| CGI-Quality said: You say the point of it was to deflate an exaggeration, but there are plenty of people who do that without resorting to telling others to "Oh shut up". On top of that, it is usually at the discretion of the moderator(s), even after a set amount of time, if you receive a Warning or Ban. In your case, history is another issue. After someone has been moderated for similar behavior a number of times, they start to go beyond PMs/Warnings. Next, the "Political Thread" talk is another moment where it is at the discretion of the moderator. Just because those topics can become toxic doesn't give you an open opportunity to up the ante. I may have even been a little easier about it if you guys were already in a disupte, but you quoted him with that. It came off as more personal, at that point, and several other mods also saw it. Your tone in there, overall, was somewhat aggressive (which wasn't that serious), but when you needlessly told TargaryenVers2 to "Oh shut up", that was a bit much. |
Could I have said it better? Yeah. Does "Oh shut up" count as such an extremity that it deserves a ban because it's not the best wording? You're the mod so that's for you to decide I guess, but I think the logical answer is no.
I understand that the set time is up to the discretion of a mod, which I think is fair. However, I don't agree with the "similar behavior numerous times" point. When I got moderated you made a note that I "should have known better by now". When I first joined this site, I thought it was just like any other forum and that saying extreme stuff wouldn't get moderation. After I learned that that wasn't how the site went, I decided to tone it down. I honestly don't know how I was magically supposed to know that "oh shut up" is something that would get me banned, especially because my previous bans specifically came from being extremely inflammatory. This wasn't a case of me not learning my lesson from my first few bans and then getting a fair ban, this is a case of me going 7 and a half months without a ban and not knowing that a ban would be distributed for something as mudane as shut up.
The political thread part was just a point, not excusing the behavior. I don't see how saying shut up is "upping the ante". Again, I feel like this is a part where I have to ask if there's always been a rule where shut up is ban worthy. Even if it came off as a bit personal or a bit much, that seems like an extreme jump in logic from "ah can you tone it down a tad" to "banned 3 days - why didn't you know better?".
I know the response will be that this is all to your discretion, and I get that. But it just doesn't seem fair and it seems like you guys go a long way to get feedback or disputes, so I just wanted to state it for the record. In the past I've really reflected on my bans as my fault and I admit that my moderation history is a big reason I took a 5 month hiatus from the site, and then came back with an alt. It's embarrassing how bad I used to be. But I don't think this really reflects that. I know it's annoying to have someone question your moderation with long replies but I really only take it seriously because that seems to be how the progressive ban system is set up.
I also want to say that the fact that I was moderated when he replied with "Short of a ban, you can't get me to shut up" is a little too ironic for my liking. Not going to say that that was your intention but it's very odd.
| RolStoppable said: You are correct on all accounts. Reading the rest of the exchange you had with that person shows no escalation from either side, nor any signs that he was offended by your "Oh shut up." Your arguments were indeed bad in the moderated post as well as the subsequent ones, but nonsense doesn't tend to get moderated on VGC. You had already received enough punishment by getting smacked down with reason while you were flinging terrible arguments in hopes that something might stick. Your arguments were so bad that I might have moderated you for stupidity and high level ignorance, but I am not a mod, so that's purely hypothetical. Given how bad your arguments in that thread were, you might consider to be at least a little bit grateful for an unjust ban that ultimately helped you to not embarrass yourself any further. |
That's fair enough I guess. But like you said, stupidity is not moderated here, and for good reason.
I will say that I've gone back and really changed my viewpoint, but even if I am stupid that shouldn't change anything.
