Still More Questions About Banned Members

Singular Sense

Originally posted by bigfatfurrytexan
i am only recounting what i witnessed.

Alas, we cannot recount what we have witnessed. However, I will say that if you could see what we can see, you wouldn't say what you said. :shk:

But here we go again: a "question" thread turns into a "what about X?" thread.

So if we decide to close it (and frankly, I'm tempted to), it will probably be for that reason.

And for anyone wondering why we don't discuss banned accounts, threads like these make the case for us.

reply to post by Majic


ok, i lied. I will reply to Majic....


....Majic, what you are left with is many members hearing the side from Proto. It is the reputation of ATS that is being smeared by the lack of forthcoming behavior.

You have to understand, this is a conspiracy site with tin hatters. Being tight lipped may be the exact opposite of how it would be best to manage such a membership.

Just some food for thoughts, from a lowly peon.

reply to post by bigfatfurrytexan


For the real tin hatters, nothing "the man" says will matter, they will believe what they want to believe. For those discerning folks like yourself, that enjoy the site, and consider most of the staff as friends, you will assume there is much more to the story than one side.

As for the staff, we will err on the side of caution and professionalism and if that causes smear to stick, then at least we have our own integrity.

reply to post by getreadyalready


Fair enough. Walking away with integrity is all that matters (if you have an ego that needs things like integrity anyway).

It reminds me of the end of the cowboy era,
after the widespread use of barbed wire.

To ply their trade, formerly independant cowboys,
had to join up with the larger ranches.

The Hero type cowboys showed a consistent and repeating pattern.
The other hands respected them, and loved working with them,
but they were always a little surly to the bosses
and were prone to go it their own way.

/shrug
David Grouchy

Taking Down The Gibbet

Long ago, back when I used to troll BB&Q as a member instead of a mod (it was called "BQ&B" back then), I actually proposed that there be a special forum where all account bans could be reviewed and discussed by the membership.

Just like anyone else, I found it jarring to see a member posting away one moment, then gone the next. And naturally, I assumed it must be for nefarious reasons.

At the time, the idea was flatly rejected by the staff because it would cause "too much drama". I disagreed, but reluctantly accepted that my brilliant idea wasn't going to become reality.

I know it sucks to be left in the dark, but since those halcyon days of my untarnished idealism, I've seen enough drama behind the scenes to appreciate why we really don't need to turn such episodes into public feeding frenzies.

When you consider what that would actually involve, it really wouldn't be fair to the ATSers involved, because more often than not it would amount to a public pillory by both staff and members.

Yes, people want to know. This is ATS after all, where everything's a conspiracy. Yes, people will assume we don't talk about it because we have something to hide, are pursuing some insidious, shadowy agenda, and that we're either often or always wrong when we ban someone.

But there are really good reasons for not putting this stuff up for public discussion, and for all the grief we get for not doing that, it's still better than the alternative.

Is what I'm sayin'

reply to post by Majic


each post in that forum would read like this:

Why was member X banned?

Because, when we contacted him to discuss (insert any infraction), he flipped his lid, told us he was bigger than the site and, when he leaves, everyone leaves with him. Then he went and u2u'd every member (including staff because he's not as bright as he thinks he is) with links to his new site. Thus, he broke the no recruiting rule so he was, again, contacted, and he threatened us with lawsuits, he threatened us with system hacks, he berated our volunteer, overworked, overabused staff.

So we banned him.


The following is not the case for any one member but they all seem to burn out in a similar manner.

Except the folks who blatantly hoax the community.

or post the porn.

reply to post by Crakeur


FWIW, we don't see nearly enough porn being posted.

Just sayin'

reply to post by bigfatfurrytexan


Been around here longer than most and seen far too many bannings.

Even though I dislike the very concept of banning on a site which allegedly encourages open and honest discussion on some pretty controversial and passionate subjects, I do understand the need for T&C and try to adhere to them at all times.
To be fair from what little I've known most the bannings have been justified, with one or two notable exceptions and ATS has lost some excellent contributors and members.
And some downright bad ones have gone the journey

Even though I often disagreed with PT I thought he was an excellent member and I never understood the reason for his banning, but I know that a lot goes on behind the scenes and I'm sure he's had plenty of opportunity to reconcile with ATS.

Members develop varying degrees of friendship over periods of time and when friends or acquaintances or well known or respected members suddenly disappear it would certainly stop the rumour mill if people had at least a basic idea of why the banning occurred other than the predictable 'breach of T&C'.
For a site that preaches openness it sometimes acts in direct contradiction to that ethos.

Sometimes out of pure curiosity I'd like to know unbanned members previous personna's, but that's just because I am a nosey bugger at times.

Enough of my waffling on....for all it's faults, and there are a few, ATS is still by far the best site of it's type around and I'll continue to try and abide by the owners T&C.

Originally posted by getreadyalready
reply to post by neformore

 

Exactly!

It's not really fair to have a bunch of members discussing someone else's account, while that someone else cannot post on their on behalf.

Besides, what purpose can discussing someone else's account serve? Should we allow it just to satisfy someone's morbid curiousity? I don't think so.

A bit semantic, but they would not be discussing an account, but a person. To frame it as discussing "someone's account" appears (to me) to intend to protect private information like their IP, name, email address etc, which I agree are good things to maintain as private, but to prohibit even the breath of a mention of that banned "person," just seems extreme. The rest of us are after all "persons" too, and make connections with other "persons" here. It's not the accounts that develop and maintain these friendships.

Btw, If they are banned they cannot post on their behalf in any topic they may have created if an apposing post is made after their banning, so that doesn't really make sense either.

I never get nor agree with this notion that we must "protect" the membership from drama and "protect" the banned member from discussion. Drama happens get over it. One of my favorite sites has a forum where drama is allowed and it's one of the friendliest sites I've been on.

The forum description clearly states;

No holds barred. For this group we are suggesting if you cannot stand the heat then get out of the kitchen. If you give out the humor you must be able to accept it, for in this group Moderation will be minimal to non-existent. Have Fun! *Please refrain from making fun of and discussing people who are not in the group and can not defend themselves.

They also don't moderate the political and social snakepit all that tightly either. These folks maintain friendships and visit each other in person, yet they are members of a forum that allows drama! Oh my how confusing. lol

...but hey, I'm a realist,, This is a private site profiting from the free contributions of others. Pretty sweet deal really.

reply to post by NoAngel2u

but to prohibit even the breath of a mention of that banned "person," just seems extreme.

But we don't "prohibit even the breath of a mention." This thread is evidence of that. In this thread several people have mentioned that they had previous versions of themselves, and a couple of banned accounts have been brought up, and none of those things were smacked down with vengeance.

We don't hammer down on the mere mention of anything, we just don't allow threads that specifically discuss another account. I say "account," because the "person" may already be a member under a new account, and they still would not be allowed to discuss their previous account. So it isn't the "person" we are talking about, it is the username and contributions of that username......i.e. account.

In your quoted rule from another forum it says....

Please refrain from making fun of and discussing people who are not in the group and can not defend themselves

Wouldn't that include banned members that are no longer part of the group and cannot defend themselves? Their rule seems pretty similar to ours?

I just want to throw my two cents in:

ATS is the only message board site that I visit/post to on any regular basis. One of the reasons for that, is because I don't have to dig through all the bull like most other sites, due to the T&C's here being enforced.

Ofcourse it isn't perfect, but it seems to get the job done. I completely understand why we can't discuss banned members. I have not heard one vaild arguement why we should. Only reasons is satisfy our own personal curiosity at the expense of the banned member, ATS staff and the site itself.

We don't want ATS to become a mud-slinging fest. That, in the end, is what would happen. Those discussions are meant to be private ones between the staff and banned members.

On a final note: this site is also free. There are actually very little ads to ignore, and I am allowed to store a huge amount of pictures, etc. here without charge. I have wonderful conversations with people I would never otherwise 'meet', in an environment that I know won't be hostile or full of profanity, etc.

If a member is banned, I know there must be a good reason. Sure, I'd like to know (had a recent experience myself with trying to figure out reasons behind a poster), but not at anyone else's expense. I actually figured it out, simply by talking with a couple of other members and following a trail left behind by said poster. There was absolutely nothing to be gained by discussing it in the open forum though and I recognized that after questioning it.

Simply put: The mods do a good job and I appreciate the environment they create for our exchanges.

The Price Of Freedom

Back in the Good Old Days when everything was groovy, we used to have a "Mud Pit" forum which was basically a "no holds barred" forum. The problem was that stuff in the "pit" invariably made its way into other forums and it was eventually shut down for that reason.

Other discussion boards may indeed operate just fine and dandy with minimal moderation, and more power to them.

Good luck convincing those of us who see what gets pulled out of the forums on ATS, however, because we encounter just about everything imaginable, and most of it isn't friendly.

A "free-for-all" policy on ATS would result in a much different board than the idealistic vision would have us believe, and I can say without hesitation that if all the crap I see hauled out of the forums every day were left in, I wouldn't be here any more. I could not abide such a toxic atmosphere.

But ATS is what it is, and while it's far from perfect, it somehow manages to be tolerable for most members, if not all.

reply to post by getreadyalready


I have seen posts removed that merely mentioned a banned member (bemoaning the loss), so we will disagree on that point. You've already got a mod with an itchy finger over this topic. lol

That quote was more to the point of "drama" in general, or rather ATS's perception that it needs to be disallowed, and FOR THE RECORD the discussion of banned members goes on in the open forum. It gets address respectfully by the admins/mods and everyone else gets to say their piece whether in agreement, or disagreement, even if the disagreement is in angered tones.

Originally posted by NoAngel2u
I have seen posts removed that merely mentioned a banned member (bemoaning the loss), so we will disagree on that point.

The posts referencing a banned member would've been off-topic to the thread, no? Once a thread starts down that path, it can be difficult to get back on track.

Yes, we will remove posts about banned members in topical threads. I've done it and I'm sure will have occasion to do it again.

Originally posted by Majic
The Price Of Freedom

Back in the Good Old Days when everything was groovy, we used to have a "Mud Pit" forum which was basically a "no holds barred" forum. The problem was that stuff in the "pit" invariably made its way into other forums and it was eventually shut down for that reason.

Other discussion boards may indeed operate just fine and dandy with minimal moderation, and more power to them.

Good luck convincing those of us who see what gets pulled out of the forums on ATS, however, because we encounter just about everything imaginable, and most of it isn't friendly.

A "free-for-all" policy on ATS would result in a much different board than the idealistic vision would have us believe, and I can say without hesitation that if all the crap I see hauled out of the forums every day were left in, I wouldn't be here any more. I could not abide such a toxic atmosphere.

But ATS is what it is, and while it's far from perfect, it somehow manages to be tolerable for most members, if not all.

I have posted several times about issues exactly like what you have mentioned recently. Sadly, those well thought out posts were in threads that got deleted even though I was defending the site. Sad. I will try to do a re-write...

ATS has a lot of users. They have more than they can handle. Moderating a forum can be extremely stressful and you never really know if you are making a 100% correct decision (well mostly). There is spam (which I always found coming from India. I did not have a single user from an Indian IP that wasn't a spammer. It hurt, but I ended up blocking the entire country from the forum I moderated.)

There is abuse, there are swear words, there are hurt feelings, there is a lot of aggression, there is a negative attitude about your status. We all feel like we need to tip toe around moderators and admins. Then there are people who think "well why can't I be one?" That is usually a bad idea. You become a moderator of a site because you contribute a lot of real info. You help the site, they help you. Simple.

What would happen if every banned user case was presented? Well, usually the user is a violator of multiple T&C violations, so posting that info would also be a T&C violation. ATS does a good job at deleting these offenses. Why would mods go to that trouble, and then release the terms of the banishment? You simple can't do it. It has to stay behind closed doors. There are also U2U's to consider (which I feel led to many of bans more than their posts). Should the moderators start posting private messages to make you feel better?

But this site is different than most. These forums have a huge number of users and posts everyday. If ATS allowed every user to post, it would be madness. It would hurt the purpose of this site!

This site is to DISCUSS conspiracies, hidden truths, and deny ignorance. It isn't here to be a playground for every user to rant and rave. This site has recently merged ATS with BTS. They have made general discussions more available to the user in that way (and allow it). That merger was an attempt to keep the relevant information, that is actually worth reading, on one side, and chats on another. We are not here to argue. We are here to discuss. That is true even at BTS.

I kind of feel we need a third category of forums on this site. Above general chit chat, To Chat, and Structured (scientific/proof/links).

PS~I am really surprised and happy this thread hasn't deteriorated like most do. Proud of you ATSers!

PSS~Even if it was closed, it is a good thread to check out. I am happy it wasn't straight out deleted.

Originally posted by yeahright

Originally posted by NoAngel2u
I have seen posts removed that merely mentioned a banned member (bemoaning the loss), so we will disagree on that point.

The posts referencing a banned member would've been off-topic to the thread, no? Once a thread starts down that path, it can be difficult to get back on track.

Yes, we will remove posts about banned members in topical threads. I've done it and I'm sure will have occasion to do it again.

I didn't think it was used in an off topic context, but certainly can't back anything up, nor did I take a screenies.

reply to post by NoAngel2u


FWIW, i have had posts removed for being off topic that were fully on topic. Once was SkepticOverlord. I sent him a "are you crazy?" U2U which was promptly ignored. Really pissed me off, as i RARELY contribute things that are off topic. I have done that more in the last few months, actually...but prior never did.

The other time it was a moderator who apologized and claimed to have exercised poor judgement at the time. I accepted this and went on as we had a cordial conversation about the subject and I was able to see the human behind the username.

well well...first off to be a conspiracy therorist....

EGO EGo Ego ego.........

this is something thats is the ball breaker in any conspiracy theorists life....the who are you to tell me what i can or can not do......"DO YOU KNOW WHO I AM".....LOL

I AM THE HAND OF GOD......ok just being the hand is not that great....but if i was the whole god would i be here discussing conspiracy....i would be the conspiracy.

heck in the real world....you know the world...the one out on the otherside of this screen.....where you get arrested under the terrorists act for stating your views....lol.

I know i have had some words with staff over a couple of issues...but in the end the staff saw that i would smite them and they relented....OPPS.....

no i mean i backed down because it was not worth the effort to pursue the non issue... i mean i have my skills and abilities...but to start calling people a bunch of noobs for trying to enforce T&C is a bit on the harsh side ....

Especially when you are using these facilities for free....beggars cannot be choosers.....I also love how there is this certain affinity for ATS members that make them feel they are any more informed than people from other conspiracy sites...LMAO.
I really do not sit here in my underwear with my fat projecting it's vile flesh over the sides of my seat.....ooops sorry that is a chatroom.....

but even so sometings do baffle me....as the discussions about....personal hygene(pssst drugs) mainly Marijuana in all of it's medicinal glory is banned...(strange).

so getting banned is some cases makes no sense....but yet again..the T&C are the rules and without rules there would be Chaos(was chaos banned?).

Any what is my point here....oh i know what it is.....the sign says it as one might stand in the dole office or the hospital waiting room.....the staff are here to help....and will not accept abusive or disruptive behavior from those they are trying to serve....

so much for the customer always being right i guess.

I thought i came close to being banned once...because of a lousy scum F*$*£* MOD but it turned out they were my mom...and i was only late for dinner.

anyhow i think the MODS do a fairly decent job cept when you can tell they have a very vested personal interest in a particular thread or subject they themselves are posting on and it might not be going the way they had intended or hoped....but other than that.....I think they do a fine job...and they should not take personal jibes or abuse from members.

I do think Proto was a worthy presenter and a good opponent and but i can honestly say that my real life conspiracy has been a ride and a half and i must thank ATS as it is a good place for me to vent.....and one day i do hope i will be allowed to go to Israel.........but for some strange reason TPTB think i have something against the SOR(state of Rothchilds)....and i for the life of me do not understand why.

So i have been banned from bigger places than ATS....but i certainly would hate being banned from ATS the most.

Originally posted by Crakeur
reply to post by snowspirit

 

believe me when I say it pains us to part ways with members who contribute. Whether it's a member with a long, prolific history of posting or someone who spends more time reading and less time posting. However, when issues arise, the discussions that take place amongst the staff and the member can turn ugly and, more often than not, the member let's their ego get the best of them.

I do not find this statement to be true at all in my experience. I am also a "banned member". To this day the only reason I can find for being banned is because I did not agree with the viewpoint of the MOD who banned me. I DID agree to follow the rules, I just did not agree with a particular Mod's stance on how he perceived my actions. At the time I was under a posting ban and communicating with one MOD. I was very clear in that I had no issue with following the rules and that I understood the MOD's position, however I disagreed with his perception of my actions. Next thing I knew I went from posting ban to full ban. Much like you say member's egos get in the way.... in my case I believe 1000% it was the MOD's ego that got in the way.