8

I am referring to a post where the poster basically says that the KKK is no big deal. This is the 3rd time I am flagging this guy in about a month. Each time his answers get deleted, but the most he got was a week ban. Previous posts went on about low IQ minorities. I probably missed some too, it's not like his answers stick around long before deletion.

I've noticed that people get quite long bans for various reasons. People whom I do not necessarily agree with but whom I think got excessive ban durations. People who normally contribute fairly high quality questions/answers, if a contentious nature. Maybe there is some abuse towards moderators behind that, I don't know.

What I do know is this poster persistently puts up about the most racist, low quality answers, I have seen to date so why are they still around?

9
  • 1
    Historically, the community has been doing a pretty good job dealing with offensive answers. There's rarely a reason for moderators to intervene, the community's response is usually enough to trigger the automated answer block which more often than not gets the point across and resolves the situation. – yannis♦ Sep 28 '20 at 9:44
  • 7
    Can you explain why you view the post as racist? The poster did not say that KKK is not a big deal. He just claims (without a source) that KKK kills fewer people than was killed by black-on-black violence, Are you saying that this statement is wrong? Can you prove it wrong? Otherwise it looks like a baseless smear. – user33768 Sep 29 '20 at 1:29
  • 5
    @MarkSapir Oh, I dunno. Maybe because saying the KKK is not big deal seems pretty darn racist on its own. Or, quoting from past posts that you can't see because they were deleted Average IQ's range in the mid 60's to low 70's. about a particular ethnic group. Twice. So, baseless smear is a bit of a stretch. On its own, for that 1 post by itself, I wouldn't raise this point in meta. Just vote to delete. As a pattern of previous posts, yes. – Italian Philosophers 4 Monica Sep 29 '20 at 2:02
  • 3
    @ItalianPhilosophers4Monica: That would be racist of course but did he really say that. I did not read the post very carefully so I could have missed that part. I have seen the question about IQ, but since I view IQ as totally meaningless, I did not read it, There are many questions and answers on main which are dumb. Like people claim to be Marxists and defend marxism, or people clearly hate every single (>40 mil) Trump supporter, etc. I usually skip this trash. – user33768 Sep 29 '20 at 3:05
  • @MarkSapir Yes, he really did make that post about IQ. Twice. Whether or not you read it carefully has little to do with it. And whether IQ itself is actually meaningful is another question, but some people, apparently the poster too, clearly see it as a proxy for intelligence. And, yes, I occasionally get annoyed when people insist that calling Trump a fascist is acceptable here. – Italian Philosophers 4 Monica Sep 29 '20 at 3:24
  • 5
    @MarkSapir Comparing people killed by the KKK with people killed by "black-on-black" violence is meaningless, it's a false equivalence. The answer in question is using a (technically true) statistic to convey the idea that in comparison the KKK isn't such a big deal. – yannis♦ Sep 29 '20 at 13:03
  • 2
    @yannis: There is no equivalence, false or otherwise. It is just your imagination (or, more likely, deliberate distortion of truth). If somebody says that 6000>4000 it means exactly that, no fine print. The phrase that KKK is not a big deal is yours and the OP. You own it. – user33768 Sep 29 '20 at 18:22
  • What differences are there between this question and politics.meta.stackexchange.com/questions/3596/… , apart from the problem user possibly being different? – Andrew Grimm Oct 2 '20 at 12:09
  • I didn't know of it. The difference? Not sure, aside from this post being explictly made to follow on why, after 3 flags on my end, this guy was still at "only" 1 week suspension. This post earned him the phase 2 month. To be honest, I don't blame anyone, least of all the moderators - they're probably swamped with our minor squabbles (I admit to my occasional snarky comments). I just wanted him out or to understand what mechanisms exist. Interestingly the main answer on your referenced question does not follow the same time progression in terms of offense #/suspension time. – Italian Philosophers 4 Monica Oct 2 '20 at 15:29
8

I hope you can understand that we have a privacy policy to follow, which means that we can not discuss individual cases in public.

But you should be aware that we moderators have to follow certain guidelines imposed by Stack Exchange which do not allow us to hand out long-term suspensions on the first infraction.

The moderation philosophy of Stack Exchange regarding the punishment of problematic users prioritizes rehabilitation over retribution, deterrence and incapacitation. Moderators are encouraged to first try to contact problematic users and turn them into constructive contributors by educating them about the expected behavior on the Stack Exchange network. We are only supposed to bring down the full force of the banhammer and hand out long-term suspensions to users who repeatedly show that they are unwilling or unable to change their behavior regardless of being told that it is inappropriate.

9
  • 1
    To elaborate: a user's first suspension will always be 7 days, the second will always be 30 days, and the third will always be 365 days. If the user continues to be disruptive after that, then an even longer suspension may be issued, but I believe that's only in exceptional circumstances. – F1Krazy Sep 27 '20 at 13:01
  • Yes, I'm good. There has been at least one other meta complaint about this person already, just wanted to make he'll be closely watched from now on. I see he's already taking a month vacation and I am now aware it'll be a year the next time around which sounds quite adequate. – Italian Philosophers 4 Monica Sep 27 '20 at 17:58
  • 5
    That's the suggested pattern @F1Krazy, but moderators are free to choose different suspension times as we see fit. Also, suspensions longer than a year are only available to SE staff - and usually only applied when an account has been disruptive across multiple sites. – yannis♦ Sep 28 '20 at 11:21
  • 2
    re "which do not allow us to hand out long-term suspensions on the first infraction": I don't think that's necessarily true. From your link: "Depending on the severity of the problem behavior — and at the complete discretion of the moderator — your account will be placed in timed suspension for anywhere from 1 to 365 days". This also aligns with the COC: "For repetitive misconduct or behavior containing harassment, bigotry, or abuse, moderators will impose a temporary suspension". – tim Sep 29 '20 at 12:54
  • The way I read this is that a suspension should be issued for a first offense if it's concerning bigotry (at the discretion of moderators, ofc). I also wouldn't see it as punishment/retribution, but protecting the community from bigotry (which can result in people feeling unwelcome here). – tim Sep 29 '20 at 12:55
  • @tim I was not saying that we can not suspend at all on a first infraction, just that we are discouraged from handing out long term suspensions to first offenders. It does not work anyway, because a relatively new user will rather create a new account than wait for weeks or even months until their suspension is over. And then we get one of those incredibly annoying serial suspension-evaders who keep creating new accounts whenever they get suspended. – Philipp♦ Sep 29 '20 at 12:56
  • @Philipp But I think even that is not true regarding harassment & bigotry (see COC quote). I think your answer is more fitting for small infractions like unfriendly comments or a high amount of low-quality answers. When we get to rants about supposedly low-IQ ethnicities, I don't see the benefit of the slow approach (I'm not saying that it should be an immediate year-long suspension / account deletion, but I also don't think it's necessary to subject the community to 3 more bigoted posts via warning -> 7 day susp. -> 30 day -> finally 365 days). – tim Sep 29 '20 at 13:18
  • And whether they create a new account after the slow warning/suspension process or right away after a long suspension doesn't seem to matter much. At least then there's a chance to identify the account as a sock and destroy it immediately. – tim Sep 29 '20 at 13:19
  • Being overtly racist more than once sounds pretty unwilling or unable to me. But hey, what do I know? – Ian Kemp Oct 7 '20 at 21:27

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .