Shit, the “you weasel” comment that we parsed earlier * was teh deciding bannable offense? *
I’m pissed off all over again!!!
absolutely. Of course, I would also include “if one can reasonably predict certain negative outcomes from a specific action, one can also be considered to be responsible for those outcomes should the person take the specific action”. That’s the basis for things like manslaughter laws and so on, that although you don’t intend to cause the death, you chose a specific course of events which could lead a resonably prudent person to conclude that negative things could happen.
You dodged the question that I asked. In opening a thread entitled “let’s un ban this banned poster” can you not reasonably predict that people will post their recollections of events? I’d say it’s obvious that the thread could not exist w/o such things.
Then, given the fact that people are posting their recollection of events, feelings etc, isn’t it **entirely forseeable ** that some one would bemoan the fact that the banned person cannot reply to these recollections and ‘defend himself’??
(which was what techie was pointing out).
which is why, Joe, I replied to her post in the way that I did.
I saw her comment/thought as an entirely predictable, unavoidable event in a thread such as this.
So, what you’re left with is folks posting their recollections, opinions etc, and the banned person has no recourse here. and that’s ‘unfair’, certainly to some people. which was, as I said another good reason to not have posted the thread in the first place.
You’re not responsible for other peoples posts, (to belabor the obvious point). However, it was unavoidable that this inherhant unfairness would occur given your action..
Holy-Moly, I was a’ wonderin’ where all the exclamation points had gone. 
Stoid you missed the next phrase “and generally heaps abuse on Muffin” ??
the actions in that thread was the proverbial last straw.
The “you weasel” and the general nastiness of Satan’s post was the “final straw”. This came after two very recent warnings by me in GD, and after Ed had given a “final warning: you’re on thin ice” post. If Ed gives a final warning, you better shape up–seriously, even one minor infraction after that will probably get you banned. I beleive Satan has received more warnings in GD than any two posters I could name, including banned posters (and this is just in my tenure as a mod, not counting any warnings he got before).
I think I have said all I can say. All of you who disagree, I am sorry, but I do not think this rehashing of ancient history is beneficial. Can y’all just go call me a shit moderator in your lj or something rather than beating this dead horse? 
SoulFrost - I will repeat to you what I said previously to milroyj. The reasons for Satan’s banning were a multitude of insults posted in Great Debates and rules violations. I didn’t want to post the full list in here because Satan isn’t here to defend myself, so I invited him (milroyj) and others to e-mail me privately if he wants the full list. I realize now that people will not be satisfied until everything is laid out in public on the boards. Tonight I can go home and post in this thread a representative list of the insults that Satan made in Great Debates. We made a list to prove to ourselves that he was egregiously pushing the boundaries. The last comment (you weasel) may seem innocuous now, but added to the previous repeated series of insults, it was the last straw.
You don’t blame him for distrusting and disliking the SDMB moderators. Part of the reason he was banned was because when a moderator, in the course of their duties, would tell him “this is a violation of the rules” he would sometimes respond with insults outside of the BBQ Pit and sometimes start a Pit thread. So if he still distrusts and dislikes us, I foresee a high probability that he would do the same thing now, if he was allowed back at the SDMB.
Fantastic idea. Anybody got one of them LiveJournal code thingamajigs for me?
Gosh, Gaudere! You’re definitely not a shit moderator. I wouldn’t even say that Euty is a shit moderator. I think there are a lot of people here who appreciated you and Arnold and Veb stepping forward and speaking up. You’ve made a difference. I know that you changed my mind, for what that’s worth.
Oh, and Coldfire, too!
Gaudere…
Yes, but the point is that, regardless of how many warnings he’d received, he did not violate that final warning.
Therefore, he was banned for no reason.
OK, perhaps you can say that his posts to Muffin was abusive. But I saw no abuse in the original thread, IIRC, that was out of line with standard GD protocol-- “Where’s your cite?”, “Answer the question!”, “Don’t put words in my mouth!”, “Defend this point of your position!”, that sort of thing.
Brian was banned, according to Ed’s own statement, for calling Muffin a weasel-- something which he never did.
-David
Thank you for the reply, Arnold.
Expect that email soon.
-David
“And generally heaps abuse on Muffin”
the next clause in the sentence.
The next paragraph in the post.
As for myself, I read over that thread again the other day, just to refresh my memory, and Brian was certainly no harsher and no more jerky in his responses than DavidB is in his non-moderating posts as a rule. And since the “final straw” was based on a false accusation (that he called muffin a weasel), then I’d have to agree that somebody was looking for an excuse and didn’t take the time to verify that the facts lined up with what they wanted to see.
Brian was banned for being a jerk. He admits he was a jerk. He says he was “a total and complete jackass”. He “couldn’t believe [he] was such a dick”. He was “out of control”. If he himself thinks he was this bad, do you think that our judgment of jerkitude is so off base? (Brian also says he called muffin a weasel, and if Brian can’t figure out whether it was a verb or a noun, how can you expect poor Ed to? ;))
Were it not for the people who say explaining our reasoning actually does help, I would be SO inclined to just never say anything about these decisions.
SoulFrost - you don’t need to bother with the e-mail. I’ll just post the list in here.
Joe_Cool - the “final straw” was based on the somewhat belligerent tone in that thread, added to the list of transgressions in the past. Which I will post tonight.
Joe, that would be my revised vote, even though no one is tallying them. (Hey kids, wouldn’t it just rock your world if the staff actually relented?)
(Incidentally, while I was deeply saddened by Brian’s banning originally, I was not involved in hashing about it. I had observed that he seemed damned cranky when he came back, and I assumed the mods had very, very good reasons, given Brian’s stature as a member.)
Oh, you must never do that, Gaudere, then you really would look like fascists. Even though it’s exasperating, and some people get knocked around a bit at times, I think the whole exercise is healthy in the big picture.
Glasnost, baby. Buy it, own it, use it, make it a part of your life.
Wow, Trisk, very interesting story. I would love to be a fly on the wall at one of your parties. Very few intellectuals are passionate enough to hit someone. It’s usually the big dumb 'roid heads that hit the intellectuals.
Have you posted about these parties before? Got a link?
Oh…
Umm… already sent Arnold.
Hope you read it before you post the list (which is irrelevant unless the infractions occured after Brian’s final warning… and if they did, why weren’t those mentioned by Ed instead of the false accusations of name-calling?)
-David
I dunno, Stoid. Yes, we do explain ourselves. But also it means bringing up things banned posters did and they cannot defend themselves on the board. I mean, we’ve had that list of “selected insults” (we do track warnings of posters, though some of us (me) are lax about keeping up with that) since Satan’s first banning, and we didn’t post it then. It’s all stuff you could find on the board (except for a post to IzzyR I deleted at Satan’s request; I think I deleted one other for sheer offensiveness but I don’t beleive I kept it or put it in that list) but I didn’t post it then. I just didn’t feel it was overall a good thing.
Well, I guess we will see if it does make people feel more at ease about the banning and then we will know whether it is a good thing to do. ::shrug::