So Sad to See You Go: Getting Banned

[PalePhoenix]

PalePhoenix submitted a new Article:

So Sad to See You Go: Getting Banned

As the holidays and New Year's near, it's an appropriate time to discuss something no one ever wants to discuss, from either side of the administrative fence: Leaving a Forum. More often than not, surprisingly, this is done according to your own free will and choosing. Although we make a tremendous noise about having to ban, or being banned, or doing practically anything within our power to AVOID banning, the recipients of such measures are, by definition, the exceptions and not the rules. How do you know when it’s time to go? What sorts of things might be enough to make you want—or even fight—to stay? And do you have an “exit strategy” that’s gracious, or grotesque?

Recently, I was discussing a situation with another TAZ Member, regarding how he appeared to be the victim of some administrative prank. Long story short, they changed his username and/or title, a few times and with what seemed like malice. This sort of practice is obviously a no-no, just in general principle, but it is neither outrageous nor unheard of. Some boards even make such profile alterations a feature of their community.

When the circumstances were described, I thought of the SomethingAwful.com forums. There, it is not only acceptable, it is common practice for admins and mods to alter member profiles as it amuses them. Other members can even PAY to change your user title, which can be (and often is) to something entirely desultory and inflammatory. Because this possibility is pre-advised, and theoretically open to anyone willing to fork over the money to mess with other peoples' representations of themselves, a member in that sort of atmosphere must be agreed to the abuses that can and do arise from the practice. In most cases, this is done “as a joke,” or “all in good fun,” but if it’s not the sort of fun you like, there’s a message in these activities.

It also reminded me of some curious choices in NYC restaurant entrepreneurship during the 1990s. One could essentially CHOOSE to dine at an eatery staffed by drag queens, aspiring actors, or some hackneyed combination of the two...only to be rampantly and unsympathetically mistreated by the wait staff. You got your food, but it was deliberately flung at you, and they made fun of your clothes or hit on your spouse. People would actually bring children to some of these places, as if they were theme parks. That mentality probably wouldn't fly anywhere else, but it was a marketing ploy that made "New York Attitude" a comical...

Read more about this article here...

 

[grepper]

I felt there was a point there somewhere but where?

It seemed to argue both sides of the fence till the grass was greener on the other side.

I was hoping instead to find a support group for banned members to gather, or maybe secret tips on 'getting back' at the banners! (grepper adds, not that I would ever do such a thing! , perhaps too hurriedly)

It also seems to indicate, perhaps none too kindly, that if YOU were banned it's probably your own damn fault!

Since I have to live with MYSELF and not with YOU/Admin/Mod, then I will subscribe to the higher concept that I was banned because the ADMIN/Mod was the assh*le, not ME!

 

[PalePhoenix]

It also seems to indicate, perhaps none too kindly, that if YOU were banned it's probably your own damn fault!

No, I indicated it about as kindly as I could.

My point--and I do have one--was more to the effect that it's not the end of the world, that one should be aware of the signs before it GETS to this juncture, and that most admins don't just go banning people all willy-nilly because it amuses them. But feel free to join my site just so I can ban you for no reason at all, and you can feel vindicated for a whole five minutes.

 

[Bhavesh Ramburn]

reminds me of http://banned.ytmnd.com/

 

[East Hill]

Well, I must add my story to this, because it's an interesting twist.

A few months ago I reported a spammer. The inexperienced moderator hit the wrong button, and banned me. After three days, I finally got hold of someone who cared enough to put me in touch with one of the other moderators.

Great.

A couple of days ago, I was naughty enough to mention, on a thread about 'why did you delete this blah blah blah', I explained that moderators have the ability to do certain things because, well, they're moderators. The person persisted, and I suggested that perhaps the enquirer had been banned by mistake, as I had been.

Well, the next thing I knew, I got a PM from a different moderator, who told me that the moderator who had banned me was very upset that I had mentioned this.

I replied to him, that I was wondering why I had suddenly turned into the bad guy? I wasn't the spammer, I was not the moderator who made the error, and there was no mention of the name or sex of the moderator in the thread, and another moderator had followed up my post by admitting that he too, had mistakenly banned someone.

I sent a PM to the moderator who had banned me, asking her, just as an experiment, if she would agree to be 'banned' as a spammer (temporarily, of course) so that she could experience what it was like.

Now I feel as if I am in World War III.

This all started because I was banned in error. Now I'm accused of harassing the moderator who banned me!

So it's not always the fault of the person who gets banned. I should have probably not replied to the person telling me that the moderator was 'upset', but how would any of you like to be blamed when YOU were the victim in the first place? It's definitely changed my feelings about the forum. As in, drop dead, all of you.

Oh well.

East Hill

 

[JohnC]

Banning: It can go either way

The sad thing...banning happens. But many times I've seen moderators act/react/post in like manner as I've seen regular accounts. If moderators aren't banned or held as accountable as regular members, regular members should be given the ability to ignore posts by moderators, when forum content posted by moderators has nothing to do with policy enforcement.

Rather than 'make' a userid a 'mod', I've suggested to many forums that they create second accounts for someone to use for when they have to do 'mod duty'.

Sometimes someone having a moderator account posts as much of an interest/disinterest post as those with normal accounts who can be 'blocked' by users. People posting are people posting. It's not fair that people viewing threads be forced to read sometimes disruptive banter that takes away from the thread's intent or direction.

 

[grepper]

The sad thing...banning happens. But many times I've seen moderators act/react/post in like manner as I've seen regular accounts. If moderators aren't banned or held as accountable as regular members, regular members should be given the ability to ignore posts by moderators, when forum content posted by moderators has nothing to do with policy enforcement.

Rather than 'make' a userid a 'mod', I've suggested to many forums that they create second accounts for someone to use for when they have to do 'mod duty'.

Sometimes someone having a moderator account posts as much of an interest/disinterest post as those with normal accounts who can be 'blocked' by users. People posting are people posting. It's not fair that people viewing threads be forced to read sometimes disruptive banter that takes away from the thread's intent or direction.

That is so true, while I cant agree with blocking communications from moderators per se, I do agree that moderators need to be moderated.
I've been on HUGE forums and seen juvenile mods do all kinds of things, and of course, they tend to dominate conversations they post in, with the huge ADMIN/MOD banner. Many times you see a bunch of "me too" posts after the mod one!

I've instituted the policy you describe where basically their mod or admin status is a separate ID or persona, often set to invisible while online, since my mods work when moderating, not socializing/posting.
It also mitigates against possible XSS attacks and KNEE JERK reactions.

Many times after seeing an "inflammatory post" but having to log off , re-login as MOD or Admin causes the initial planned action to be diluted.

I did see a site where the mods didnt have an "identity" but rather different color/avatar levels (like the Terror threat level) so the severity of the response was determined by the avatar that appeared under your post!

Still, mods are people too (mostly) and its hard to separate the badge from the person from the ego sometimes. So if someone who has 'mod power' feels that they are not getting the kowtow they feel they deserve well, they'll do what they feel like, aint it?

The problem gets bigger when it comes to moderating the moderators- a few sites seem to engender a 'siege mentality' .. us vs "them" and to not blindly support the mods actions -right or wrong- will lead to the death of the republic or some such nonsense.

<shrug>

 

[East Hill]

I've instituted the policy you describe where basically their mod or admin status is a separate ID or persona, often set to invisible while online, since my mods work when moderating, not socializing/posting.

I think that this is a big problem at the forum I've described above. An unfortunate number of the moderators, actually, on this particular forum tend to regard moderating as a secondary thing they do, rather than their primary function. I think we would all agree, if one agrees to be a moderator, one is a moderator first. It may be an unpaid job, but it's a job that you agreed to perform. If you only want to be a moderator to enhance your ability to swat down people you don't like, you shouldn't be a moderator. If your main interest in the forum is to chit chat with others, when will you have time to moderate?

The problem gets bigger when it comes to moderating the moderators- a few sites seem to engender a 'siege mentality' <shrug>

That is exactly what happened to me. I felt as if I was under attack by a swarm of Africanised bees. One bee stings, and the rest follow.

Meh.

East Hill

 

[bonelifer]

East Hill it sounds as if you need to go the Control panel and demote all your moderators. Then decide what new people could fill the positions. These moderators sound at best childish and at worst they are a detriment to your boards well being. If as administrator you can be ran over by the moderators you will be seen as weak and easy prey by regular members, spammers, etc.

 

[PalePhoenix]

It seems like misunderstandings can beget others, but whereas being "banned in error" because someone hit the wrong but is certainly a faux pas, how one comports him- or herself immediately thereafter may create its own problems. Being shut out when you know you didn't do anything wrong may create feelings of pressure and panic, but what could have been resolved with one email and some patience seems to have blossomed out of control.

My article (and Nitr021's amusing, if irreverent link) tries to softball the 'real' bannings. Put simply, when people "can't take a hint." There are just too many reasons and combinations of social situations to list. If nothing else, I'm also trying to remind that there are a lot more fish, and forums, in the sea. The central problem really is, though, that some people get attached to their daily routines, both online and off. If that mod who accidentally banned you didn't mean anything, then I doubt you'd have let the circumstances faze you. Of course, there's also a difference between a polite note ("Hey, I'm not sure you meant to ban me. What's going on?") and banging on the door like a madman ("Let me IN!").

​

 

[East Hill]

I leave it with this:

I'm not the owner of the forum, I am simply a paying member. The 'ban' I was given was a 'spammer' ban. I've explained elsewhere that there was no way to contact the person who banned me. I did not have access to anyone's e-mail address, nor, obviously, could I send anyone a PM asking the easy and polite question, "Did you really mean to do this?".

Pale Phoenix is correct, I use that forum as a way of getting away from the stress of my real job. Again, he is correct, that with a simple e-mail and some patience, the error was corrected.

The later problem arose because I referred to an 'accidental banning', in a thread in which 'banning' was a central issue. It was a thread in which I took the side of the moderators. But, I pointed out that yes, 'moderators could make mistakes, this happened to me, perhaps this happened to you?' and was immediately greeted with hostile PMs telling me that I was guilty of harassement, even though I'd originally been sent e-mails telling me if there were any problems that I could feel free to discuss the issue with the moderator who banned me in error. Wow. That's where the incident devolved into a mess.

Quotes from the thread:

"I do know that I got banned by mistake once, because a moderator thought I was a spammer, so perhaps someone mistook you for the person responsible for posting whatever was objectionable?"

[cut out a bit of chatter]:

I did that to a member once. Accidentally banned the person that reported a spammer instead of the spammer being reported. They were banned about one minute before I realized what I did. I quickly sent an e-mail letting them know what had happened and that I messed up. [note--this was not the same moderator who 'banned' me]

my response:
'Twas not you who banned me, and it lasted over three days. The story disappeared in the Great Purge [a hard drive crash where about four days worth of postings disappeared] of about a month ago.

Part of the problem was that there was, and still is, NO WAY to contact an administrator or moderator if a person is banned [as a spammer], except by violating the TOS and registering under a new identity..."

And for that I got nasty PMs. Am I a troublemaker? Probably. It's in my job description at work . I think it's a valid question to ask though--how would the rest of you have handled it? I'm here to learn, I don't want to repeat a stupid situation. I think if I had been the moderator who banned me, I would have sheepishly come forward and admitted that I had done the deed (just as the other moderator did), but that this was not what happened in the case 'before the court'. The odd aspect of this whole thing, is that only the moderator who banned me (plus other moderators, I would assume) knew of the incident. The story had been lost in the hard drive failure, and there was no way to find any reference to it. It can't be found with a search through my posts. I could have been talking about having been banned IN ANY FORUM, not the forum associated with the thread I've quoted. The assumption was made that I was talking about the moderator who 'banned' me on the forum under discussion here. I could have been talking about Pale Phoenix banning me, for all the viewers of the thread knew. Heck, I could have been making the whole 'banning' incident up for illustrational purposes only!

By the way, the thread that started the whole discussion of 'moderating' was entitled "Men, how do you pee?" Go figure.

And yes, all it would have been avoided if the moderator had paid a little bit more attention the very first time she banned somebody.

Whew. Take a deep breath!

Have any of you ever seen your spammer ban? That's my question for the day. If you're an administrator, tell your moderators that you are going to 'ban' them with the permanent ban so that they can see what it looks like. I can guarantee you that they will have a much greater appreciation for that ban hammer. Or, more to the point, when you select a new moderator, tell him or her that you are going to have them go through a 'temporary ban', so they can see what it's like from the other side. It's all right for them to take a couple of seconds more to dispose of that spammer, just make certain that if it was member reported, please, please, don't ban the member who reported the spam. It could make for hard feelings where there was no intent to cause harm.

I think that's the gist of my tale. It could happen to you, either side of the story. You could be the new moderator making a mistake. You could be me, getting banned in error. I realise that the moderator was new, but to so severely over-react a couple of months later, when it was not a threat to her authority, and to be PM'd by a mobbing murder of moderators, was what was truly bizarre. I'm just saying, if you can afford to alienate a paying member like me, who's going to be left in your forum? It's an important question for you who own forums. Can you afford to have something like my experience happen on your forum? What would you do?

East Hill

 

[powerstroke]

It seems like misunderstandings can beget others, but whereas being "banned in error" because someone hit the wrong but is certainly a faux pas, how one comports him- or herself immediately thereafter may create its own problems.

Maybe so. You and George are a constant reminder why people here don't frequent as often.

 

[PalePhoenix]

Maybe so...

Who is George and what do you mean?

 

[djbaxter]

And how did you teach that happy monkey to paint like that?

 

[PalePhoenix]

And how did you teach that happy monkey to paint like that?

Look closer. It was simple. I banned him.

Furious George​

 

[grepper]

Buy Curious George?

Look closer. It was simple. I banned him.

Furious George​

Those cute, adorable stuffed toys (getting more and more stuffed each day) are available at your local Toys R Us store!

 

[PalePhoenix]

Ironically (or not), I have a pic that goes with your post title. I don't think it'd be appropriate here, but I'll probably make it into an avatar for my board.

 

[sodascouts]

I think the problem is people expect admins and moderators to behave ethically and fairly. Many times they don't. It's galling. It's insulting. It's unfortunate. It's life.

I actually have less problem with banning than I do with the "harrass someone until he/she leaves" scenario described in some posts above. I find such behavior a cowardly method to get the desired result - the user gone - without having to look "bad" for banning someone because the admins dislike that person or believe that person is a "troublemaker."

It's your right to get rid of people as an admin, fine. Have the balls to take responsiblity for it. Have the balls to say "I am the admin. I don't want you around. I ban you. And you can't do anything about!" :: evil laughter ensues ::

But is it WRONG for an admin to harrass someone until he/she leaves? It is wrong for an admin to violate his/her own policies on user harrassment? Is it wrong to take advantage of a position of power? I believe it is. Unfortunately, what I believe counts for little on a board controlled by people who disagree.

While this seems to give the admins the "right" to do whatever they please, admins should remember that persistent harrassment of users will create an atmosphere of hostility that will lead to people turning to other forums. Therefore, whether or not an admin feels the user "deserves" to be harrassed, doing so will hurt his/her own community long after that person is chased off. It may not happen with one person, maybe not two, but a continued pattern of hostile behavior in an admin (or moderators) cannot help but damage the community. Therefore, while it may be the admin's "right" to be arbitrary, it is actually against the self-interest of the admin to abuse power, no matter how much of an ego trip it is.

 

[holvoetn]

Please allow me to share my observation from being a supermod at a technology oriented forum:

When a spammer comes by: no regrets -> out the door he goes (sometimes even before he finishes posting ).

When a member misbehaves, usually first some PMs are exchanged and in parallel we always have a round of discussion with the mod team. If this does not resolve the situation, a temporary time-out is warranted with explanation to others why.
I have yet to see a member becoming a recidivist. Either they come back and behave as of that moment, or they do not come back at all ...

Ofcourse, if someone really breaks forum rules in a real flagrant way, he also goes into the same drawer as a spammer. No second chance.

Unfortunately this is not a thing where a set of rules can be made which will fit each and every situation. It all depends on the situation, the offense, the member in question etc etc.

But never, never, NEVER will we allow harassment from mod/admin side 'just because we can'.
It is far more display of power NOT to do something especially when being able to do it anyhow ...

 

[PalePhoenix]

I actually have less problem with banning than I do with the "harrass someone until he/she leaves" scenario described in some posts above...Therefore, while it may be the admin's "right" to be arbitrary, it is actually against the self-interest of the admin to abuse power...

I had noticed that trend, and I hoped it would have been clearer that it was not what I was implying when I wrote the article. I don't support such adolescent behavior. Many people go to forums to escape bullying and harassment, and that's not the kind of 'message' I intended for people to be sending. While 'cowardice' would imply an inability to deal with any such difficulties directly, there is still something to be said for subtlety and suggestion. Neither of which I'm particularly good at, mind you, without concerted effort, but avoiding a major conflict with a dozen small ones isn't always the way to go, either.

My focus was, instead, more on those who get warnings, who may already have been banned once or twice, or who get into repeated confrontations with staff or other members...NOT the playing out of a virtual William Golding novel. But yes, I can see how it might cut both ways. Consensus cannot always exclude unfavorable members, though this is too tough to make into a generalization about moving forward in an online community when staff (and/or members) have identified an unruly, undesirable, or simply 'mismatched' element in their midst.

I want to say this much, though: I have probably fought to keep far more people than I have tried to remove, regardless of my position or location at the time. It's certainly not because I'm either naïve or more forgiving. Sometimes we see worthwhile things in others, which the rest do not; at different moments, we see something dangerous that most seem to miss.