UncaYimmy posted on March 05, 2011 09:31
It has come to my attention that a moderator, JHunter, says that I was shown the door for my "rude", "obnoxious", "misogynistic" posts. If my posts were consistently "rude" as claimed, then I would have been violating Rule 0, right? So, mods, where the list of my infractions for Rule 0? How about my suspensions for violating Rule 0? Rule 12?
<crickets>
Exactly. I was never once suspended for violation Rule 0 or Rule 12 (attacking the arguer). Fortunately, a member has sent to me my suspension history, which I will recap here for all to see in a chronology of my time on the board. You will see that all of my suspensions came from Forum Management as did most of my infractions. This is important because FM is moderated differently than the rest of the board, especially in the past. Threads were closed at the drop of a hat, and mods ordered people not to discuss topics they didn't want discussed. If you bring up something they think is too closely related to a forbidden subject, they slap you with an infraction for ignoring a mod box - a highly subjective judgment call.
October 2008 - First posts
May 2009 - Couple of infractions in FM for heated arguments in favor of the mods
September 2009 - Moderator Prewitt81 calls me "petty and mean spirited" for saying that RSL gets favorable treatment.
September 2009 - I quietly ask for my posting privileges to be suspended and do not give any reasons why.
October 2009 - I get an e-mail from Jeff Wagg confirming that RSL gets favorable treatment on the forums.
November 2009 - I report a post by RSL that is off-topic for GS&P. I make a smart-ass comment that if this is a case of RSL getting favorable treatment again, just ignore my report. Eight hours later Darat changes my password without telling me, then changes it a second time without telling me after I reset it. He, Jeff and I get into a pissing match.
December 2009 - After a long, contentious thread in Forum Management about the situation, my account is reinstated, and I return to the forums.
January 2010 - I get my first ever infractions outside of Forum Management (two). Both were reversed on appeal.
March 5, 2010 - 24 hour suspension for ignoring a mod box in FM (discussing a forbidden topic).
March 22, 2010 - 24 hour suspension for "abusing the reporting system" (because after making a point by reporting Darat (in FM) for advocacy of suicide (to demonstrate the stupidity of the rule), I report a post (in FM) asking if a member who hates me could be advised not to call me "dude" since I find it offensive.
April 5, 2010 - 3 day suspension for ignoring a mod box in FM. Turns out I ignored a warning issued in a different FM thread over a month prior (another case of discussing a forbidden subject).
June , 2010 - 30 day suspension from Forum Management for the undefined rule of "gaming the system" - a suspension many felt was unwarranted.
November 2010 - 3 day forum-wide suspension plus 30 day suspension from Forum Management for reposting redacted text in Forum Management. I apologized via PM since I partially redacted what I thought was enough the text to get my point across without running afoul of the rules.
January 2010 - The New and Improved FM opens where members are finally allowed to continue discussing topics the mods no longer want to discuss. The mods took my suggestion to simply post a mod box telling the membership that moderator participation is over. In other words my FM suspensions last year and my "gaming the system" suspension would be virtually impossible for me to get under the new rules.
February 2011 - Banned from the board for my "body of work" which we learn means being rude, obnoxious, and misogynistic.
So, once again, where are the suspensions for being rude? At what point did the mods tell me that my violations of Rule 0 (or Rule 12) were so habitual and/or egregious that I should be banned?
Am I obnoxious? Some think so. More, however, have described me as one who posts well-formed arguments that are meticulously evidenced. Most importantly, being obnoxious is not against the rules. Nobody gets infractions for being obnoxious, and the mods never once told me that I was being obnoxious.
Am I misogynistic? No, I am not, and nobody has provided any evidence to prove that assertion. I have argued strenously with many different people on the board, and I don't treat women any differently than I treat men. Most importantly, being misogynistic is not against the rules. In fact, the mods have repeatedly pointed out that being racist, homophobic and/or a bigot is not against the rules.
Why would a moderator say I was shown the door for being something that is not against the rules? And if I was as rude as they say, where is the history of infractions and suspensions?
I'll leave it to the reader to decide why I was banned. People are welcome to not want me around, but last I looked members were not supposed to be sanctioned for being unpopular, much less banned without so much as a single suspension for the "repeated" behavior for which they are allegedly banned.
Potential $1M Challenge Candidate? I saved the following post on my hard drive a while back as I contemplated making it into my signature. It was written by longtime member rwguinn:
http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?postid=6531668#post6531668
Uncayimmy
These dudes are LOOKing for an excuse to ban you.
It is obvious that the mods and admins cannot/will not understand your point and are intentionally derailing to get you pissed enough to ban/suspend you.
Addendum: I should point out once again that I am not saying I never deserved any of the infractions I received. I freely admit I deserved some of them. My reason for bringing up the rule changes in FM is not to excuse what I did last spring. I pushed as hard as I thought I could get away with to get bad rules changed, though a couple of the infractions for "ignoring a mod box" were a bit specious and heavy-handed. After that I backed off, and I had zero problems with bringing up old topics after last spring. I mention this to show that the rules are so dramatically different now in FM that it's virtually impossible for me to repeat my behavior of last year. Not only are the thread closure rules changed, but the advocacy of suicide rule's enforcement was changed to not be so draconian.
What I want to see is evidence that I violated Rule 0 and Rule 12 at some egregious and habitual level that I deserved to be banned, because that's the reason that has been given. I think the fact that I had zero suspensions related to those rules is prima facie evidence that I did not engage any such behavior. Everything else about me personally is immaterial. If being a bastard is grounds for banning somebody, a whole lot of people are on the bubble.