You missed one, Bone.
CarnalK suspension
Note it used “suspension” in the title. Think it was the first use of the formal suspension system we have today* so I guess I’m kind of a big deal. 
*prior to that a poster or two had been banned but allowed back.
Well clearly the search phrase “suspended” is not sufficient. I say board action needs uniformity in language to make searching easier. 
Wasn’t he here since 2001?
From my perspective, if you haven’t racked up a few warnings in 15 (!) years then you just aren’t doing things right.
I am struck by how few suspensions there actually are, to be honest.
I think that speaks to the quality of moderation. It’s unreasonable to expect you’ll always agree with where exactly they see the line. Which must mean there will come a time when you will just shrug and think, “Well, I don’t see it that way. But whatever.”, and then move on.
Personally, I think extra consideration should be given in that regard to posters who’ve been around a long time and contribute to the boards.
My personal observation: This place is a lot quieter than it was 18 months ago. There seem to be fewer active posters and threads, and it’s not unusual for me to log in and discover that either none of the threads I’ve commented in have replies, or only one or two of them do.
Personally, I never had any issues with BrainGlutton but I also don’t recall interacting with them in any meaningful way either. Regardless, I agree with the people saying the banning is counterproductive.
I can’t summon up any outrage or delight that BG was banned, but the idea that he had to be cut a ton of extra slack for his “net positive value” to the board (as the OP put it) prompts a round of :dubious::dubious::dubious:.
Apart from his “value” in repeatedly posting conspiracy theory-drenched nonsense, this is the guy who posted (in a thread about Elie Wiesel being attacked) that Holocaust denial was a manifestation of white supremacist resentment about Jews “milking” the Holocaust. And when another poster wondered whether BG agreed with that point of view or was just citing white supremacist opinion, he responded:
This lovely statement came to mind today when I read about Wiesel’s death.
Whether this tempers the nostalgia about BG’s “net positive value” to the Dope is another matter.
I think two sets of standards would be even more counterproductive. I’d expect to be banned if I had 20 warning and 2 suspensions and still continued with the exact same behavior. At that point if I am not banned either the rules have no teeth and the board is a free for all in terms of behavior or I am one of the mods’ pet posters. Both of these are worse than banning a poster who has some subjectively high ratio between subjectively good and objectively line crossing posts.
And I go back and find a old rather controversial thread, maybe a zombie, and it’s amazing the number of "Banned"s you see.
I made sure to break the rules a couple of times just so I’d get warned and maintain my street cred.
I think this is a good point. If I find myself getting more cranky than usual reading posts on some topic, I know it’s time to take a break. I just stop reading political threads or threads in the pit and spend a couple of weeks just discussing movies in Cafe Society.
This is one reason I don’t think I’d be good as a mod on this board. If I was a mod, I’d be obligated to monitor the worst parts of this board on an ongoing basis. A year of that and I’d go postal.
One Mod was so mean, he warned me just for snoring!
Well, he did receive a petition signed by 3,000 other posters…
I would say, again, that the rules do have teeth if you keep handing out suspensions. I don’t know how many people have seen the pilot of “The Wire” (“This America, man!”) so I will just say, what if someone had a compulsion to shoplift a Snickers every Monday morning at 10 a.m.? You would give him a fine or probation at first, but at some point you would probably start giving him 30 days in the clink. Even if this went on for years, and you knew he was going to come out and do it again, you still wouldn’t just keep him locked up forever. At least, I wouldn’t. I would try to let him out on a Tuesday, so he had the maximum amount of freedom before coming back through the revolving door.
If I was a storeowner and there was a chronic shoplifter that just wouldn’t stop, I wouldn’t want him locked up forever, either…but I damn well would ban her/him from my store forever.
One problem with ATMB discussions is that they tend to work off of general principles, when the mods are presumably most concerned about how things work in practice. So let’s game out the Slacker plan a little.
Firstly, management doesn’t want to be put in the position of judging hundreds of posts for minimal reasonability. They could take a shortcut and use reports as an indicator, but then the exercise devolves into a popularity contest. Also, perceptions of this policy would lead to increased reporting by those with grudges. (I respond: then sample!) More deeply mods like to confine their actions to enforcing rules rather than evaluating content. Because bias. (I say: teachers have the same challenge. It’s an issue, but not an impossible one.) And with bias comes perceptions of unfairness. (I say: yeah, inevitably. I just weigh this less. But this is one of the rubs: I suspect most posters would part company with me on this point.)
Secondly troll management is a key challenge. Some trolls are obvious. But some recurring ones are less so. To levy a warning, suspicion is insufficient though preponderance of the evidence is probably ok. The more mercy, the more the system becomes something to be gamed for lulz.
Thirdly, I’m guessing that after 2 or 3 suspensions the whole thing may seem ridiculous and the offenders would be sorely tempted to troll or line dance. Human nature and all that. Thus the problem metastasizes.
But I’m guessing one big reason is that the mods might think back to some a few of the now-banned and once sometime troublemakers and conclude that they really don’t want to be in the habit of giving them 5th, 10th or 50th chances. Never mind having this place crawling with such folk.
Incidentally, I did perceive changes in behavior by BG. And I didn’t think the last 2 warnings were especially blatant. But were the behavioral changes sufficient? Under current rules, probably not. Just noting this FTR.
Excellent analogy. The SDMB isn’t the only MB on the internet. No one is being put in jail, or even close to it. I was trying to think of a response to that post, but you nailed it.