This topic is locked
This thread is meant to clarify and explain information about bans.
Three Major Reasons We Ban
1) Intentionally harmful behavior - immediate ban with no warning. Rarely, we have someone who just wants to cause trouble out of hate, spite, or malice. 
These are things that cannot reasonably be done by accident - they are done on purpose to cause harm to others. One example we had a while back was a disgruntled member who spammed the forum with profanity - things like "YOU ARE ALL [CURSE] AND YOU CAN [CURSE] AND I HOPE YOU [CURSE]." The person who did this knew that it was inappropriate, and did it solely to cause trouble. 
This would also include things like posting pornography, violent or gory content, illegal content, harassment, doxing, racism, sexism, threats, etc.
2) Being disrespectful towards and arguing with forum staff - immediate ban with no warning. Not because we take it personally, but because it's a red flag that a member is not going to stop the behavior. Plus, if they won’t respect the forum staff, they can’t be trusted to respect members either. 
Think about it this way. If a police officer pulls you over for speeding and you start cursing at and insulting them...do you really they're going to stand there and calmly explain to you what you did wrong? No. If a teachers asks you to be quiet in class and you respond by screaming and arguing with them, are they going to give you another gentle reminder? No.
3) Repeated rule-breaking - ban after verbal reminders and warnings. This is much, much more common and probably accounts for 99% of bans. This is when a member continuously ignores rules and moderator instructions.
Except for the really bad things discussed above, we do not just ban people out of nowhere. They are usually given multiple chances and are explicitly told the consequences if they continue the behavior at each and every step. It's not "Surprise, now you're banned the first time you ever broke a given rule!"
Other Information about Bans
It's worth mentioning that we do not like banning people. It is not fun or an easy thing to do. 
Just because someone was banned doesn't mean they are a terrible person - to be completely honest, we sometimes feel bad for banning people. It's troubling when other members are upset or angry that their friend was banned. 
And it's certainly no fun when we end up getting harassed on other social media by the person who was banned. 
Oftentimes, banning someone is a bigger hassle than allowing them to stay on the forum and break rules. But we have to ban despite this, because it's not fair to members who do follow the rules to allow someone who ignores them to stay on the forum!
What We Ask
After a ban, we ask two main things of members:
1) Have some trust in us. We realize this is a tough thing to ask for, but nonetheless we ask for it. Have faith that we do not ban without very, very good reason. 
2) Please do not post threads or statuses asking about banned members. We understand the curiosity. We do. However, there is simply no fair way for us to approach questions about specific members. Is it fair for us to talk about what someone did publicly when they are not able to defend themselves or participate in the discussion? 
Threads or statuses like these will be locked and/or deleted.
In Summary
We DO NOT ban people for simple, one-time mistakes, misunderstandings or confusion.
We DO NOT ban people for accidentally breaking a rule.
We DO NOT ban people just for fun or to go on a power trip.
We DO make every effort to explain the rules and give chances to fix it.
We DO have private conversations with them trying to fix the problem.
We will ban people who seek to cause harm to the community or its members.
We will ban people who disrespect forum rules, staff, and members.
We will ban people who continue to do things that we explicitly and repeatedly asked them not to do.
Questions?
If you have any questions, you are encouraged to contact HH Moderator privately here.
If we receive important questions that we feel many would benefit from, we will post them as an addition to this thread (anonymously - usernames will not be shared!). Keep in mind that we will not answer questions about specific members or those of a sensitive nature.
Edited by HH Moderator, 07 March 2017 - 05:04 AM.
