I don’t think that “this was too stupid to be trolling” is really the most effective defense. 
That’s not the basis for my assessment. Rather,
[ol]
[li]Clothahump was not at all out of character in his use and defense of the term, other than that one post. So unless his entire board persona was one massive con, it’s more likely that the post was the outlier, and not the initial use/defense.[/li][li]The entire context of that post was clearly an attempted sneering defense in a Pit thread aimed at attacking him. It’s not uncommon for people in that situation to adopt a phony stance which they think may benefit them.[/li][/ol]
That said, I’m not sure of any of this. But I think it’s more likely than not correct. And it accounts for his re-use/defense of the term better than him deciding to troll again on exactly the same subject.
How that adds up in terms of board rules and enforcement is of less interest to me, and I can certainly see the argument that the mods should take him at his own word. This is just about what he was up to at the time, since that happens to be being discussed here.
Well OK, this about sums it up except I’m fairly certain that I did not say blah,blah,blah.
I’m more of a yadda, yadda type.
The cardinal rule of the Dope is “Don’t be a jerk.” He broke that rule and has paid the price.
Thank you for clarifying that we can start a second thread to discuss bannings. I had thought that we could not do so since the announcement threads were locked.
F-P your clarification doesn’t counter Colibri’s point. Either Clothy meant the admission or he was saving face, we can’t know which. He was taken at his word and warned and suspended. Even if it was a desperate defensive play, it is highly unlikely that he forgot all about it a year later.
I don’t buy the defensive ploy theory in any case. He’s been around for years, unapologetically saying racist things and using racist terms. Why would he suddenly feel cornered on this issue and need to cover up? He manifestly does not care what the rest of us think about this.
Being a Brit I don’t participate much in or even read most of the political threads here, so Clothahump never annoyed me as much as he evidently did some people. I don’t even have a very strong opinion of him myself. But I do recall a thread not many months ago in which he appeared to graciously (well, relatively) concede a couple of points, and decided to purge his ignore list. It seemed at that stage he was willing to hear other points of view and engage in genuine discussion. Sadly, it seems that was short-lived and he went back to his old ways. Since it appears they were the vast majority of his posts, IMHO he has had many chances and just doesn’t want to change. In other words, he enjoys being a troll more than engaging constructively. A shame, but there it is.
Absolutely perfect. Very well played.
It’s particularly galling here. If I had to name one thing that really stood out about the poster in question, it was that their contribution to any given thread was, with astounding regularity, the worst thing in said thread. I think that was intentional - or if it wasn’t, it doesn’t matter.
Lemme explain.
A disturbing number of threads where they posted followed the following pattern:
<Discussion about topic A>
<Poster in question says something phenomenally dumb>
<Large number of other posters respond to debunk/insult poster in question>
<Poster in question ignores substantive rebuttals, focuses on insults>
<Discussion turns to shit>
This is classic troll behavior. It’s just not immediately obvious, and very much possible to do without explicitly breaking any rules.
Seriously, it’s so easy. Anyone can do it. Here’s how.
Pick literally any thread. Post something at least slightly related to the topic which is blatantly wrong, or at least so unpopular that you know you’re going to get immense pushback on it. Put the least amount of effort possible into it, preferably keeping things very vague. Do so in a manner which does not overtly break the rules. Then, when people comment on it, and you inevitably get a mix of people all over Graham’s Scale, from those who directly refute your central point to those who just call you an idiot, focus entirely on the latter while ignoring the former, and watch as the thread devolves. And this will happen on a forum dedicated to fighting ignorance - an ignorant, low-content statement is really grade-A bait for the kind of people who are interested in what the tagline suggests. It’s a chance to show off how smart you are easily - who doesn’t want that?
Do this long enough, and the forum will inevitably filter for the people who reach for the ad hominems (because the people willing to spend the time to debunk your bullshit have long since learned that it really isn’t worth the trouble - hi there, NotCarlson 
), and this only becomes more and more effective.
At no point here does the hypothetical troll break the rules, mind you. Not a single post they make is actually worth warning! That’s why it works! If their posts were obviously offensive, they couldn’t keep the con going. You have to pay attention to the larger pattern, and notice that it keeps happening again and again.
Now, some might make the defense that the poster in question wasn’t doing this on purpose, that it was unintentional and a result of their stupidity. Over and over and over again. But the overall effect on the board is… the same drastic drop in thread quality whenever anyone engages with them. At that point, “intent” seems like a very odd hair to split.
Seriously, this thread is… bizarre. Please don’t demand extra appeals for someone who was by far the single worst poster on the entire forum. If they weren’t a troll, they were acting completely indistinguishably from a troll, and making the entire forum worse by their presence.
There’s exactly one good thing I’ve learned from this guy - not to throw around the term “troll” lightly. Because if you start calling any idiot with a mouth bigger than their brain a troll, you miss the nuance in what makes an actual troll a problem on sites like this.
Since Collunsbury, anyway.
Thanks Dead [del]Parrot[/del] Cat.
But you allow people to open a second thread to discuss the banning. And people can say “Good, I’m glad he’s gone” in that thread, can’t they? So what’s the difference?
History has shown there to be a great deal of difference.
The difference is that fewer of those threads are started, and fewer people post in them.
The difference is, most people aren’t going to start a whole new thread just to take a few shots at a banned poster. If someone opens a new thread with a legitimate question, we’re willing to do the small amount of extra work to keep the thread from turning into a pitting of the bannee, because we want people to be able to raise questions about moderation of the board. And it usually turns out to not be a problem in these situations, because the practice of always locking the announcement does a good job of communicating that drive-by pot-shots at banned posters aren’t encouraged.
Most bannings are actually not controversial, and once people check out the poster’s history of warnings in the banning announcement they don’t feel it’s necessary to appeal the banning. So for the majority of bannings, most remarks would be of the nature “Good, I’m glad he’s gone.”
The current policy limits discussion threads to posters for whom at least one poster feels it’s worth the small effort to open a new thread. (For most banned poster, not even a single poster feels it’s worth it.) There are fewer threads, and as has been said the discussion is seen to be more serious, there are fewer potshots that need to be moderated.
Okay, that makes sense.
He had a real eye for mustache grooming. His precision was noteworthy!
I’ve never been a particular fan of elaborate theories concerning what motives someone had, but this still ignores the point that he was suspended for that behavior.
The point of warnings is to let a poster know they need to change their behavior and a suspension is a final notice.
Just like driving a car, you have a duty to follow the rules. If you get your thrills from coming as close to the edge as possible, you really can’t complain if you get busted when you go over.
“So is it now a bannable offense (or part of one) to not engage when people are posting at you, whether they’re just mocking you or insulting you or just want to make their majority opinion heard because they have nothing to lose and everything to gain.”
Those are not my words but my sentiments.
If I post my opinion on a topic and people come in to call me a doo-doo-butt-face and I do not respond to their shenanagins am I now a suspect of some offense?
Seems to me like it is a bannable offence to admit to trolling, get a suspension, then come back a year later and do the same thing again. Isn’t that what the ban was for?
The “not engaging” aspect is clearly just window dressing.
That bears no resemblance at all to what I said.