the best way to choose officers is to get to know people and be sure that you can trust them to help you run your guild. If you are a guildmaster it is ultimately your responsibility to pick officers wisely and any griefing that may happen to your guild is a reflection on your own poor judgement. HOWEVER, there are a few griefers that will take the time to gain your trust strictly to take your guild out, this kind of griefing does not reflect on the guildmaster in my mind because you genuinly trusted them and they betrayed that trust.

Summary: if you are a GM and your guild gets griefed (especially now that the recruiter rank exists) it is usually due to your own poor judgement.

My Solution: Be VERY careful who you make an officer, ensure that you can ABSOLUTELY trust the people that you want to promote to officer. This solution won't extinguish the threat of griefing but it will greatly diminish it.

Any way you look at it, mass removing is just griefing to me. But, I agree, GM's shouldn't throw around officer positions litely, especially now that there's a recruiter position. I don't agree that it's the GM who should keep people happy though, as you said in your post. It's a group effort to be nice to eachother. Even if the GM is online 24h/day, differences of opinions between members can always happen. However, it is the GM's responsibility to keep the guild organized and use common sense to avoid griefing. And your basic pointers definitely help in that :)