I still haven't received a suspension notice from the JREF. Because I didn't receive one, I filed my appeal thinking I was suspended for something entirely different. Lisa, of course, rejected my appeal and closed the thread. You would think she would have given me a chance to file a proper appeal since I was never told what the suspension was for, but that's Lisa.
So, here's my explanation of what happened. First, a definition of sophistry. a mod favorite. Sophistry or sophism is "an argument apparently correct in form but actually invalid; especially : such an argument used to deceive." I'm not sure they know this considering how they throw around the word. Anyway, I made the following post in a new thread about 16 minutes after Darat closed a thread that was barely four hours old.
In the recently closed thread about a moderator adding NSFW tags, Darat, in his infinite wisdom, declared that it was just "housekeeping" and thus no big deal <cough>. I have a different issue. In this case the only indication that a moderator changed the post was if you looked at the Last Edited By line at the bottom of the message. The casual observer would assume that The Atheist himself added the NSFW tags since we don't expect other people to edit posts.
I suggest that when the mods perform "housekeeping" that there be a policy of making it obvious that a moderator changed the post. The blue mod boxes would work just fine. That way there's no missing who wrote what.
Darat then issued a mod box warning that read:
UncaYimmy - repeatedly trying to use sophistry to get around thread closures and other mod directives will result in further action which may include suspension.
First off, I didn't use sophistry. I did something "bad," but it wasn't sophistry. Had Darat not had such an itchy trigger finger, I would have made my legitimate suggestion in the appropriate thread. Since I couldn't, I started a new thread and made my sincere suggestion. I also took the opportunity (see the bolded part) to express my displeasure with Darat's decision. That's not sophistry. It was a blatant comment about the ruling. By referring to Darat's "infinite wisdom" I was being sarcastic. For those who didn't get it, the "<cough>" was a dead giveaway as was, the "I have a different issue" comment.
There was nothing subtle about what I did. Darat knew it and basically said, "Fine, Unca. Keep it up and see what happens." I didn't appeal the mod box or express any form of denial. And before the modettes get their panties in a bunch because I <gasp> deliberately broke a "rule" somehow, Cleon, a former mod, just today admitted making a post fully expecting a yellow card. Hell, Ducky reports his own deliberate violations. It's not a big deal, and my snide comment was met with an appropriate reaction from Darat (well, I would have let it slide, but I'm easy going like that).
This leads us to the post that got me suspended. Context is everything, right? Okay, so I was originally warned for making a deliberate comment about my feelings on Darat's ruling in a thread. Not the closure - his ruling. In this latest post, I made no comment whatsoever about the ruling. I protested the closing of a thread. Unlike the aforementioned post, it is impossible to read this one and figure out whether I was for or against the ruling in the thread (not the closure, the ruling).
The mods seem to think that my post was somehow insincere and an attempt to discuss the thread further. Obviously, I didn't discuss the topic further, so the mods must believe that my intent was to discuss it further. If so, then it was nothing at all like the post I got a warning for because in that one I commented on the topic and did not protest the closure. In this one I commented on the closure and did not even mention the topic. Complete opposites. This is indisputable.
It's also clear evidence that I was following the directive because I did the complete opposite of what I did before. There's also another post where I deliberately and obviously made it a point to demonstrate that I was following the directive.
So, was I being insincere in protesting that the thread was closed prematurely? Let's look at my recent history. In my thread about Thread Closure Policy I have a poll with an option that suggests mods give a 24 hour warning before closing a thread. Cleon and I discussed mods being too quick to close threads, and he agreed this is sometimes a problem. So quite clearly I have expressed my displeasure with threads being closed too soon, which is exactly what I did in my protest thread. It was not a new argument like the suggestion to use blue mod boxes. Context, right?
After the mod warning, I made this post complaining about another thread that was closed too early. In it I wrote, "Five hours and nine minutes later Darat closed the thread...members were not allowed to post their opinions..." Sound familiar? So, after my mod box warning I made a post bitching about a specific thread that was closed prematurely. Remember, Darat's warning didn't say anything about starting new threads, so it applied to that post. I received no comments from the moderators about it because you're allowed to complain that a thread was closed prematurely so long as you don't discuss the topic of the closed thread. For those who doubt this fact, a protest thread just happened when people protested the thread protesting my suspension for protesting a closed thread for being closed to soon. Others have posted examples.
To recap:
1) Protesting threads being closed has always been permitted so long as the topic of the closed thread is not discussed.
2) The text of my post followed the above completely.
3) The two posts in questions were complete opposites. The first expressed an opinion on the topic and not the closure. The second one expressed an opinion on the closure and did not even mention the topic. That's called obeying the mod box.
4) In my post I made the same arguments about thread closures that I have made before several times, so I did not "invent" an argument by any stretch of the imagination. I think this is what they mean by sophistry. My feelings about premature thread closures are well documented.
5) Since that mod box warning I have protested the closing of a thread prematurely and did not receive any comments whatsoever from the mods.
So, on what basis do the mods argue that this time I meant something entirely different from what I wrote? Where's the context? There is none. This ruling was a mistake, plain and simple.
For those who still disagree, rewrite my post in a way that would not get me suspended. Don't pretend that people cannot protest the closing of a thread because they can, and it just happened yesterday. Do not argue that I was prohibited by the mod box from starting protest threads for thread closures because the mod box did not say I couldn't do that. It didn't even mention starting threads specifically.
If you can't find a way for me to protest the closing of a thread without getting suspended, then there's a serious problem in moderation that goes far beyond cat avatars.