We are going to give this idea a try, but there's going to be a few changes in terms of how we interact with members from here on out. We will no longer be using temporary bans. Or the Warning Points system. From this point forward, each user is allowed 3 warnings via PM from a moderator. If you continue to break rules and ignore the warnings, you will be subject to a permanent, irreversible ban. Any permanently banned members will be logged in this thread by the moderators. It's important to note there will be times when the PM system will be jumped over because a user is completely out of bounds. This includes posting hate speech (something overtly racist, sexist, or prejudicial), pornography (you may laugh, but this has happened before), or bullying another member. Posts will still be subject to deletion due to their usual reasons: responding in textspeak, using emoticons, posting reactionary pictures or gifs outside of the the two designated Off-Topic threads, or general nastiness. Banned users who sign up again and make their presence known will be subject to insta-banning. An example: @invertedbutterfly bans me for bullying @RhythmNative, and I immediately sign up again as Otherguy to continue being a jerk. If you can show the capacity to change, but eleven months down the road you slip up, we'll use the 3 warnings then banning system. A lot of this will rely on the discretion of moderators, which I know will be unpleasing to many. However, we hope to add to the moderating team within the next week so there are more voices on different schedules, thereby spreading the work and having new perspectives to create a more equal environment for all posters. Thanks, - Dave
supersoon has been permanently banned for the spate of parody accounts that have been occurring in recent months; whilst some of these have no doubt been amusing, some of these accounts have used personal, identifiable information about forum users who have come forward to us privately raising concerns about being harassed and stalked online which we agree is unacceptable.
