Without trying to get into discussing another member’s ban, I think this is how the process works:
- If two users have the same opinions approved by the staff, yet one person is getting moderated for it while the other person is getting away with it, then the issue isn’t what they did but rather how they did it. If you were rude about stating your opinion or sharing your problems, like making accusations, spreading conspiracy theories, or sharing your opinions just to create chaos, then that’s going to get you in trouble.
- The staff judge based on their observations of the posts rather than how the poster or most users see the posts. If your post came off to be rude, yet you don’t see it as rude, then you might need to do some research or talk to someone else about why your post was rude.
- As the staff said, bans are serious business, as it takes the whole team to act upon it. If someone was getting banned for a while, and they haven’t done anything extreme, then it’s not just based on one or two offenses, but rather their entire history of offenses. If you continue to repeat the same behavior for years, and you show no signs of improving, then a more serious penalty may be needed.
- For stuff like sexual harassment and bigotry, they are by no means acceptable. However, it doesn’t make you any better than to start a fight or argue with these people. If someone engages in unacceptable behavior like this, then you need to report them. Starting or getting into an argument isn’t going to get them to change their views or behavior, and leaving them unreported is going to lead them into continuing this behavior. And if you do start an argument or participate in it, then you’ll create a conflict that will get out of control. And then, when the staff get involved, you’ll get in trouble too, not just the offender. Now banning them won’t change their behavior either (and if it did, it may change them for the worse), but it will ensure safety and comfort among the community.
i’m not trying to jump down your throat or invalidate your thoughts here, but i’d like to address some of the things you’ve said, because to me, your post comes off as if you haven’t actually read any of the things many people in this thread have repeatedly brought up.
1) we have addressed time and time again that being direct and firm is not the same as being rude. there is very much a line between the two, as has already been mentioned, but the rules specifically state that if you disagree with someone, you must do so in a dignified manner, refrain from using personal attacks, and not belittle anyone. that is it. and it’s already been established a dozen times at this point that many people have never seen the banned user do any of those things. i would very much agree that making unfounded accusations or spreading conspiracy theories breaks those rules, but
your interpretation of rude is not universal. if someone is not directly attacking another person on a personal level but is simply stating their opinion clearly and bluntly, that is not being rude. we should not have to sugarcoat every single word we say in order to keep people from being offended by things that, half the time, are not even a big deal in the first place. there are a lot of people here who seem to take everything very,
very personally if there is even the faintest drop of negativity involved, and while i totally understand that as a hypersensitive, hyper-empathic person myself, you being offended by someone else’s tone does not automatically put you in the right. the world is an ugly place. tbt doesn’t have to be an exact mirror of the real world, but just like i said in march, there is no good community in which disagreements and discourse do not occur. disagreement and discussion is almost the entire purpose of a forum. the tone policing
has to stop, not just by staff but by other members as well. if you can’t spot the difference between a disagreement and a personal attack, i really don’t know what to tell you. it is beyond ridiculous to expect everyone to speak the way you think is correct.
2) while i hear where you’re coming from on this, this argument does not hold water. the staff
does consider how other users perceive another person’s post - we’ve already been told loud and clear by jeremy that some users have complained about the banned user, so staff took those people’s feelings into account. but on multiple occasions now - twice in three months, to be specific - this user was targeted and had MANY other members jump to his defense. yet the opinions of those users have been ignored twice now, and most likely privately mocked as well. yet again, this is a clear, undeniable bias against not just the banned user, but also anyone that agrees with him, regardless of the way they express themselves or present their argument. i’ve hoped for years that this isn’t the case, but at this point it seems to me that staff will only hear and respect the side of the argument that they themselves agree with. this could not be clearer at this point.
3) this is true, but again, using a serious tone that some people don’t like is not equivalent to repeated bannable behaviors like trolling, stalking, personal attacks, harassment, etc.
4) i’ll be honest, this is the bit of your post that frustrates me the most. one of the most constantly repeated things in this entire thread from the very beginning is that staff does not respond to reports of bigotry, harassment, etc in an appropriate way, if at all. it’s been said multiple times now, but i can easily locate a train of homophobic posts from just a few months ago that were not only excusing homophobia, but also wildly irrelevant to the thread topic to begin with. i know i wasn’t the only one who had a problem with those posts, yet they are still up, the user faced no punishment (let’s be real, if they had, the posts would’ve been removed, full stop, but they were not) and it was ignored altogether by staff. this is a pattern, and this is why people are upset. not just about the user in question getting banned, as he would be the first to call out ****ty behavior like this, but because staff seems to direct their disciplinary actions repeatedly on someone they very obviously do not like, while they do nothing for actual, serious problems that occur. your implication that someone standing up against bigotry is just as bad as the actual bigot simply because they’re “continuing an argument” is ABSURD. the current state of the US government is a prime example of what happens when we choose to let hatred flourish around us instead of making an effort to stop it. IF staff had proved that they care about these things, then yes, i would agree that reporting someone would be the way to go. but that is not reality, and that's exactly why we're here in the first place.
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i’m gonna wrap this up by saying i think it’s absolutely disgraceful that yet again there are people in other parts of the forum gossiping about this discussion and labeling it as toxicity or drama. hate to break it to y'all, but bringing up this conversation outside of the thread it belongs in is literally the essence of starting drama and toxicity! i’m going to go out on a limb and say these people were the same ones rooting for the ban of this user, so here’s my question - your voice was heard by staff, so WHY is it so wrong for us to use our voices as well? why is it that every time someone has a problem with the way staff is behaving, we are suddenly the devil incarnate and just trying to destroy the vibe of tbt? staff dug themselves into this hole; none of us forced them into it. this is now the third time in just as many months that they’ve had to do damage control for a situation
they caused! the valentine’s day thing? could’ve been solved immediately by a staff member apologizing. the occurrence in march? shouldn’t have ever happened, since the site owner publicly shaming a member is an unbelievably foul and unprofessional thing to do, and i still cannot believe the people out there who think it was an acceptable thing to do. and regardless of your opinion on the ban of the user we’re discussing, staff YET AGAIN shot themselves in the foot with this fiasco by threatening to silence the conversation. the double standard i’ve noticed in the past few months is astonishing. why is it that only some people on this forum get to say their piece and be heard, but anyone else who has an opposing view is “starting drama”?
i really had hope after march that things would change here, but honestly, the writing was on the wall then and it is now too. these issues are not new - this may be the first time you’re hearing of them, but they are not new. in one of my posts a few months ago, i acknowledged that the tbt staff is not a hive mind, but i’m starting to wonder if that’s actually true. everything they do lately seems to just be an effort to clean up each other’s messes, ignore valid complaints from longtime members, and use pointless PR nothing-statements instead of actually leveling with the people they’ve upset. i’ve been part of online communities before, both good and bad, but the absolute refusal of the people responsible to accept any kind of real blame here is kind of insane. and when they do accept blame, it’s often half-assed, still ends up redirecting part of that blame onto other members, and only comes after a loud public outcry. and while i can’t and won’t speak for everyone, i think the whole “we won’t discuss another person’s ban for the sake of privacy” is completely missing the actual point of why people are upset. i don’t really think we need or want the ~juicy details~ of this person’s ban, because we all know the BS excuse it’s gonna be - “rude behavior”. what i think people want here is to know why it’s acceptable for a staff member, likely multiple, to have a clear bias against a longtime member and expect it to go unquestioned, and also why it’s acceptable to attempt to silence the pushback you knew you were going to receive. but i likely won’t get an answer to that question, nor will any of us, because this will be swept under the rug as these things always are. and that’s sad.
