1 reply to this topic

[caliban]

You have violated our by-laws, most likely Bylaw A (the User Agreement)

Some of the not absolutely obvious reasons (spam) to get banned:

• blatant or surreptitious advertising without authorisation (Art.1 S.08c)
• registering and using multiple accounts (Art.1 S.2b)
• repeated low-quality posts in contravention of the posting guidelines (Art.2)
• using the face of another person as your avatar picture or otherwise misrepresenting yourself - you can be annonymous but you cannot claim to be someone else (Art.1 S.6d)
• your 'thank you' score is very low and this is not the result of unpopular but cogent arguments but apparently due to aggressive and pointless interactions (Art.2 S.1)

What should you do if you have been banned?

Firstly, you should calm down.

If your ban is time-limited: Just sit it out. If you are still interested after the allotted 'time out' you are very welcome back. But please do not create a new account to circumvent the ban - you will be permanently banned.

If your ban is permanent: Please move on. There are other websites to visit.

If your ban is unjustified. Moderators make mistakes. Ask yourself if you really want to contribute at LongeCity (not just the pointless justification of being 'right'). If yes, then explain your case calmly to the moderator. If that doesn't work you can email info@longecity.org. If you are a Member your complaint will always be investigated, if you are a registered user we may or may not have the capacity to investigate -- if we don't it's nothing personal, but LongeCity has many other things it also needs to focus on.

[caliban]

Users will be familiar with the ‘report’ feature where a post gets flagged up to a moderator, and the 'downvote' function in a post. And then there is the option of responding directly in a thread.

This week we had a case where a long-time user with a good ThankYou score ‘achieved’ a sad record for attracting both negative votes and reports in the shortest amount of time ever seen at LongeCity by suggesting that another user who perceived that he was suffering from neural damage due to substance abuse in his youth, should commit suicide.

The ‘offender’ was subsequently banned at the discretion of a moderator but, to me, the merits or otherwise of the ban itself was rather a side issue to the observation that, by that time, the community had already spoken -- and described, (entirely without the intervention of any ‘authorities’) the rules of acceptable conduct on LongeCity and our shared philosophy to uphold life over death!


(I wanted to share this as a further dimension to the mechanisms in the first post, not to start an unproductive discussion about this particular case - all 'FAQ' threads in this forum section are locked for that reason, but Members can always discuss specific cases in the Institute section.)