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[Hyraxylos]

What’s going on here?

I was off for only the first day of my break from this forum and was taking a nap when my latest flying-dream was interrupted very suddenly by an indescribable nightmare. It was so horrid that I don’t even remember what it was, but it woke me up very quickly. Then, for some inexplicable reason, my body swiftly conveyed itself to my computer and entered this site. I saw something then that made me wish I’d never opened my eyes. Namely, that my arguably closest friend in this community was banned for making controversial remarks. So on the issue of the aforementioned ban I’ve several urgent questions that must be answered, since I don’t know the whole story.

1. Who made this decision? (optional)
2. Where can I read what was posted? I’ve every right and need to know.
3. Did the other administrators and members agree to it?
4. Was he warned beforehand that if he didn’t quit what he was doing he would be banned?
5. IS THIS PERMANENT?

Again, this is important to me because it will help me to better decide whether or not I should return here myself. That said, this is the only thread that I am commenting on until I have finished sorting through my thoughts.

[Celtore]

If you're talking about W, even his last journal entry was deleted. I don't know if he did this himself, or if it was deleted by someone else when I commented and tried to comfort him. Personally, I'd like an explanation as to what's going on, as well. Everyone is talking about censorship in another thread, and how it's more detrimental than helpful, but given no more information than I have at this time, this ban seems like censorship in and of itself. I would hate to see this forum die, as it's become home to me moreso than my real home, but if things continue in this manner, I may be forced to leave, as well.

[Shimdrashula]

W has been a thorn in the side of the dragonkin community since December and has been banned now from at least three different sites. The reasons usually involve inconsiderate behavior, closed minded logic, member attacks, website privacy issues, netiquette infractions, as well as a host of other issues that have been continuing for months. He has been warned and does nothing more than repeat himself and continue his posts as if nothing was said. He was tolerated here much longer than many other sites have.

W was a prime example of what we DO NOT want here. The vote to remove him was unanimous.

EDIT: Hyraxylos I have removed your post. Remember posting here is a privilege not a right. Our decisions are our own and disclosure of our reasons are up to us. You will respect that and NOT assume you have a right to know about another's business. If you want to help him, that is your priority. We have exhausted our options.

[Selroth]

Unfortunately, I've made a mistake.  W_Dragon's ban was never meant to be public, but it ended up that way as he was still able to login to the website.  Even now he still is, but cannot access the forum.  I'm not sure HOW it's happening - he's not willfully evading the ban from what I can tell.  I just can't seem to figure out what's going on with the database and why things aren't working.  So, he logged on, posted a journal, and I tried removing it before it became a public affair - we already have too much drama running around the site.  So yeah, all me there.  And yeah, I understand how this can be called "censorship".  I'll talk about this later.

I put the ban into effect.  He's been a "problem member" for over a month.  A warning wasn't going to cut it, nor was a temporary ban going to solve anything.  If he was to understand his social problems, I would have hoped his banning from virtually every other community he was serious about would have showed him he as a problem.  As to other administrators "agreeing to it" - I practically staffed new people who wanted to do it FOR that reason.  I wanted an active staff, not a resistive staff.  But it's not specifically him that's the problem, in my eyes.

Atomic's Resignation (see http://www.draconomicon.com/index.php?name=PNphpBB2&file=viewtopic&t=2904) as well as Karnanyd's (supposedly temporary) absense has left me alone with the website.  It's not that I'm stealing the rights to the site, as I am the senior administrator directly below T-Sar-Goth - I just preferred it to be otherwise hence I appointed both Karn and Atomic.  Atomic and Karn would normally provide substancial resistance to my motives, and I kinda liked it that way.  But since they burnt out and left 1) I needed to find a new administrative staff as I do NOT like being alone 2) the problem is bigger than I initially thought.  For a very long time now I felt there was something wrong with this community.  Well, not this community - every draconic community I have seen.  

Time after time after time, we have a user that is just... not a positive influence on the community.  Get complaints, they ruin topics, they bring unwanted guests, and are really a troll without even knowing it.  But, too often we need to wait for them to break "a rule" or something official to remedy the problem.  I don't like that.  The reasons to remedy a problem are more obvious than that, and do not need to be complicated.  

My goal is to make this a wonderful place for wonderful people.  Not everyone is welcome, not everyone will feel comfortable, and not everyone will stick around.  I'd rather have 50 intelligent, mature, strongly-bonded people than 1000+ strangers haggling unproductively.  I believe that most people will be able to sense that they are not respected in a community - but in W_Dragons case, I just think he was downright blind to this.  People like that, may need to be forcefully removed.

[Hyraxylos]

But... what about all the REST of us? And shouldn't the entire community have SOME say in whether someone really IS worth banning permanently??  :drag_blah:  What I would do is just make the ban temporary... I'm assuming that hasn't been tried yet. It's just that there are too many of us who get left in the dark, and the reason I said that the administration "had no right" to ban him without consulting the rest of us is because some of us actually consider him our FRIEND and just don't agree with the whole approach. And I'm NOT trying to set up a rebellion here, NONE of us are, we just want to convey our feelings to the people up top without having our right to free speech being stepped on.  :drag_cry:

[Silver]

If there is anyone that thinks the admins are the only ones that agree with the course of action they took, I can assure you the admins are not alone. I can attest that, quite frequently, a post of W's was bothersome/annoying (however you want to put it) to me. It has been going on for a while now, practically since he first joined. And many times, his posts also seemingly showed no regard for others' beliefs or feelings, upsetting several members.

Cheers admins, know you have at least one supporter.

[Selroth]

I hate to make this short, but I'm running out of time.  I'm in the middle of my lunch hour :)

The community does have some say in whether someone is banned or not.  Hence why I appointed new mods and admins.  Because I know, I'm not too in touch with the community, and even if so there are many perspectives.  This is why my first action as an "alone admin" was to get another admin with equal power as myself.  I didn't really care much about W_Dragon as he was in the background.  He didn't ruin any of my discussions because I didn't discuss.  But, as I looked more, and got new members, that was essentially thier first major action.  And so far, only a few have objected to it.

We do consider everyone else.  We do know he has friends.  This website is full of wonderful, open-minded people who are able to take a sense of empathy with him.  This is the fundamental reason why it's hard to do so, and essentially why him, as well as other "problem users" in the past have been delayed so long in banning.  But, we feel that the majority of the community benefits from his absence.  However, note the word "majority."  I'm sorry for the others who don't agree with the actions that have taken place (and probably being "sorry" doesn't cut it), but I think the action taken is the most fair.

[Selroth]

I'd like to share an email W_Dragon wrote to me.  I hope he didn't intend it to be confidential as I don't intend to break that.  But, I would like to think he'd like others to see it as well.  He's been put in a very hard position, and it takes a pretty good heart to write what he did under his circumstances:

Hey Selroth, I can see what you mean by 'incompatibility', from what it
seems my mind works differently then many others, and not always in a good
way either as explained in my journal entry and the comments here.
http://draconity.org/index.php?module=v4bJournal&func=journal_view&mode=deta
il&pagefunc=last&uid=1241

The failure to be compatible with the other members was a problem I have had
in other forums for years, you look at some of my art topics on
Blenderartists and you'll see why. It's not that I try to be incompatible or
that I was trying to get myself banned or anything it's just that I have a
tendency to screw up at times at every forum I've ever been to and never
learn from it. I know you can allow me to use the forum again, but you look
at the problems I've outlined and my behavior on the Blender forums and I
may have some work to do (or quite a bit) before that's considered. But
unfortunately I think now I may have a cognitive barrier or even inability
that would make fully reforming how I act all that much harder, one thing is
I've never really reformed all that much, like one reason I hadn't been in a
school building for the past 2 years and did my work at home was because at
times I was barely able to function in that type of environment even if it
was a special school designed to handle students like that.

If you don't think that's bad enough this comes one day after seriously
considering giving up on all my hopes and dreams, I know I'm a failure at
behaving in forums and I know that just like I fail to behave in forums I'll
end up failing at all I want to do.

Just so you know, this is not a cry for attention, this is just noting the
previous problems I've had that may have been taken as warning signs on the
forums. Thanks for trying to not come out as intimidating though.

[Rogwell]

All of your actions were well justified given your position. Granted this came out as a shock considering how it happened - it was a shock to me for sure. I also was not aware of Atomic's and Karn's diminishing admin presence although saw a big decrease in general activity. Things are changing, this site is growing and there are a lot of growing pains with it. I dislike seeing people change ways and attitudes due to a rogue member, decision, change, etc. but I've come to realize that as I take the site very seriously so do others. My only hope is that those of us that remain can reconcile whats left and move up & forward. In the near 3 months I've been here things have turned a complete circle and I hope that some normality will be restored and people will return. A lot has happened and I fear a portion of the community is permanently hurt. What I see now isn't what I saw three months ago; there are a lot of missing faces.

[Selroth]

I'd also like to add that the reason that I attempted to not have this be brought up publicly are very large.  I didn't intend to censor anything.  But, the cons against making it public were overwhelming.  So, I didn't hide it with the intent to censor, it ended up hidden as I didn't want to broadcast.

W_Dragon doesn't feel good about this.  I don't think he wanted the issue to be dramatically public.  We're not making fun of him or shaming him for anything.  What good does bringing the issue up?  I feel that even now, it's hurting him more than a silent ban would have.  But, maybe I'm wrong.

And I'm not trying to ignore the community.  I hope I illustrated that above - I tried to appoint representatives FROM the community.  We're working to better the community.  But, if suppose we launched a poll.  We'd get many objections, yes.  But, those objections come from a small percentage of the community.  The majority would have little reason to cast their vote - they don't want to bother with the drama any more than they have to, as it's not fun.  So, that'd make it worse.

[Shimdrashula]

And just to be fair, the feelings of W WERE considered. It was not a decision taken lightly. It is unfortunate that thanks to recent actions of some members, he can no longer go with dignity. But live and learn.

[Rogwell]

I felt it shouldn't of been public, either, but accidents happen. W was very active and had a lot to say - for administration to axe him and then go public not only hurts the community it hurts W more than any thing else. I mean, I'm hurt just because of the way the community reacted alone the action its self. Some times situations like this call for a silent maneuver even if it upsets the community when they find out later. Public bannings result in upset - I've seen large communities out of control depending on who was banned never mind why. When the dust settles and questions are asked, maybe then it would be appropriate to say when & why.

[Silver]

Rogwell, it wasn't MEANT to be public, Selroth said so himself:

Unfortunately, I've made a mistake.  W_Dragon's ban was never meant to be public, but it ended up that way as he was still able to login to the website.  Even now he still is, but cannot access the forum.  I'm not sure HOW it's happening - he's not willfully evading the ban from what I can tell.  I just can't seem to figure out what's going on with the database and why things aren't working.  So, he logged on, posted a journal, and I tried removing it before it became a public affair - we already have too much drama running around the site.  

[Rogwell]

Slight mixup in wording  :drag_blush: I fixed it, sorry.

[Nezdragon]

Make that two supporters.  

I personally found that W's posts kept on saying some of the same things over and over, and at times there was no point behind what he was saying.  If I didn't know any better, I would have guessed that he was just trying to increase his post count.  Like others have said, some of his posts have patently ignored what other members think, feel, and believe.  A number of people have taken offense to this, and some have gone so far as to leave.  I can't say I blame them.  Now, W's posts aren't as bad as they were back in December.  On one forum, he amassed over 175 posts in a 12 day period.  I consider myself a highly active member there, and after eight months I only recently broke 500 posts.  At least several successful threads got locked due to his posts.

Now, I do understand that he has had a tough background, he mentioned that he has Asperger's, and I know full well how that can be.  He also has a very fundamentalist family.  I hope that he can learn and benefit from his time here.

As it is, I think that mistakes have been made on all sides.  I really don't care to point fingers or name names, but I think that a number of problems caused by this whole fiasco have been remedied.  I hope that we, as a community, can regroup, forgive, forget, and move on.  This is a great place, and I would hate to see more trouble in it.

~Nez

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