The Permaban Penalty

[wicked]

Secondly, I think Norse didn't violated the guidelines, which, furthermore though placed there with good intent, are inherently wrong and restricitve of free speech, a right protected by the 1st amendment of your very own and very great Constitution.

Well I haven't read the Canadian Constitution. Is there one? What's Amendment 1 to it? We've had this debate countless times. This is an internet gaming site, and a Canadian one at that. This isn't a free-for-all free speech soapbox site. Guidelines were set to encourage basic human decency. Who'd've thought we'd ever have to remind people not to be racist.

[lalaland]

I've been reading up on this and honestly don't know what to think...
Mods should make a standard set of guidelines, something like:

1st offense: 24 hr ban
2nd: 48 hr ban
3rd: 1 week ban
4th: 2 week ban
5th: month long ban
6th: 3 month ban

or something of the like, but have standards that all mods adhere to.

[wicked]

lala, we do have a system like that in place. However, there are many more warnings at first and along the way. The system was followed in this case, as it has been for the other permaband cases as well. The bans are for people who don't listen to the multiple warnings.

[Napoleon Ier]

Secondly, I think Norse didn't violated the guidelines, which, furthermore though placed there with good intent, are inherently wrong and restricitve of free speech, a right protected by the 1st amendment of your very own and very great Constitution.

Well I haven't read the Canadian Constitution. Is there one? What's Amendment 1 to it? We've had this debate countless times. This is an internet gaming site, and a Canadian one at that. This isn't a free-for-all free speech soapbox site. Guidelines were set to encourage basic human decency. Who'd've thought we'd ever have to remind people not to be racist.

Canadian? Great! I love Canada! So much I curse Rochambeau every day for not seizing it back from England after Yorktown....

Under the Canadian Charter of Rights and freedoms,

"2. Everyone has the following fundamental freedoms:

(a) freedom of conscience and religion;
(b) freedom of thought, belief, opinion and expression, including freedom of the press and other media of communication;
(c) freedom of peaceful assembly; and
(d) freedom of association. "

[lalaland]

lala, we do have a system like that in place. However, there are many more warnings at first and along the way. The system was followed in this case, as it has been for the other permaband cases as well.

Is there a way that this system could be posted in the "Rules" section or somewhere? Because it's all seemed a bit random to me....

[wacicha]

“Let us all hope that the dark clouds of racial prejudice will soon pass away, and that in some not too distant tomorrow the radiant stars of love and brotherhood will shine over our great nation with all their scintillating beauty.”

Martin Luther King jr

“Lukewarm acceptance is more bewildering than outright rejection.”

Martin Luther King jr

“Racism is man's gravest threat to man - the maximum of hatred for a minimum of reason.”

Abraham J. Heschel

[Napoleon Ier]

“Let us all hope that the dark clouds of racial prejudice will soon pass away, and that in some not too distant tomorrow the radiant stars of love and brotherhood will shine over our great nation with all their scintillating beauty.”

Certainly! But should we force our opinion on people? No! I'm sure the good reverend Dr. King would not have advocated an outright repression of free speech...the mods otherwise, become the Alabama State Police, and wicked Governor Wallace.

[wacicha]

lol the good old boys of alabama under wickeds rule now that would be worth paying good money to see.

[Napoleon Ier]

lol the good old boys of alabama under wickeds rule now that would be worth paying good money to see.

Maybe I'm a little harsh comapring wicked to wallace...but it seems it'sone rule for lib-lab leftists and another for red-blooded conservatives like Norse,who happen to make half-serious comments about civilizational progress.

[wicked]

Nap, you do realize this is a gaming site, correct? I'm beginning to wonder.

[InkL0sed]

This is actually about the right to property. This is Lack's property, on which he is allowing us to play some games. And he can kick us out if we get too rowdy.

Lack (and his mods/bouncers) are nice to you – if you're nice to them. Be nice, people.

PS Think of it like graffiti – Lack is allowing us to put up stuff on his wall because he's a nice guy, but he retains the right to erase some of it, and exclude some of us, because it's his property.

[Napoleon Ier]

Nap, you do realize this is a gaming site, correct? I'm beginning to wonder.

Yes! But ... "Without free speech no search for truth is possible... no discovery of truth is useful. Better a thousandfold abuse of free speech than denial of free speech. The abuse dies in a day, but the denial slays the life of the people, and entombs the hope of the race."

- Bradlaugh

The IK forum is a place for the search of Platonic Truth...

[Napoleon Ier]

This is actually about the right to property. This is Lack's property, on which he is allowing us to play some games. And he can kick us out if we get too rowdy.

Lack (and his mods/bouncers) are nice to you – if you're nice to them. Be nice, people.

PS Think of it like graffiti – Lack is allowing us to put up stuff on his wall because he's a nice guy, but he retains the right to erase some of it, and exclude some of us, because it's his property.

True. I'm just saying he, or rather his representatives, are going about that regulation in the wrong way.

[Dancing Mustard]

Look, this thread really is being sidetracked a bit.

This isn't a "We love racism so can you not ban Norse" rant, this is a complaint about the somewhat inflexible approach CC takes to banning users for forum misconduct. The simple fact of the matter is that it's perverse to ban people for lengths of time determined by the amount of times they have previously been banned; to do so is frankly disproportionate to the actual 'wrong' they have committed.

I can't see why bans aren't calculated based on the actual 'harm' the users misdemeanour caused to the community, rather than calculating the penalty by simply counting the number of previous breaches.
To use the (obvious and admittedly trite) prison metaphor, you wouldn't send a three time petty thief to jail for the same amount of time you'd send a three time crack dealer.

The point is that users like Norse (and RK) do not pose a serious bar to the CC forum community functioning healthily, and as such there's no need to permanently remove them from our midst. Doing so is just heavy-handed and overzealous, it's simply not needed to keep the forum peace. What's really required is proportionate bans handed out in each individual case of a rules breach (and I'm not saying these might not in some way correlate to the number of past breaches perpetrated). The permaban only needs to come out of the closet if a poster is intentionally trying to ruing the entire forum experience for others and/or is making it impossible to use the forums with any degree of ease (see Xtratabasco for a good example).

This is why every permaban causes such an outrage, it's because the current system of automatically increasing bans is disproportionate and unfair. The penalty is unecessary except for the infrequent cases such as Xtratabasco's, where a user is purposefully ruining this forum for all others. People like Norse and RK will not change because of banning, but they don't need to be permanently removed, they just need to be given reprimands when they make their errors. Is our community really better off for the lack of the two of them? Or would we be better served by a more flexible moderating policy that refused to embrace the (no doubt appealing) lazy option of permabanning without regard to the gravity of the actual misdemeanour committed?




Disclaimer: It's fucking late here, and I'm hard at work. As such that post may be sketchy at best, but I figured I ought to add something before this well-intentioned (and highly relevant) thread was dragged off topic by a raft of point-missing tangents.

[Napoleon Ier]

^^=D>

[Optimus Prime]

This is actually about the right to property. This is Lack's property, on which he is allowing us to play some games. And he can kick us out if we get too rowdy.

Lack (and his mods/bouncers) are nice to you – if you're nice to them. Be nice, people.

PS Think of it like graffiti – Lack is allowing us to put up stuff on his wall because he's a nice guy, but he retains the right to erase some of it, and exclude some of us, because it's his property.

True. I'm just saying he, or rather his representatives, are going about that regulation in the wrong way.

I don't believe you get to make that determination.

[InkL0sed]

This is actually about the right to property. This is Lack's property, on which he is allowing us to play some games. And he can kick us out if we get too rowdy.

Lack (and his mods/bouncers) are nice to you – if you're nice to them. Be nice, people.

PS Think of it like graffiti – Lack is allowing us to put up stuff on his wall because he's a nice guy, but he retains the right to erase some of it, and exclude some of us, because it's his property.

True. I'm just saying he, or rather his representatives, are going about that regulation in the wrong way.

And I'm just saying the freedom of speech argument holds no value.

[Napoleon Ier]

This is actually about the right to property. This is Lack's property, on which he is allowing us to play some games. And he can kick us out if we get too rowdy.

Lack (and his mods/bouncers) are nice to you – if you're nice to them. Be nice, people.

PS Think of it like graffiti – Lack is allowing us to put up stuff on his wall because he's a nice guy, but he retains the right to erase some of it, and exclude some of us, because it's his property.

True. I'm just saying he, or rather his representatives, are going about that regulation in the wrong way.

I don't believe you get to make that determination.

Well how do you mean? A determination?

As far as I'm aware, I'm well within my bounds in stating that I believe there is a misuse of power in moderative circles, possibly even a well-intentioned one.

The proprietor of this website, whoever, has every right to kick me off it, shut me up, but I'm right now exercising legitimate free speech.

[Napoleon Ier]

This is actually about the right to property. This is Lack's property, on which he is allowing us to play some games. And he can kick us out if we get too rowdy.

Lack (and his mods/bouncers) are nice to you – if you're nice to them. Be nice, people.

PS Think of it like graffiti – Lack is allowing us to put up stuff on his wall because he's a nice guy, but he retains the right to erase some of it, and exclude some of us, because it's his property.

True. I'm just saying he, or rather his representatives, are going about that regulation in the wrong way.

And I'm just saying the freedom of speech argument holds no value.

Well it does. If the owner of the site has society's health at heart, and the principles of liberty in mind, he'll allos free speech and promote it.

[Coleman]

I'd just like to add, since people seem to be looking at this, that I'm not a mod, I just do Map Ideas sub forum and XML checking before maps go live.

Yes, that is all that I do.

Please stop bugging me about other stuff, I don't know about other stuff and have no obligation to help you if you bug me about stuff other then Map Ideas and XML concerns.

That said, I've given inside input on perma-bans in the past. I've disagreed with every instance of their use just like many of you.

I do understand the current system though. It's like felony charges and the three strikes rule. It makes sense. If you do something irritating enough to get an official warning that should be a hint to stop committing felonies. People that don't get the hint get up to their last strike and can't use the forum anymore.

It makes sense.

The problem I have with it right now is everything is a felony. People sometimes end up perma-banned for slap on the wrist level offenses. It would make more sense to me to categorize offenses into different groups and designate one group to have some sort of 2 or 3 strikes rule, while the rest can get you anywhere from a week to a month each time.

It would also be nice to have some sort of public court type decision on these perma-bans with a jury, but I'll settle with whatever reform we can manage to get. And it needs reform.

[V.I.]

Sir, To let you know who I am. I am in charge of this paticular forum. I do NOT go into the FLAME forum I stay right here. If you took a poll on me I am sure the popular opinion would not be derogitory towards me.

I do not have to explain why the other mods banned anyone I just take care of my little neck of the woods.

Now with that understood, I am trying to have both sides posted so the uninformed may be informed.

I count myself among the uninformed. so you sir, can be part of the solution or ---

Again, nothing you say here has any relevance to this discussion. While the sound of your own voice (or clickty-clack of key strokes) might make your day, it does not assist in this conversation.

No one is interested in conducting a poll on your public approval rating.

No one was asking you to explain why "other mods banned anyone."

I too was seeking more information on the subject, however your blanket statements of "I don't want this discussion in MY forum" and "Either provide 2-sided information, or end this thread" certainly doesn't sound like the words of an individual interested in the entire story.

As to your last "point": I do not respond well to threats, nor have I ever met a "wise man" who felt the need to provide them, however thinly veiled. I also believe that anyone who feels the need to write a note stating "Wise Man", then pin it to their sleeve most likely belongs in some sort of mental institution.

I apologize for the sidetrack, however I believe it important to point out the laziness of one of CC's moderators. The same people who are given the ability to shut down threads and ban members.

[wacicha]

Wow you must be tired sir there is no threat. please get off my ass

[V.I.]

Or part of the problem. And please do not curse in any thread other than Flame Wars forum. This is a child-friendly site.

[Dancing Mustard]

The problem I have with it right now is everything is a felony. People sometimes end up perma-banned for slap on the wrist level offenses. It would make more sense to me to categorize offenses into different groups and designate one group to have some sort of 2 or 3 strikes rule, while the rest can get you anywhere from a week to a month each time.


I'll settle with whatever reform we can manage to get. And it needs reform.

Now that's what I'm talking about. That is precisely the kind of sensible statement I was hoping to hear from some authority figures here.

Does anybody else have anything to contribute on this subject, because this is exactly the kind of reform that I am currently lobbying for, and it's what this forum needs to make its system of reprimands fair and proportionate.

[wcaclimbing]

Or part of the problem. Chump.

Thats not a threat.... its a statement.

Saying that if you aren't actively adding to the debate, then you are just adding clutter to the argument and making it more difficult for everyone else.