I beg to differ. He’s not coming back.
Satan seemed contrite enough in his e-mail, but his board history does not inspire us with confidence. He was a frequent and valued poster at one point and then hit a rough patch and took a self-imposed sabbatical from the board. After his return he acted appropriately (for the SDMB) at first but then reverted to the posting style that had caused him to receive some staff warnings before his leave of absence, and eventually we reluctantly decided that he needed to be banned.
We felt that Satan’s distrust of the SDMB staff members (as evidenced by his recent Live Journal posts a month ago stating that the moderators repeatedly abuse their powers) would cause a repeat of some of the behaviours that caused his banning in the first place.
We feared that the benefit of allowing his return was overshadowed by the real risk that we would need to ban him a second time, with the ensuing commotion and public outcry. We do not think it would be beneficial for the membership and, to be honest, save the staff a lot of headaches, if we did not have to go through this turmoil again.
JerseyDiamond, a couple of points of interest:
a) As previously stated, Collounsbury was only banned once.
b) I’m not that familiar with Kirkland’s case, but, as part of the unpleasant task that faced us when we were confronted with the Satan case, we reviewed his (Satan’s) past transgressions. I can assure you that the insults that Satan posted in Great Debates were an order of magnitude (IMHO) beyond Collounsbury’s comments. In addition Satan was personally abusive to several staff members when they were in the exercise of their duties - something Collounsbury never did, and I don’t think Kirkland did.
Thank you for taking a moment to step in and say your piece, Winkie. Really. (I’ve always dreamed of saying that. Winkie. Winkie Winkie Winkie)
However, with all due, I still say that the “commotion” and “outcry” is nothing worse than what we see every day here. And no one has yet shown it as anything else. People get upset, they say rough stuff, it’s over, the Dope goes on. It’s ultimately nothing in the grand scheme of this message board. There’s 13,000 registered users. I imagine that maybe a few dozen of us are really invested in the outcome one way or another. (And not a single one would have their life changed in any result.) Just another day in the Pit, if it came to that.
The only part that I obviously can’t speak to at all is what the Mods go through. I don’t know exactly what is involved in terms of time, emotional investment, or work, that’s for you to say. I don’t see it, but I don’t do your jobs. And if it’s (potentially) just too big a deal for the 20 of you to want to deal with, well, that’s your call, of course.
Damn shame.
So, rather than judge him by his actions and his apology, you judge what he says in a private journal?(Publicly accessable or not ) That’s pretty low, IMHO. Also, can you now point to the Mods response to what I thought was a fantasticly written and brutally honest self assement and apropriately contrite letter, and say that he’s wrong about mod bias towards him? Is not this continued stubborness on the admins part causing the very brew-ha-ha you claim to be trying to avoid? These questions and many more may or may not be answered on the next episode of “SDMBSoap”
[sub]I think they’re fair questions, BTW[/sub]
Weirddave - I debated whether or not I should say that our decision was partly based on his Livejournal entry, but the fact of the matter is that it did influence our decision, so I decided to be honest. One of our main concerns was, did we think that Satan would behave differently? And the LJ entry argued against that. I didn’t like revealing it, but there is a certain section of our posters that insist on asking our motivations publicly instead of privately via e-mail.
I will note that Satan is not averse to using Livejournal himself to invite a discussion on board matters and state his point of view, when it suits him.
Are the mods biased against him? I can honestly say that I personally am not biased. But then Satan never insulted me on the board. The moderators that were insulted by Satan on the board? They very well may be biased. We are not soulless machines.
I will point out that in his “brutally honest” self assessment he doesn’t mention that he was dissing the moderators as recently as one month ago in his online diary.
Finally - the decision to not readmit him was not a unanimous one. It was a long discussion.
Not true. As we have seen in the thread, we already have one poster quitting because of the discussion initiated on the issue. Some people will say “one person quitting, so what.” I will respond that there seems to be a lot of fuss for the potential return of just one person.
Actually, I can speak re Kirk’s case, since I banned him both times. I really, truly thought the ban had made him realize the seriousness of his offense–which, as I recall, was about three wanrings total over a period of a few months. He swore to behave. I emailed him several times over a period of weeks explaining the behavior I expected of him. He seemed eager to reform and respectful of what the rules were. So I let him back. And banned him again when he did not obey the rules. And then he made a sock, which I also banned. (Actually, I think the only poster who was not banned again after being banned once and reinstated is Krispy, and he hardly even posts.)
Regarding Satan’s livejournal, it is public, though I did not know about it until recently. If a poster wanted to return and I checked a public website of his and saw him say “hah hah, the SDMB sux roxxxxx!!!”, I would not feel compelled to ignore that evidence. Similarily, I do not feel compelled to ignore recent evidence that, despite his email claiming that he has forgiven and forgotten over the past 22 months, Satan strongly disagrees with our enforcement of rules and policies–it is our enforcement of these rules that he would have been expected to obey, after all. I am rather hesistant to believe his promise to obey the rules and swearing that he holds no grudges when a month or so ago he is calling mods names and saying lying, hypocisy, and acting like jerks is SOP here.
Yes, but note: that person is quitting because Satan is NOT being reinstated, not because he IS.
I think this thread is a perfect example of how “bad” it could get if Satan came back and were banned.
Knowing that it was not a unanimous decision makes it even more depressing.
Sucks sucks sucks. Sucks a few more times. Did I mention that it sucks?
IMHO, I can’t believe you can honestly come to that conclusion Arnold.
In the thread that ultimately got Satan banned, he accused another poster of “weasling”. As in a verb, not a noun. As has already been pointed out, he was disagreeing or criticizing another poster’s debating style, not name-calling. Name -calling was what C did with insulting regularity.
Thank you for a fair and honest answer, Arnold, one that was probably not the easiest to give. You are a class act.
See, this is why we don’t like to discuss these things in public. If I reveal the insults that Satan posted in Great Debates, we’re accused of attacking someone when they can’t defend themselves. If I don’t reveal the insults, people say “I don’t believe you.” Contact me via e-mail if you want the dirty details milroyj.
Actually, C didn’t call people names or I would have banned him long before. He was very “good” about insulting the post, not the posters, he just frothed at the mouth too much when he would insult the post. Believe me, Milroyj, I’m a GD mod, I read all those posts and know what was said and what was not. 
If you want to try to find cites of C calling people names, I’m willing to listen, but it’s a pretty moot point now that I’ve banned him. And I agree with Arnold’s assessment re the relative “insultingness” of the insults both posters made, unless you can find C calling someone “moronic leprotic crotch goblin” or “walking anal leakage”.
I would like to point out, however, that part of what LJ is for is to rant about private issues that you don’t want to bring on the boards, for whatever reason. I myself groused in my LJ a bit last year when the issue of sig length came up and I seemed to be unfairly singled out. I bitched over there because the issue had been raised and settled here, this was not the place for it. YMMV.
Um, sorry, Arnold.
Which is why I was not too happy when I saw Joe_Cool start this thread publicly on the board instead of privately via e-mail.
Last time Satan was banned we had people quit. So if we ban him again, we might have more people quit. The difference, if we don’t allow him back, is that people might quit now but the staff avoids potential headaches in the future. I can honestly say that Satan’s case took hours of our time when he was first banned.
Finally, quoting from your previous post: you ask (rhetorically) about this thread “Shit, did it even do any lasting damage of any nameable sort?” I would reply to you, if someone quitting is not lasting damage of any nameable sort, then Satan not being able to post here is similarly not “lasting damage of any nameable sort.”
I agree, but once we learned about it, it was a factor. Would you have me pretend it wasn’t?
I don’t know anything about LJ, but my understanding is that Satan’s LJ belongs to an “SDMB group” of some kind, doesn’t it? Given that, is he surprised that people at the SDMB would find out about what he said? Isn’t there a way to keep posts private so that not everyone can see them?
Finally, I do not spend my time running around trying to read poster’s live journals. But when the information is presented to me, I don’t close my eyes and pretend that it doesn’t exist.
Couple of comments: I think Mr Cynical’s leaving is “lasting damage,” just the same as I would any other thoughtful and interesting poster’s deciding to leave. I do hope he reconsiders.
I for one appreciate greatly the amount of frankness the Admins. have brought to this thread. Though I do not want this to be seen as in any way reflecting on Joe Cool, the main reason I decided against saying anything the last two years about my feelings on the issue was that I felt that doing so would create the kind of divisiveness without appreciable fruit that this thread in fact has. And I don’t want my disagreement on what the staff’s judgment ended up being to be seen as in any way challenging the decision of the staff – being on another staff, I know what that sort of agonizing judgment and the inevitable ensuing disgruntledness is like. (Hint, Stoid. ;))
But this thread has resulted in something highly improbable occurring: Stoid, Joe Cool, and I agreeing on an issue! 
I don’t recall ever having a conflict with Brian, but I am entirely in agreement with the decision to not reinstate him. I agree that he wrote a very fine letter asking to be let back in. A very fine letter.
I don’t believe him.
I might be wrong, of course. The letter might be 100% honest and reflective despite making no mention of the attitudes so clear in the LJ entry on 5 December 2002. Some of you have obviously viewed both pieces of writing and formed that judgment. We will simply have to disagree on that point. At least, I have no desire to try and change your opinions. It seems a pointless exercise.
As to “what harm can it do?” I remember quite well the bannings of both Satan and Melin, and I cannot blame the administration for not wanting to go through such an exercise again.
As to “forgiveness,” I am all for it. As I said above, I don’t believe that Brian and I ever had any real conflicts. If we did, I surey bear him no grudge, and I forgive him for any acts, words, or lapses which might trouble his conscience (though I doubt he carries any such guilts on my behalf). Forgiveness is a fine thing. If any mods or administrators still harbor ill feelings about Brians actions while he was a member of these boards, I highly recommend that they try to forgive, too.
That’s a very different thing from reinstating his posting privileges, of course. I have long since forgiven the young houseguest who stole jewelry from my girlfriend, sold cocaine out of my back yard, and gave my name when apprehended. I truly bear him no ill will. But he will never be invited back into my house.
I see your point, but in point of fact, the entry was in Satan’s personal journal. You would have to go to his journal to see it. It wasn’t locked, so it is available to anyone who goes looking in his private journal. It was not posted in the SDMB community.