Forum:AR:Should we or should we not unban Obi maul12?

So I spoke with Christian (NKSCF) earlier this evening, and he informed me that our dear old friend Obi maul12 would like to be unbanned. Joe (Obi maul) sent me an e-mail formally requesting this shortly thereafter.

Before going any further, I’ll just remind you guys what he was banned for: disruption, sockpuppetry, personal attacks, and impersonation in the form of vandal accounts. Essentially, he impersonated our other dear friend Babylon/Assaulthead/etc./etc./etc. by making vandal accounts slandering yours truly. He made 8 of them in the span of about 2 hours or so. I knew it was him pretty much from the time he made the first account. It just took a little bit of deception on my part and JM76’s part to get a confession out of him. He was then promptly banned.

Here is a list of all of the accounts he made that night, which was September 6, 2009:

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 * FUCK BRANDONS COCK
 * BRANDONS A VAGINA LICKER
 * BRANDON SUCKS DICKS
 * BRANDON DICK LICKER
 * BRANDONS MOMMY
 * BRANDONS COCK
 * BRANDONS A DICKHEAD
 * BRANON DICKHEAD

In case you wanted to look at the block log, then you won’t be able to unless you’re, well, me, lol. I have the ability to hide edits on this wiki in order to get rid of that obscene stuff, so it won’t show up in the block log. I just clicked “show” for myself and got those names. I also just want to point out that my blocking him had nothing to do with him coming after me. After getting death threats and seeing stuff like that from Babylon/Assaulthead for months on end, you pretty much become numb to that sort of thing.

Anywho, now that I’ve given you the basic facts, I’ll start with what he wants to say. Here is the e-mail that I received from him:


 * Hello, Brandon. I’m going to get straight to the point - I’m sending you this email because I would like my account, 'Obi maul12', on Star Wars Fanon to be unblocked. I’ve prepared a defense below.


 * First off, my creation of vandalous accounts was very stupid, and I know it – vandalism is a very serious issue on wikis, and I’m not sure why I did so. You’d have my word that no such thing would happen again should my account be unbanned.


 * Second, my sole interest for returning to the site is to write articles. I have no interest in regaining my seer position or gaining any other positions.


 * Third, from talking to Christian Ashley, most of the prominent creators of Star Wars Fanon have done stupid things in their past (Vandal Wars, etc.), have learned from their mistakes, and are respected members of the community today (JM76, Christian, Gnosis, etc.)


 * Fourth, Hunter Manuel made personal attacks on Star Wars Fanon as well as the roleplaying site, and was permanently banned. He then came back to SWF under a sockpuppet, and when he revealed his true identity, he was given only a two-week ban. I have not tried to deceive you like this – I haven’t made any sockpuppets since my ban.


 * Lastly, Christian has given me his ‘seal of approval’ – he thinks I should be unbanned, and said that he’ll be sending a message your way confirming this. Vic Dorantes also thinks I should be unbanned; I can get confirmation from him if necessary, and/or you can talk to him yourself.


 * So, to restate, I’d like to be unbanned from Star Wars Fanon. If you’d like, you could say that if I break one rule when I return, you could ban me again – I wouldn’t do so anyway.


 * Sincerely,


 * Joe

Now that he’s gotten his piece in, allow me to retort. Let me say that normally I would assume good faith, but I can’t help but throw that out the window here.

For his second point, I’m not sure I can believe that. Article writing was pretty much the LEAST of his activities on this wiki. Most of the time it seemed like he’d rather sit around and take pot shots at other people and just come around with snide remarks instead of actually being a constructive community member. Yes, he was a Seer, and he did a fairly decent job at that, but I don’t know if that was actually to do a job or to have a job. After all, he’s the only person who’s ever nominated himself to be a Seer here, but that could be a non-issue.

As for his third point about people like Christian with the Vandal Wars and all that, it is a fair point. However, here’s another point: the equality policy. Because there’s no ex post facto enforcement of that, people like Christian, JM76, and others are exempt by default from it for whatever happened before it was adopted. Joe, on the other hand, acted the same way as Babylon/Assaulthead (minus the death threats), who has been infinitely blocked numerous times. Equality and precedent say that Joe’s block is fair and should remain. Retaining Vacatour’s block also establishes a precedent of keeping users blocked.

For his fourth point, Hunter (Xwing327) was banned infinitely for personal attacks, yes. That said, let’s get some context there. I believe he made one personal attack against Jasca Ducato and was then infinitely banned for it. It was a giant knee jerk reaction. This is far more serious than Hunter calling someone an asshole and then making a sockpuppet or two. Let me also just point out that regardless of the results of that (Hunter being allowed to stay under his Xwing account), I did not support the decision to unban him. Perhaps I’m remembering the events wrong, but I wasn’t involved in most of it. Someone else can clarify if need be.

This may be crossing into NPA territory, but it’s important to get my view across as clearly as possible. I think he’s a little punk and has been for awhile. He’s a young teenager, and this idea that he’s matured enough for me to believe he’s legitimately sorry is a stretch.

He says he’s not sure why he did what he did, so let me offer a theory: he thinks he’s funny. I wouldn’t be the only one who’s accused him of trolling on SWF and #swfanon before. I'm not inclined to believe he's sorry. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if he tried to get back his Seer position not long after supposedly making amends. He always did seem to be looking for recognition, as evidenced by his passive aggressive whining that he was never nominated for UOTM.

I know what I just said was rather strong, and since Joe is reading this I’ll just say that I’m sorry if it’s insulted you, but I’m only telling the truth as I see it. Perhaps I’m wrong, perhaps I’m not. I’m not going to hold back on what I see, though.

So what are my preferences? Well, I have two. My first and strongest preference is to just leave him blocked. He messed up big time, and we do have an equality policy. Yes, we can take things on a case by case basis, but I’d rather just leave him blocked. I have no good faith left for him at this point.

My second preference, assuming we don’t go with the first, is to impose major restrictions on his return. First, and the most obvious, one screw up and he’s gone. The next would be holding him to his word that he just wants to be an article writer. If that’s all he wants, then this is what we’ll tell him: no voting for two (2) years on UOTM, QOTW, FANs, GANs, administrative/Seer/bureaucrat/etc. elections. No voting on anything, period for two (2) years. That also prevents him, by default, from being elected to any position, because all of those positions require you to meet the voting policy. He can nominate things and people, as well as review FANs and GANs, but no actual voting. I’d be open to considering any other conditions the rest of you think of.

So that’s that. I prefer keeping him blocked, but I’m open to the second one. The voting in this AR forum will be reserved exclusively to administrators, but first I’d like to have a discussion to see what other administrators think. Non-administrators are free to chime in as well. - Brandon Rhea  (talk) 06:49, February 13, 2010 (UTC)

Discussion
Oh, let me also just add that Joe's point about Hunter/Xwing's actions on TheStarWarsRP.Com are totally irrelevant to this discussion. We're dealing with SWF issues, not SWRP issues. - Brandon Rhea  (talk) 06:50, February 13, 2010 (UTC)

Man, what an interesting ordeal this has been. Since I'm the one who's trying to convince everyone to let Joe come back, I'll go ahead and say my piece. (Probably not so eloquently, since it's two in the morning here, but if Brandon can do it, so can I.)

Yes, he made a stupid mistake. In our talks on Facebook he admitted to this time and again, saying that he made one of the dumbest moves in the history of the site for, and I quote, "the LULZ." At the same time he was also disobeying the age limit set by Wikia in order to protect its members from potentially horrifying consequences. Let me get this straight before I go on: Vandalism is not acceptable. Vandalism is petty and wrong, as are personal attacks, of which I participated in once due to my own idiocy. Youth makes people do stupid, youthful things. I agree with Brandon on the exemption for some of us here from the equality policy, but I also think that we made mistakes back then that helped us grow as people foremost and as editors of wiki sites. I wasn't exactly the most mature guy when I started writing here, but you know what, after I made all those dumb mistakes and then some I did something else: I learned from them. Personal attacks = no-no. Vandal Wars page = glorification of the person and the vandal involved. I was young. I made mistakes. I learned from them. It's possible that Joe can as well.

Normally I wouldn't care about this issue, but I've been semi-studying Joe over the past couple of months, mostly based on his Facebook statuses and from conversations we've had on chat. Now, yes, I'm pretty sure every judge or attorney in the room laughed when I used Facebook statuses as a tool for character witness, but I promise it means something to this as a whole. It is quite difficult for us to truly know people on the Internet, more often than not because it is normally very hard to see what emotion the person opposite you is trying to convey in their words, since you can't hear them and get a sense of what they're trying to say. In all my talks with Joe, he has been sincere, apologetic, and generally respectable to me. Apparently Victor has also had a similar revelation about him as well, but I cannot back this up with anything he has said, so he is fit to set the record straight should he come by here.

Joe says that he wants to be here and write articles, which I see nothing wrong with at the moment. However, should the chance be given to him and he abuses this privilege, then I say "Ban, ban, ban him forever." My family notes me as the eternal pessimistic-optimist&mdash;otherwise known as a walking paradox in human form&mdash;which basically means I see both sides of most every argument I get into. Joe made personal attacks against Brandon and that was uncalled for, therefore he was banned, however, Joe realizes his mistakes and wants to move on by starting anew. I'm all for second chances, since that's basically what my beliefs boil down to, but I am not for taking advantage of people's emotions. I say this firmly right now: If he goes back on his word and does anything (vandalism, personal attacks, etc.) disrespectful to us all, then I give every single one of you the right to say, "I told you so, Christian." Mostly because I'd freaking deserve it for my naivete.

Give the man a chance is basically what I'm trying to say here. He made mistakes, he wants to make up for them, and he needs us to decide whether this is feasible. I agree with Brandon's restrictions, especially since they help to limit the amount of work Joe can do to be exactly what he claims he wants to do. The lack of voting prevents him from being a Seer&mdash;a job that he doesn't need to get near should he be reinstated as a user&mdash;and this also helps limit his choices. If he's really willing to do what he says, then he'll do it. If not, then I made a mistake, and I apologize in advance for it. So there are my two cents in the matter. It's time for some good sleeping tonight. Jesus Freak NK says NK's 'mazin' articles 07:16, February 13, 2010 (UTC)


 * I'll have a longer response tomorrow, but I just want to point out that Joe wasn't violating COPPA or the privacy policy at the time. That was a year and a half ago when that stopped being an issue. - Brandon Rhea Alliance Starbird.svg (talk) 07:38, February 13, 2010 (UTC)


 * The way I see it, people don't change. Unless you get visited by three spirits, I seriously doubt a person's personality, actions, and/or opinions will ever change. Keep him blocked. ---Ping(JediCommando) 15:07, February 13, 2010 (UTC)

This is in response to the Equality policy paragraph: I don't think that Forum:AR:Administrator discussion - Darth Vacatour establishes any sort of precedent. User:Obi maul12 did some pretty stupid things here, but Obi maul12's vandalism is incomparable to Darth Vacatour's long history of vandalism. In fact, I doubt that any vandal or troll here could match Vacatour's obsession with causing trouble here. Darth Vacatour even has an Encyclopedia Dramatica article (the article is called "Ultraviolet News Network"). C3PO also wrote an essay on Vacatour since he knew Vacatour was a major threat to this wiki. Vacatour also abused our trust by creating a sockpuppet. Joe's activity isn't as bad as Vacatour's vandalism, so I don't believe that their vandalism should be treated as if they have equal weight. Saying that Joe and Vacatour should have the same punishment is like saying that Misdemeanors should be treated the same as Felonies. Vandalism should be treated by their grade or caliber. --Michaeldsuarez (Talk) (Deeds) 15:18, February 13, 2010 (UTC)


 * Vandalism is vandalism is vandalism. Whether one was really really bad and the other was just kind of bad doesn't make a difference. Both carry an infinite block if they're "some sort of explicity [sic] or vulgar item, such as cuss words meant to degrade page they defaced, uploading porn, etc." They are treated as equal under the blocking policy as well as the equality policy. The Vacatour discussion establishes a precedent that we should keep users like this blocked, even though we can, of course, look at things case by case. The extent of what they did is irrelevant if we're actually going to take the equality policy seriously. - Brandon Rhea Alliance Starbird.svg (talk) 17:20, February 13, 2010 (UTC)