Louisiana Superdome, April 7th
A somewhat irrelevant Google search shows 53,400 hits for “PMS Remedies” and 52,100 for “Overreacting”.
“Junior Mod Camper”? 802 hits
My apologies for jumping in here, Una, but there was no reason to suppose the SDMB administration was going to say anything about this, absent a thread like this. This isn’t a criticism of the SDMB; there’s just no reason for them to say that there’s anything to say, until asked.
Sure, Joe_Cool is basing this thread on a one-sided, hearsay report. Perhaps he should have emailed one of the mods to ask for the other side of the story, as I was considering doing. But even then, it would have been preferable for a SD mod or admin to respond directly here, rather than be quoted secondhand.
And this is unreasonable, how?
Under what circumstances should people get a chance to be unbanned here? And if so, after how long? Unless your answers are ‘none’ and ‘never’, it seems to me that Satan’s case is a perfectly reasonable one for the SD admin to reconsider.
Or you could just post to this one, as you have. I understand that persons might object to his return. I just don’t understand your ire that the issue was raised to begin with.
Hey, Joe. Remember this? From the FAQ:
**You wanna discuss bannings, you don’t start a thread–you e-mail a mod or admin.
What part of that did you not understand?
Bad joe_cool, bad! Duck duck sure schooled you but good.
Now go to your room. YOU UNDERSTAND ME?
No problem, my tongue was firmly in cheek as well. As a Bears fan I need a good sense of humor. 
“Please allow me to ontroduce myself, I’m a man of wealth and taste…” 
Sure, IMO, they should consider it if they feel the need to, or the subject in question broaches it with them. On the subject of “none” and “never” - I think there are several people who definitely fall into that category. Does Satan? Even though I’ve sounded very negative here in this thread, I feel the answer is - IMO only, which means nothing - no, he is definitely not a person who should be never, under and circumstances be unbanned.
I, and I think others, had an issue here because we feel that any appeals on his behalf should have been made directly to the Staff. Setting this up as a rallying point seems to be along the lines of testing the waters to see if a wave of popularity will induce the Staff to look more favorably on reinstatement. And that seems wrong, regardless of who the subject is.
Other people have been unbanned. But knowing Lynn and Jenny, I’ll hazard that it didn’t happen by or due to the popularity of the banned person. They had to have had a good, honest belief that the person in question would actually be “reformed”, and would not drag the Board into another months-long descent into strife.
I had the same reaction as Joe upon meeting Satan back in November. I miss him, but at the same time he unabashedly violated board rules. Numerous times. I’d like to see him back here without the GD insults and such things, but IMHO it’s a lot more to ask of the powers that be than it was when some others were unbanned. He knew the rules and violated them too many times. The only possible compromise I can think of is a probationary period wherein if he did anything jerkish in a set time from his reinstatement, he’d be gone and “don’t even bother asking again because we gave you a shitload of chances”.
That might take away some of the bite of the person a lot of us admired and respected a while back, but … well, maybe I’m not the only one who noticed a difference in Satan’s demeanor and posting style after the break he took from the boards a good bit before he was banned. He left as the poster Satan. He came back as Satan, Power to be Reckoned with.
Everyone has their own kryptonite. Satan was his own undoing.
Not at all necessarily true. Note Anthracite’s citation of his contempt for mods (which I think is a gross overstatement, but if she sees it that way, perhaps they do, too.). They could just have a personal dislike for him.
I think this would hardly be setting any precedents. At least none that are likely to have any real effect on the board in the big picture. Satan is a pretty special case. The only other banned member that I can think of that compares with Brian would be Collounsbury, in terms of length of membership and overall contribution to the board. (And there’s still a huge difference between even those two…the general feeling about Coll seemed to be “Damn, what a fucking asshole that guy is, but he sure does have some good info” vs. the general feeling about Satan which seemed to me more “Damn, that Satan is a great guy, I wonder why he’s being such a dick today?”) It’s not like we’re seeing long time members getting banned every day, and people aren’t going to be rising up and begging for the reinstatement of trolls and socks.
I think it’s perfectly reasonable to bring Satan back if he’s making all the right noises. Looked at from a larger perspective, Satan’s positive contributions to the board were enormous, he was very much liked and respected by most posters. He went through a rough patch and got too bitchy for awhile, and was careless because he thought anyone his kind of history and stature on the board was immune to banning. He found out differently.
But shit, man, when people go to prison they usually get out at some point and are given a chance to show they’ve been rehabilitated. I think if you weigh Satan’s positive contributions against his negative ones, he’s earned a second chance.
And ** RT, ** I think her ire was obvious…she personally dislikes him and doesn’t want him back. That seems pretty self-evident.
count me in with the “this is bad form” group. Since the issue is clearly at this point between the poster and the admin, and it’s also not a recent event for us to all ponder and reflect about, the only thing we’re left w/is a “popularity poll” sort of deal.
Ya know, there were things I liked about Wildest Bill, too. But he also caused a buncha work for the (ahem) unpaid moderators. and was given (not as many as Satan) chances.
Collunsbury was also a very valuable poster as well, bringing good info in an acerbic package.
there’s other posters, as well, who had good or funny things to say, but crossed a line either too often or in a big enough way to cause them to be more of a problem, hence their banning.
hundreds of folks manage to get involved passionatel in GD threads w/o resorting to personal insults time and time again.
Should it be permanent? shrug. not my call. The people who make that call are also the ones who would be responsible for dealing with the results.
and, I’m in the business of rehabiliation etc. But being “sentenced” to a banning from a message board isn’t a life threatening thing. Really it isn’t.
(added on preview -Stoid - IIRC, it was more like "Why is he being such a dickhead again. and again. and, remember the Michael Masterson/Silo debacle? long term poster, blew a gasket, got banned, was allowed to come back, posted for quite a while, simmered and blew gaskets again. Perhaps it isn’t such a “we don’t like him” case, and more of a “why on earth would we put ourselves through that again”. My ex-husband has changed substantially since we divorced. Corrected a whole lotta the things that bugged the shit out of me. I wish him well. I still wouldn’t date him again though)
(parenthetically - what’s with the DDG bashing? she and Audrey respond generally that they both feel that this thread is of questionable nature, generally disagreeing w/the OP and he gets snippy about it? they say it’s between the administration and the poster in question, and he responds with a basic “who asked you?” you posted the goddam thing. and in the pit. if you only wished administration input and responses, you should have used email, and emailed 'em all. Post a thread, expect replies, and not just from folks who agree with you)
I really don’t think anyone is disputing that Satan is a great guy and deserves reconsideration. At least, I’m not. I think he’s a great guy, and I think he deserves reconsideration.
But apparently, that happened, if Joe_Cool is to be believed. He appealed; he was turned down. And if it did not happen, then Satan knows what he needs to do to get back here.
My lame ass conduct? Sorry, I don’t respond well to being called a “Sanctimonious pinheaded asshole” and being told to “fuck myself” after speaking civilly to somebody. If that makes me a bad guy, then so be it.
And I was being dishonest? Information that I later admitted to when called out? Give me a break. Think about it: If I were trying to hide information, do you really think I’d have vomited it up that easily? Give me a break.
Why?
Are we not a community? Are we not the people who will be interacting with him? What could make more sense than to hear the voices of the people who make the SDMB what it is? (Yes, the Chicago Reader generously gives us the space, and the mods keep it sane, but the Dope is * us *, and it seems obvious that our opinion should count for something. Not everything, but it makes absolutel no sense at all, IMO, to claim that considering our opinion would be “wrong”.)
Damn this thread is moving quickly… by the time my post gets sent there’s five more!
If Satan wants to get reinstated, he should e-mail an administrator and present his case for reinstatement.
Because it can be a very polarizing event.
Examples: the ‘who’s the most popular mod’ poll, the Melin banning, Satan’s banning to name a few.
And also the people who might be saying “the moderators are a bunch of assholes” if we decide we have to ban him a second time.
Just sayin’, is all.
Is this a confidence you’re revealing or a diagnosis based on message board posts?
The SDMB community is not only made of moderators’ whims and decisions. It is also made of the opinions, desires, and viewpoints of its members. I think that a grassroots campaign to reinstate a former very popular member of the board can be a very positive and good thing, and is certainly the sort of thing one could expect in any other “community.”
That said, it seems to me that a lot of the people who are staunchly against Satan’s return are those same people who were at odds with his acerbic opinions and who seem to have an axe to grind.
I mean, really, DDG, what on earth made you respond to a snarky reply with a ferocious assault of vituperative language? Was it what joe_cool said, or was it his defense of Satan?
Count me firmly within the “this thread was a good idea” and “give Satan another chance” camp.